SU_T_47

[i] Hello [name] .

[r] Hello.

[i] Welcome.

[r] Thank you.

[i] Could you tell us who [name] is?

[r] [name] from Libya, I’m almost 44 years old. Father of a child I have not seen, orphan of a family.

[i] Why did you say that you are the father of a child, who have you not seen?

[r] The problem is in my social situation, since I have no family, which is why I don’t see my daughter. Because my in-laws took advantage of my social situation…

[i] Did they stop you from seeing your daughter?

[r] Yes, they started fighting me. And then the country is in chaos. I have not found anyone in the state or in the people around this family to be able to mediate between us to solve the problem.

[i] To have your right as a father and be able to see your daughter.

[r] Yes.

[i] And how long have you been in Italy?

[r] I left Libya on 03/05/2017. I stayed in the sea for 4 days, I arrived on 07/05/2017 in Italy I do not remember the name.

[i] The Lampedusa?

[r] No, it’s not the Lampedusa.

[i] Did you arrive by sea?

[r] Yes.

[i] So you came illegally?

[r] Yes, risking my life so much for what I lived in my country I had nothing more to lose. So much so that I called my friends in Libya and told them if you find my body on the beach you will find me smiling. Because I tried…

[i] Change.

[r] Change my situation.

[i] At this point was the situation dramatic enough to push you to risk your life?

[[r] More than your imagination.

[i] How was this journey and in what condition did you pass it?

[r] I honestly had no idea before about illegal immigration. but I had a friend who told him that I had reached the limit and I can’t go on. After losing my home my job and everything during the war. I lost my home in 2013 during the war between “Zentan” and “Misurata” and my mogie left me. I stayed for almost 4 years between rentals from place to place. I stayed with friends for a year and a half. But for my age you have to be already well made.

[i] Established.

[r] Yes, established settled you still don’t have to think about making your own life. It’s enough that everything I’ve built up in my life before has been destroyed.

[i] Unfortunately.

[r] Unfortunately.

[i] Is that why you chose to immigrate?

[r] Yes, in the hope of adjusting my situation and I live a second chance at life.

[i] [name] , can we say that you have managed to achieve everything you dreamed of since you decided to immigrate and come to Italy?

[r] I haven’t seen anything.

[i] Why?

[r] I’ve had a bad treatment sincerely. And honestly, I didn’t regret leaving Libya. But after what I experienced here I hoped not to have arrived here and not to have died in the sea.

[i] And how was the treatment here, and what did shut you down to hope you didn’t get here?

[r] Bad. I don’t know how people thought I was a hungry man who risked his life in the sea to come here just to eat and sleep. As soon as I arrived, they took my fingerprints by force. We stayed two days in a closed place closed doors of the walls with barbed wire and soldiers.

[i] As if it were in the prison?

[r] Yes, we stayed there and they took our documents to register on the computer. And then they sent me to the camp of Settimo Torinese 21 hours by bus. I arrived at Settimo camp on 09/05/2017. I stayed two days and the third one I escaped. I didn’t leave the camp and Italy for no reason. But because of the bad treatment. They stole my very personal things that I kept in my tent that they had given me.

[i] And your right.

[r] And when I asked where my stuff was they told me that Marco took it and put it in the office so you don’t lose it. And this person works with the red crocuses like a cleaner. He doesn’t have a direct line to get into my tent in the middle of 100 tents to clean it. But he cleaned everything up and left it at zero.

[i] But before he went in to clean it, did he ask for permission?

[r] Absolutely not, I entered for lunch in less than 15 minutes. When I came back I was shocked I found the tent tightly closed not as I had closed it normal. I returned the found closed well and the tent clean but not found my things. Where are my things nothing, and then I went to ask I was told that they put them aside. In the afternoon when I didn’t pick up my stuff I messed it up because I wanted my stuff where it is? The director came out and told me you have nothing.

[i] Why?

[r] She told me I don’t have any rights here. I swear I was shocked after he told me I have no right here. How do I not have a right here? I’m a refugee, did I tell him where I am? I’m from the red cross and I’m followed by them I’m not on the street. He told me you have the right to one thing you go and do in the police station. In fact I went and I made the complaint of what is happening to me and so far I still have the report there have been 2 years. When I returned they had sent the report to the reception center and one they gave me and me. In the evening some guys came to me who are in the tent next door told me that they want you for your things. I was happy when I ran away. When I arrived, what did I find? I found a manager in the office went out to smoke and I did not understand anything from him but there was the mediator. He was screaming at me in the face and he was very nervous and I was more shocked I wondered why all this. Why this treatment? I just came to ask for my right. What I understood from the mediator is that he is angry with me because I went to make the complaint.

[i] But you said that the director who told you to make the complaint.

[r] I told him that the director who told me I’m a refugee I don’t know where if he finds the police station I can speak Italian. The director told me to go to the police station and sent a mediator with me, I don’t understand why he was yelling at me. He kept screaming and the boy who was there told me better if you go out now. Afterwards he came to me and told me to go away from here because it’s possible that I’ll put you in my head and make you suffer.

[i] Are you having problems with this?

[r] It creates problems for me. I followed the boy’s advice and on the second day I ran away without having had any justice or taken my things.

[i] Nothing?

[r] Nothing, I went to Germany even though it was not my intention to go there. I came underground and couldn’t wait to get to Italy and settle here. But for what I have experienced here and the bad behavior I was shocked and in the end I escaped.

[i] And when you went to Germany how was the situation?

[r] We have a proverb here that says “Run away from the beast and find the heartbreaker” in the sense that it gives bad treatment to the worst.

[i] Unfortunatamnte.

[r] Unfortunately, yes. I stayed a month and a half in a camp during the month of Ramadan (the month of fasting). A whole month they gave me toast and cheese and sometimes soup. For me I can say it’s okay I’m not a hungry I can resist, but just treat me well. I applied to go to the west of Germany but they sent me to the east of Germany. Where there are people who don’t want to, they don’t support immigrants. He felt it was a punishment. When I went there they asked me for identity documents and I gave them my passport and identity card because I trusted them. I trusted them because I gave them to the state.

[i] To whom shall he protect you.

[r] Yes. I stayed a month and a half in Dresden then they sent me to another area. I used to consider Dresden a remote city, but after they sent me to Lopau I started seeing Dresden as Chicago or New York.

[i] Comparing Lopau with Dresden?

[r] Yes, from evil to worst they put me in a city I called “zombie city”. They don’t want us to hate each other, they wrote us posters “Go back to your country, German cuisine does not conform to Islamic cuisine” And they put a picture of a pig and a lamb with the words “go outside” Sometimes I didn’t leave my room for weeks, I gave up going to certain posts because of their bad behavior.

[i] Were you afraid?

[r] Of course.

[i] Was there a threat?

[r] Yes, and there were people who were abused. What could I do? I tried to do what they wanted. Never had problems or broken the law or I took a bus without paying anything I did nothing for 20 months. There were people for 20 months have accumulated 3000 euros of fines I did not. Because of my age and my social situation I was corrected so.

[i] You are in the village and you have respected its rules and laws. This is my duty and also my obligation. I arrived in the country so I have to follow his rules and respect them. With the hope of obtaining not all my rights but a bit of it as a person who has risked his life and who hopes for a second chance of life.

[i] It is the right of each of us.

I spoke to those on the Red Cross and told them that my soul is tired. I have already been destroyed and you have put me in a place with people who don’t want me, thus destroying me more. I can’t go out or make friends even work I can’t do anything.

[i] Did you feel like a prisoner?

[R] I used to call an open prison, the door is open, you can go out but you’ll come back. I was told by the employee of the Red Cross social worker “You are here safely no one will kill you” because I have a police report where they threatened me with death and I was treated very badly. All this because I had asked for the family booklet from the office of “Suq El Jumaa” who had problems with other areas. But what was my fault? Anyway, he always told me that I’m safe but I got tired of this sentence. I told him, please shoot me in the head and I’ll die once better than I die here every day. I resisted too long the first month the second the tenth but 20 are many. I still have a video of this place where I was is a building in the middle of the forest. That was for people who have a death sentence people who have no right to anything. I could see people who got there and immediately took the documents. I say my country is at war I did not come to try to eat pasta and rice and I sleep. I am here because I want another chance to learn a language to meet new people, get married and make a family, in short, live. Obviously I will work and I will pay the taxes and I will pay the rent.

And what did you do to overcome this period and how did you get back to Italy?

[r] When I lost hope after rejecting my application and I filed an appeal and they rejected it. And they closed my asylum file for 6 months without consulting me. By chance I consulted a lawyer before coming here, and he told me that for the last 6 months you have been eating and sleeping here and you are nobody you are like a ghost you don’t even have asylum.

[i] Why?

[r] He said why they had written to me and I didn’t answer. I told him I sent him the appeal, he told me they wanted another written in German. but I didn’t know, I had to pay for the first appeal and my situation doesn’t allow me to. I wrote him a sheet of paper and I still have a copy where I ask that my passport and documents be returned to me. The social workers told me to write a paper and I sign it. where I declare that I want to close my asylum file and I take my documents and go back to Italy. At the beginning I was told it’s okay to help you. and a lady told me we’ll get you a ticket and then you go back to Italy. She came back after a week and told me not if she can, I asked why she said I don’t have the right. How do I not have the right? You want me to kill myself to make you understand that I’m destroyed. In vain, I have not been given my passport, I always asked him so I go back to Italy the country from where I came. The first time I arrived in Italy I made the fingerprints and I happened with the others there then I came to you and it was worse. Now I want to go back to Italy but they didn’t want to give me any passport or ticket. Something that the lawyer and a legal consultant told me that I can go back where I want. I told him I want to go back to Italy, he told me to go back to Italy and ask them for your documents and they will send them to you.

[i] And did they send you the documents after you returned to Italy?

[r] No.

[i] And so far what is your situation?

[r] Destroyed.

[i] Don’t you have the documents?

[r] I don’t have anything. I just gave the lawyer documents proving that they took my documents all the way so she could communicate with them. When I arrived here, I spent 2 weeks sleeping on the street. The police didn’t accept me because they said I arrived alone. But I came alone because if I didn’t, you’d have killed me in Germany. Because I got to a point where I wanted to end it.

[i] Have you lost hope?

[r] I lost everything. Then after 2 weeks they accepted me and took my fingerprints and gave me a piece of paper. What I understood on that sheet is that I have to wait another year, half or two, to have an appointment with the court.

[i] And during this time what will become of you? What could you do?

[r] You mean now?

[i] Yes, in this waiting time.

[r] My mood is on the ground and my morale is down. I don’t even want to live. Before I was talking to Rodrigo the person in charge told him that I started thinking about suicide again. In a month I will be 44 years old and you tell me to wait two years to have an appointment, life is short. I have lost 2 years of my life so far. When I can see my daughter. When I can work and meet a woman and build a family. Or I’ll have to be so alone I eat and sleep alone. I have lost more than 10 kilos. I am not hungry to come here just to eat and sleep.

[i] Do you want to work?

[r] I want to work. I’ve met Arab and Italian women but the first woman they made me is if I have the documents and then if I have a job. These are the first two questions. I got bored, sometimes I stay more than 5 days without leaving the house. I go out and see women, families, husbands and wives happy with their daughters and I only with tears in their eyes. Better to stay home.

I hope [name] that this period is just a cloud and that sooner or later it will pass.

[r] He doesn’t want to pass.

[i] You only have to resist, and you’ll see that what comes next will be better. You have overcome the worst and death. I thank you for this interview and I hope you will achieve everything you dreamed of when you decided to immigrate to this country. Thank you very much.

[r] Please.

[i] I hope that the future will be better and that God will help you.

[r] Let’s hope for good. Thank you.