The organizations Alterego-Fabbrica dei Diritti, A Buon Diritto Onlus, MEDU-Medici per i Diritti Umani, BE Free, and Women’s International league for peace and freedom have produced a report on the living conditions of immigrants in Via di Vannina, Rome, Italy.
The report makes clear that hundreds of people had been residing in a building at Via di Vannina 78 between 2014 and March 2018, when police expelled residents and closed the building.
At the time of its closure, the place had become a ghetto, socially excluded from the rest of Italian society in large part because of the indifference of public institutions.
Overview
The building at Via di Vannina 78 had at times been occupied by more than 200 people. Most of them were non-EU nationals.
Because of the large number of residents and the marginalization they faced, the building had turned into an inner-city shantytown: on the ground floor, residents had built wooden shacks without light, water or toilets. Living conditions were extremely precarious.
Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) intervened on 21 July 2017 to aid people with serious injuries: an individual with an orbital bone fracture and a septal fracture; an individual with contusions on the head and back and wounds on the left arm; another individual with a leg contusion and a broken tibia; and an individual with a contusion on the metatarsophalangeal joint. The most serious case was that of a Gambian man who was injured by a police officer, and as a consequence has permanently lost the vision in his right eye.
1) The Via di Vannina residents
In June 2017, about three hundred people were living in the building, including families with children who later moved to other European countries. Many residents were young adults who, after being hosted by a private family, were obliged to find a new living place and had no alternative but to reside in Via di Vannina.
A majority of the residents were men, and only five women were living in the building. The registered ages ranged from 18 to 30, and most of the residents were from Congo, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Nigeria, Senegal, Sierra Leone and Togo.
2) The conditions
The sanitary conditions of the building had become precarious: infestations of rats, heaps of garbage and lack of a reasonable standard of construction and sanitation, with few wooden cabins, built by residents and used as baths.
3) Causes of isolation
A lack of social integration coupled with poor language skills to adapt to Italian society, and lack of work opportunities, contribute to the social isolation of migrants. As a result, many residents have not been able to successfully fit in.
4) Residence
Another aspect that pushed people to live in the building on Via di Vannina is the non-renewal of residence permits, due to the requirement from Roman immigration police to provide an address of residence.
A residence permit is a fundamental right, as it is instrumental to the exercise of further rights: it is essential to receive social services, to enroll in the National Health System, and for registration at national employment centers.
5) Outputs
The former occupants at Via di Vannina are for the most part non-EU nationals who have been living for some time in Italy, gaining significant work experience and a great willingness to find a professional career that guarantees their full autonomy.
The main causes of poor living conditions and isolation are:
- the inefficiencies of the reception system;
- discordant practices of Rome's police force;
- difficulties in obtaining a residence permit.
Conclusion and Recommendations
Following the unauthorized shutdown of Via di Vannina 78, without the consent of Sala Operativa Sociale (SOS), the public institution in charge of dealing with social emergencies, the building has since reopened, and many charities and NGOs have provided both material and emotional support to residents, while grappling with practical solutions to prevent further isolation.
A Buon Diritto, Alterego – Fabbrica dei diritti and BeFree provided legal support, while Intersos and Medici per i diritti umani (MEDU) supplied social and medical care. Women’s International league for peace and freedom helped residents find better employment opportunities, allowing people to overcome precarious living conditions.
Symbolically, the NGOs endeavored to create support offices on Via di Vannina, to show that solutions could be found through cooperation and understanding at community level.
1) An inefficient reception system
Data on the residents of Via di Vannina 78 has surfaced that many asylum seekers have experienced difficulties in moving autonomously across Italy. Such condition is due to lack of language skills to communicate in Italian, as well as cultural understanding to participate in the Italian work environment.
Recommendation:
Law 46/2017 requires the registration of asylum seekers who have been accepted in the reception centers to the city hall office (civil registration) by the responsible of the hosting structure, who must inform the city hall of any change of residence of their guests. Whilst registration was less important previously, it is now essential to exercise further rights, as shown by the testimonies of migrants in Via di Vannina. Therefore, we stress that all public institutions and authorities ought to abide by this rule, in order to facilitate movements, relocation, cancellation and registration to a new address or municipality.
Providing updates on the residence of asylum seekers helps public institutions such as Police Headquarters, to document the movements of people. This procedure helps migrants to benefit from national social services, increasing asylum seekers’ chances of integration. It also essential to conduct further research on the current flaws of the reception conditions in Italy, and tackle how to create and maintain homogeneity and quality reception conditions.
2) Discordant police practices
According to the report, the main problem is the lack of a residence permit. The residence permit is a right that all citizens legally residing in Italy should have, and except in special cases, providing record of living in Italian territory should suffice to obtain a residence permit.
Additionally, for asylum seekers, the procedure to renew their temporary residency is - in theory - a fast and simple process designed to help them. However, immigration police mismanage the application process for residence permits (asking applicants to submit a document that they cannot obtain without a residence permit), creating obstacles for asylum seekers in finding job opportunities, obtaining a housing contract, and other barriers that make social integration more difficult.
Via di Vannina is an example of how the practices of public institutions can impact the living standards of entire communities. The police should promote equality, legality, and fairness between all residents in the Italian territory, and should also stop any behavior that goes against the rules set forth by the Italian Constitution, particularily with respect to the promotion, inclusion, security, and respect of all persons.
Recommendation:
The immigration office of the Rome police headquarters should abide by the internal regulation of the Ministry of Interior of 18 May 2015 on international protection and residence permits. It should be highlighted that a residence permit is essential, and without a residence permit civil registration is not possible.
A first attempt to create more harmonious reception conditions was made with the internal regulation of the Ministry of Interior of 17 November 2006, whereby asylum seekers received a receipt of residency application, or "cedolino." This system helps asylum seekers begin further integration procedures that would help them standardize their status. This system, if successful, should also encompass renewal of temporary residency and applications for asylum.
3) Difficulties in obtaining residency
For asylum seekers, Article 26 of the Refugee Convention 1951 clearly states, "Each Contracting State shall accord to refugees lawfully in its territory the right to choose their place of residence and to move freely within its territory."
The Italian government specifies, through internal regulation of the Ministry of Interior of 18 May 2015, that civil registration can take place despite not having a permanent living place. Indeed, the right to have a resident permit, and have a clear status trumps the current living conditions of asylum seekers.
In theory, registration offices could help asylum seekers register prior to having indicated a permanent residence. In practice, however, asylum seekers are exposed to homelessness and must seek social assistance in order to start civil registration.
Another flaw of the system is time management. Application procedures and application results are poorly timed: in most cases, asylum seekers’ temporary resident status expires before their application has been processed or even taken into consideration.
The procedure is intricate and dysfunctional: on the one hand, asylum seekers have applied for residents permits and are in a state of limbo, not knowing what might happen next; on the other hand, Rome's immigration police do not give any form of receipt or proof showing that asylum seekers have applied for the renewal of the residence permit.
Most refugees and migrants become homeless and undocumented as a result of the current reception conditions. It is also worth mentioning that presently, the municipalities that release the the civil registrations are overburdened.
Recommendation:
The report suggests that, one year following the implementation of the 31/2017 resolution, it is now necessary to confront policy outcomes and how they affect people. This would establish an inter- and intra-institutional dialogue between NGOs and public institutions, in order to provide practical solutions and touch upon policy proposals that would improve current laws.
