Yahya Aaboud works as a financial expert in a Basque company. Despite having a good salary, he reports that in a real estate agency in Irún, upon seeing his Moroccan surname, they rejected him when he wanted to rent a home. He called the real estate agency, confirmed that the apartment was available and decided to reserve it. However, after sending the documentation by email so that the rental contract could be prepared, the real estate agency informed him that, suddenly, the home was no longer available.
Yahya, disconcerted after receiving the cancellation message from the real estate agency, spoke with a colleague of Spanish origin who made the same call to the real estate agency to inquire about the same apartment. As they both suspected, the apartment was still available and they went to visit it together. When the real estate worker saw Yahya, he confessed that it was the owner of the property who had imposed the requirement that his apartment not be rented to “outsiders.”
All of this was recorded in an audio recorded with the mobile phone, which made it possible for Yahya to file a complaint. “The recording made it possible to obtain evidence that has been essential when filing a complaint. This, on the one hand, exemplifies a way of doing things well in terms of collecting evidence, since the difficulty in obtaining it is usually the biggest obstacle when reporting a discriminatory incident. On the other hand, it also proved and corroborated with an audio an everyday reality that is so often denied and silenced due to lack of evidence: that of the discrimination that foreigners suffer when accessing the rental housing market,” they explain. from Zehar Errefuxatuekin, who have prepared five booklets so that foreigners know how to confront different types of racism.
According to reports from the NGO, Yahya, instead of reporting the real estate company, decided to go to the Housing Department of the Basque Government, specifically to the Territorial Housing Delegation of Gipuzkoa of the Department of Territorial Planning, Housing and Transport of the Basque Government (institutional tool ). “He went to the Basque Government as the ultimate responsible party and guarantor that discriminatory actions do not occur in a public service (understood as such because it is intended for the general public), such as a real estate agency. Yahya asked the Basque Government to sanction the real estate company for having committed discrimination. Instead of executing said sanction, the Basque Government archived the file, citing procedural issues. This has forced Yahya to resort to judicial means (legal tool), as a second tool,” they confirm. At the time of writing, the case is pending a ruling.
“Those of us who share our daily lives with refugees know that the violations of rights they suffered in their countries of origin do not disappear when they arrive here. We welcome, yes, but we also discriminate. We do it in a big way, through legality and practices that institutionalize discrimination. But also from a small point of view, when in everyday life we place ourselves above other people whom we do not fully recognize. When we talk about hosting, we don’t just talk about hosting, about offering a roof over our heads. We mean that we recognize refugees as part of the Basque society that we form, that we know their history, their culture, that we value their experience and knowledge and bring them ours so that together we can share spaces, experiences and foster true intercultural coexistence. ”explains Javier Canivell, director of Zehar Errefuxiatuekin.
Another of the cases in which they have worked at Zehar Errefuxatuekin in relation to racism, in this case workplace racism, is that of Ousmane. He is a 32-year-old young man, originally from Senegal, who, since his arrival in Euskadi, has worked as a mechanic in several workshops. According to what they say, although Ousmane really likes being a mechanic, he is considering working in a different sector, because in the workshops he has worked “he receives insults and from one of them he was fired unfairly.”
The dismissal that Ousmane relates occurred after six months of working in a mechanical workshop in Bilbao where he began working in October 2023 with an indefinite contract, and where the majority of workers are of foreign origin. Six months after starting to work, always in the same workshop, on March 15, he is called to the workshop secretary’s office where he is informed that this is his last day of work and that he can go home since You are not required to remain in the workshop. The young man, surprised and not knowing what has happened, decides to go to the NGO in search of an answer. From there they recommend that you contact a union to work on your case.
“Ousmane’s story is common or illustrative of many of the stories of discrimination that migrants and refugees experience when they access the labor market, without forgetting that in our societies the employment and working conditions enjoyed mark access to human rights. fundamentals such as health protection (recognition of disabilities, work accidents or occupational diseases) through social security systems, education in the field of vocational training, social protection in case of unemployment or when most vulnerable We find ourselves and it determines the purchasing power and social class in which we place ourselves and the rest of the people with whom we live. Therefore, being able to enjoy decent, quality employment is, de facto, a key or gateway to the exercise of basic rights and full citizenship, just like decent housing or registration,” Zehar Errefuxatuekin maintains.
With the aim of providing information and tools to know how to deal with this type of situation, Zehar-Errefuxiatuekin has created five booklets to confront any discriminatory or racist treatment in five different areas of the daily life of refugees and migrants, within the framework of the project “lAGORAtorio: Investigation of good practices and collective construction of proposals around cultural diversity, coexistence and discrimination with refugees” that has had the support of the Basque Government, the Araba Provincial Council, the Bizkaia Provincial Council, the Gipuzkoa Provincial Council and the Donostia City Council.
According to reports, the five booklets have been prepared in the meeting and listening spaces called “lAGORATORIES”, a mixture of the words agora and laboratory, which are “a space for debate in which refugees, migrants and/or racialized people use their voice as political subjects, as opposed to a passive role as subjects of policies or actions designed by third parties.” They use it to diagnose, propose and activate tools and policies favorable to social cohesion and equality.
“Zehar-Errefuxiatuekin works with people who escape their homes and abandon their countries due to the violence and persecution they suffer. Upon arriving in our country, this persecution does not stop, but changes, transforms and materializes into racism and discrimination and becomes their daily reality. It is essential to raise awareness and train citizens to eradicate these situations and build inclusive and equitable societies,” concludes Canivell.
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