Hardships of an African Immigrant in Greece

Loretta Makoli is an immigrant who has been living and working in Greece for 31 years. She is a representative of the United African Women organization. She has many stories to tell; stories about the difficulties that the immigrants who live and work in Greece face daily. “I know a mother whose child is in the hospital needing surgery. The mother has to sign for the doctors to proceed. She has no residence permit and thus she is afraid to go and sign,” stated Mrs. Makoli and she continues “being a mother myself, I hurt. I haven’t seen my child for 20 years because I cannot get a resident permit for him.” The Greek Alternate Minister of Interior Leonidas Grigorakos responded immediately to the organization’s call and he promised that the Greek Ministry of Interior will handle all the cases which have been submitted to the Ministry by political parties or organizations. “We are constantly making efforts to obtain residence permits but we always face obstacles. When a child is born here and it is time to go to school, the obstacles for the permit residence are huge even if the child’s parents are legal residents of Greece. Thus, the child is forced to quit school,” mentioned Mrs. Makoli  and she continued “Of course it is good that we left our country which was at war. It is good to be in Greece because we were saved. But do you know what it is to walk on the streets and hear others saying “You ruined Greece. You are criminals?!”

READ THE ORIGINAL POST AT greece.greekreporter.com