26.09.2014 Dammarie-les-Lys: informal settlement Rroma being evicted

The Rroma of an informal settlement in Dammarie-les-Lys, on the Île-de-France, will have to leave their dwellings by December 8th. A local court decided it. Around 100 people had settled on a community plot that, among other things, encompasses a dilapidated building. In this unoccupied house and around the building, the immigrants settled down on June 12th. Functioning sanitary facilities were not available. Several of the children are enrolled in local schools. Their future education is now being threatened: “They have the right to three months extension on the site”, adds Myriam Leroux, of the association “Essonnian solidarity for the Roma and Romanian families” (ASEFRR), a member of the collective Romeurope. She is accompanying them since their expulsion from the neighbouring department of Essonne. “They are all rag pickers. They sell at the flea markets of Montreuil on Saturday, Sunday and Monday. Otherwise, they live by begging. The women makes 5 to 10 Euros a day. What to eat from. They are also enrolled in the Restos du Coeur [a French soup kitchen]”, she says. And afterwards, where will they go? “For them it is the system-D [self-help]!” It should be stressed that forced evictions of informal settlements complicate a long-term integration of the Rroma immigrants. Due to the expulsions, the problems and the integration question are simply moved from one location to the next, but not solved. Also, due to the media’s and aid organisations’ focus on informal settlements, one suggests that Rroma are exclusively belonging to the lower class and are poorly educated. According to estimates of the Rroma Foundation, 100,000 to 500,000 Rroma are integrated and live unobtrusively in French society. They are completely hidden from the French public. The recently immigrated Rroma from Eastern Europe constitute only a small portion of all Rroma residents in France (compare Bordier 2014).