UNMIK ON AIR

15^th December 2003

ON THE EDGE - ROMA COMMUNITY

(By Zoran Culafic)

Bease Selimi: Our life here is just hopeless, depressing, believe me it's like building castles in the air, and that's not a lie, that is the truth here.

Bease Selimi, a Roma woman from the Plemetina IDP camp near Obilic, some ten kilometers northwest of Pristina. She is one of some 350 Roma Ashkali and Egyptians living in what can only be described as dire conditions. Selimi’s story is unfortunately an oft-repeated one.

Hello and welcome to UNMIK ON AIR

The Plemetina Camp for internally displaced people was established right after the end of the 1999 conflict. But the inhabitants of the camp have received little attention – both from the media and the powers that be.

Although Ashkalys and Egyptians are Muslims, like the majority population in Kosovo, and their mother tongue is Albanian, they nonetheless shared the fate of the Roma community, forced to flee from Kosovo after the end of the conflict, largely due to accusations that they were too attached to the Serbs.

According to Plemetina Camp representative Bayrus Bayrami, Ashkalies and Egyptians are for all practical purposes one and the same.

Bayrus Bayrami: After the war, the Roma retained their identity as Romas; they have their language, their tradition. As for Egyptians, there were a huge number of them before but after the war we had a problem because they ended up as a divided people. You ask why - because of fear, simply because of fear. I know many Egyptians, mostly community leaders, who declare themselves now as Ashkali ...The fact of the matter is that Ashkali and Egyptians are one loaf of bread, made of the same dough, except that the loaf has now been cut into two, one Egyptian, the other Ashkali.

A dozen removable containers, mud all around, rusty pipes, barefoot children playing with parts of abandoned cars – living in Plemetina is better than having to survive in the great outdoors, but only just.

Tiny rooms used simultaneously as kitchen, bedroom and bathroom. Almost 20 people in a single room where everyone struggles for a place to sleep on dusty blankets spread out on the floor. The room smells of dirty laundry and stale food.

Roma woman: Look, just see how many cockroaches there are here, look no hygiene at all. I have to work ten days in order to buy a bar of soap or shampoo.

Miradije Ibeciri is just 18 years old and already the mother of 3 children. Originally from Pristina, Miradije is at her wits end as to how she will feed her family.

Miradije Ibeciri: What kind of life is this? This is not a life. We do not have enough to eat, nor a place to sleep. I cannot produce enough milk to breastfeed my child. I’m just baking potatoes and giving it to the child who is five months old. In the morning I make tea and I feed my child with bread and Russian tea. What else can I do?

It’s not that the inhabitants of Plemetina have been forgotten, for four years now they’ve been receiving aid from different humanitarian organizations, medical treatment, money for paying the bills and basic food. Beaze Selimi, like the others, is very grateful for the help provided so far, but can’t help complaining about the food, often, it is rotten she says or is way past its expiry date.

Beaze Selimi: I was making a soup with pasta, although it was more water than pasta. I wanted to add an egg to make it better, but when I broke it, it appeared that the egg had a small dead chick inside. I was scared that my children could get poisoned if they ate that. I had to throw away half the food. But those who bring us the food probably say, “who cares, it’s for the Gypsies and Ashkalias, they can eat anything”

Amongst organizations providing financial assistance to the people of Plemetina is the Mother Teresa Association, an implementation partner of UNHCR. It has provided temporary low paid jobs for some 15 IDP’s in the camp. The Obiliq municipality is also trying to help, but with few results so far according to their beneficiaries. The fact of the matter is the majority of people are without any source of living whatsoever.

Roma woman: I’m a woman and I’m a father too; I’m everything my kids have. So I’m forced to go out and beg. I just came back from Mitrovica and got this money from begging, some 200 – 300 dinars to buy medicine and food for my kids; But there’s no way to earn enough, even our relatives who work in Italy told me – look, we are not picking bananas freely here to send money to you. Forget it.

ATMOS: Roma boy singing

Father, why do you send me to school, my grades are bad; but this boy doesn’t have to worry about low grades, he simply doesn’t go to school at all, like many other children from Plemetina. The reasons are various but the common ones are poverty, an unstable security situation and a lack of school textbooks. Add to this the attitude of their parents – many consider that it is preferable to push the kids out on the streets to “earn” some desperately, needed money than send them to school.

A logic that can perhaps be understood given the desperation of the parents, but for the children it means that the future will be as bleak as the present. And that’s something everyone needs to take note of.

That does it for this edition of UNMIK ON AIR.
Thanks for listening.