Noi culturi, noi antropologii - Humanitas

The leader of the Muslim community argued that the lack
of a clear legislation regarding asylum in Romania attracted
many „bogus“ refugees (in contrast to genuine refugees)
whose aims were to use Romania as an access ramp toward
Western Europe:
Regarding the legislation in that time, there wasn’t any. There
was no clear legislation of the Romanian state regarding refugees:
they didn’t know who was a refugee and they didn’t have
a serious filter to analyze the ones who are refugees or not.
This uncertain „refugee umbrella“ was for many years a type of
hook for the ones who wanted to spend a time here and then to
leave from Romania towards the West. But among them there
were also people who for real needed all the help they could
get: poor people, children, families. 154
Dr. Ahmed also recounted that the lack of legislation was
supplemented by the lack of basic knowledge of the personnel
in charge with the management of asylum seekers arriving
in Romania in those days. The same situation is also
recounted by the refugees themselves: „The ones dealing
with the asylum procedure did not have basic knowledge
about the countries in the world. They told me that Cameroon
is in South America.“ 155 Besides this, the refugees remember
that not only they faced the lack of legislation and
the authorities’ lack of knowledge regarding their situation,
but they were also periodically and unexpectedly checked
by the police. The refugees have criticized these behaviors
arguing that compared to other refugee receiving countries,
in Romania, the institution dealing with the refugees’ status
and integration is the police, a coercive institution.
Moreover, in the first wave, integration of the recognized
refugees was not at all a priority for the Romanian authorities.
Besides, the legislation was sprinkled with many inconsistencies
which hampered the refugees’ integration in
Romania. In the first wave, no law existed regarding the integration
of recognized refugees in Romania: „No provisions
in any related laws or Decrees state a general obligation on
154. Interview with dr. Ahmed Mazar Nakechbandi, a leader of the
Muslim community in Bucharest, October 2010.
155. P, Refugee from Cameroon, 38 years old
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