The Scars of the Erasure_web

Erasure_4a 10.1.11 20:29 Page 7272 THE SCARS OF THE ERASUREin Slovenia, or the child of such a person. If both partners or the entire familywere erased, this condition could not be met. And additionally it could be metonly after an erased partner succeeded in obtaining a personal document. Apersonal document is required even to register a marriage, and for some erasedpersons this was not possible. Some erased persons who met other conditionsmarried their partners in order to fully meet legal requirements.The second requirement, proof of sufficient income for living, proved to beimpossible to meet for those persons who were not formally employed or whosespouses had insufficient income. This brings to light the absurd fact that the systemrequired these people to present proofs available only to those living withinthe legal framework, while not taking into account actual circumstances – i.e.,the fact that these people had no legal basis; only in one case (which is an exceptionthat confirms the rule), was a person considered to meet the income requirementbased on his statement that he worked illegally. Some erasedindividuals attempted to resolve this predicament by stating third persons, forexample other family members or acquaintances, as their sponsors. 20According to the testimonies, two indirect difficulties were present whentrying to gather the required certificates and proofs. Erased persons had to obtaincertain documents (e.g., a birth certificate and a certificate of clean criminalrecord) from the countries whose citizens they supposedly were, but they couldnot travel there because they would not have been allowed to return to Sloveniaowing to their unregulated status. This was another situation in which social networksproved to be of great importance, with their relatives or friends coming totheir assistance and gathering documents on their behalf.The second problem stemmed from the fact that, at least during the early1990s, the processing of applications took a long time, while certain documentshad a short validity period (6 months). Our interviewees reported that they hadto obtain the same document more than once during one and the same procedure,which presented a special problem. They also mentioned that because ofdelays they sometimes received temporary residence permits only a short timebefore these expired, so they had to restart the whole procedure straight awayin order to be able to extend their status. Obtaining a residence permit was thereforenot only a painstaking and time-consuming procedure, and frequently a veryrigid one given all the verifications involved, but it also incurred considerable expense,which frequently exceeded the financial ability of the individual who initiatedthe procedure. Moreover, an application for legal status is a multi-stageprocess, so in some cases it extended over several years, either because somedocument was missing, or the application was rejected and the applicant fileda complaint or similar. These years of prolonged procedures were years of greatuncertainty for them.20 The case was similar for people detained in the Center for Aliens. They were usually released when another person(a family member or someone else) provided a guarantee for such a person, meaning primarily guaranteed accommodationand food.