Migrations are an inborn instinct for every person! We move, walk, wander – we migrate! This process has never been something new for the Balkan countries! Generations of our fellow citizens have migrated in the past century, second generation of Macedonians, Albanians, Bosniaks, Turks, Roma and others are being born outside the Balkans! The road to those countries had often been similar to the one of today’s migrants – illegal.
Ask them how they travelled, the route to Slovenia for many is the same as the one for the migrants and refugees. Migrations continue even now, but our fellow countrymen in EU say that it takes time for their requests for asylum to be reviewed, and that they are also rejected, hence we often witness the deportations the EU countries carry out to our fellow citizens. The number of returnees is large, whereas the EU countries are also announcing a quicker procedure for returning them.
Macedonia like always, unprepared for this “phenomenon”, the returnees usually having sold everything, in the hope that they would never return, the children having started school there so now they don’t even speak their own language anymore. And now, here they are back in Macedonia as homeless, in a country unfamiliar to their little children who have just started going to German schools. And not to mention the psychological moment, the depression due to the “unrealized dream” and the “failure”, now I find it hard to write about this part! We have been facing these kind of cases for the past year.
This is just a brief attempt for me to explain to my fellow citizens, who these days are allowing themselves to be manipulated and misled for the thousandth time! Fear has been ruling them for 11 years, so they still cannot feel the freedom. When the EU talks about the refugees’ saga to arrive to the EU, and is putting itself on one side opposite the “wave” of refugees, Macedonia is not on the side of the EU, but rather on the side of the countries that produce refugees. The thousands of refugees with whom they intimidate you, are not refugees from the Middle East or Africa, but are our fellow citizens who in the past 10 years have left Macedonia and sought asylum in Europe.
According to most parameters, Macedonia is already a safe country and there is no reason for us to seek asylum in the EU. Macedonia is not a safe country only for refugees who are fleeing war and terror. We have become a “home” only for around 40 refugees from Syria, Afghanistan, Pakistan and other countries who lost their lives here and their home is now the Macedonian soil. The refugees and migrants who are transiting through our country still face crime, hunger and disinterestedness from the state authorities! The same authorities who have committed to respecting the international agreements are now “swearing” that the same will not apply to the refugees! The refugees know this, and that is why there is no force or law that will make them stay in Macedonia. The refugees are courageous and dignified people, they have the right to choose where their place of shelter will be! Millions who passed through in 2015 did not choose the country that profited off of their suffering, they felt the “welcome” in the dirty trains! Therefore, my fellow citizens, ministers, politicians, blind supporters, you will see the refugees, not beside us in Macedonia, but beside you throughout the European countries!
