[This post was written by Panayote Dimitras of the Greek Helsinki Monitor. I took the photographs at the City Hall action I attended yesterday. I will write my thoughts on the "event" tomorrow.]

There was a crew preparing a documentary on the recycling of metal scrap filming the Votanikos Roma last week. They got notice that a cleaning operation was being prepared for Friday 4 pm in the second Votanikos Roma settlement. Indeed at that very time they called us to say that nine trucks and the related equipment and crew from City Hall had come to “clean” but then went to the Roma trying to trigger a new “voluntary departure” as the one that took place on 2 June in the other settlement. Papers were put in front of the Roma to sign and money was offered, the crew told us. We told them to keep one of the papers which is attached and is a garbage removal order of the municipality of Athens.

Thanks to the presence of the crew, the Roma were convinced to wait while we were called. Also a member of the crew is an acquaintance of Deputy Ombudsman Andreas Takis. She called him and he went there first; he talked to the municipal officers Messrs. Markopoulos and Arapopoulos. Soon after the trucks (after removing only some of the real garbage there) left and never came back. Mr. Takis gave his phone number to them as well as to the Roma and said he was to be called should anything happen. He also told the crew to get some simple paper signed by the Roma requesting his attention; it is reminded that a formal complaint to the Ombudsman meeting all the high threshold requirements that the Ombudsman demands has been filed on behalf of the Roma of both communities in January 2007 on which the Ombudsman did not do anything of substance that would have prevented their eviction or threat thereof. When the member of the crew and myself met Mr. Markopoulos on Monday (see below), he told us that he had called the Ombudsman (actually and very interestingly he referred to him as “this lawyer who was there on Friday” maybe not having understood that he was talking to an Independent Authority and not a lawyer) during the weekend to brief him that they were not going to go back the past weekend but this coming Friday 22 June, but his cell phone was off, Mr. Markopoulos said.

On Monday, GHM organized a mobilization in front of the City Hall asking the Roma families facing eviction to come there and being assured from the PASOK Human Rights section that 4-5 persons would be there and the Coalition City Hall faction (”Open City”) that some 15 persons will be there. GHM also appealed to concerned volunteers. The Roma of Votanikos were asked to come there with families so as to make their presence felt while the City Council would be debating the issue on a motion “before the agenda” from Open City. At the appointed time (12-12:30), only GHM, blogger Devious Diva, the crew person (see above), and the head of another NGO (Social Action Center) working with Muslim Roma of Votanikos, Kolonos, and Kerameikos were there. Roma were reluctant to come and asked for someone to go and get them. GHM and friends had no such means while the others were not forthcoming to help. Upon GHM insistence some 6 families (the ones under threat of imminent eviction from the Viamax property) showed up by 13:30. Then also 2 persons from PASOK and 2 from the Open City came, along with one journalist and one Greek photography student who is doing a university project on these Roma. None of the City Council members even came to greet this groups when they went to the City Hall. In view of this poor turnout, no TV station sent any crew to cover the protest whose only result was in effect to show that one cannot get any substantial support for effective action on behalf of the Roma.

In the City Council meeting, the issue was raised only by Open City. The Mayor angrily dismissed any claims of efforts to evict them and repeated that it was not his responsibility but the central government’s to find a place for them. It appeared that he had not received any call from the Ombudsman on this, or that he had chosen to ignore any call he might have received. Neither the socialists nor the communists addressed the issue. In fact the socialists seemed eager to discuss the issue of garbage and other problems in Athens’ most fashionable street, Voukourestiou, and gave the floor to sic jewellers or real estate businessmen there to complain… In the end, Open City leader Alex Tsipras, replying to the Mayor’s question “what do you suggest” moved for the creation of a committee from all 4 factions to address the urgent issues of temporary settlement of the Roma and pressure the central government for the final resettlement. None of the other factions addressed the motion which was thus rejected through silence. Open City told GHM that they will try to find means to table it in Parliament and also legal support should an eviction (attempt) happen.

In the meantime, that same morning the lawyer of Viamax called me as he was told by the Aegaleo police director I talked to last Thursday that he had almost convinced the Roma that day to go when I showed up and told them to stay until they are given alternative accommodation or legal action be taken against them. After I explained the situation I repeated that the appropriate way to evict them was not police harassment which is illegal and we will file complaints for every such police action but legal action on his behalf which may help trigger some state solution if Roma are arrested. I also asked him to call the mayor since he represents a very large company.

Obviously we expect him to continue pressuring the police to force them out, and/or perhaps seek legal action, and now that the Roma saw that nothing happened yesterday they are disheartened and we cannot offer them nothing concrete. GHM fears these Roma may be evicted any day now while the 100 families remaining in the Votanikos settlement may be “cleaned out” soon.

We repeat: unless an IGO intervention (CoE CHR, ECRI, UN Rapporteurs on Housing or ESCR or Migrants or Racism) is urgently made the largest eviction of Roma in the last decade in Greece will happen and we will all be witnesses and in one way accomplices by our inaction.

On the other hand, should these IGOs finally act they may help trigger a process by which not only the Votanikos Roma but also the Attiki Odos Roma (by the airport) or the Faliro Roma (near Piraeus) may avoid eviction and Greece may be forced to take seriously its obligations: otherwise, it will get away once more with such gross violations and will learn that international commitments and recommendations or letters (like the one from the CoE CHR last November) could be “safely” ignored. INGO statements or letters to Greek authorities are ineffective and a waste of -limited and precious- resources for the INGOs.

Technorati: Roma, Greece, eviction, city hall,