Polyparty-ism - Search for Common Ground

"ROMA TENTING"
Thirty-year-old Dushko was a
patient at the psychiatric clinic at
Bardovci and now, when he has to
return to normal life, he has nowhere
to go because his family won't accept
him. And while he counts the last
days he can spend in the hospital, he
probably knows that he has no alternative
but to join the ranks of people
with no address.
While Dushko wants to return
home but is unable to, several Roma
families, who are said
to have decent houses
in Prilep, are caravaning
across the country.
In summer, but
also in winter, they
are accustomed to
sleeping "in nature"
or seeking handouts
from passers-by.
These life stories
are just some of the
many stories fate has
written on the streets
of the capital. It is
hard to establish the
accurate number of
people who live under the blue sky
from someone's charity. Social workers
note that homeless people are not
just the ones we see sleeping on the
streets, parks and bus stations. Many
of them live far away from public
sight. These people present a particularly
difficult problem, precisely
because it is so hard to find them in
the city and the suburbs. These examples
illustrate that, despite the common
presumption, poverty is the
main but not the only reason for people
to become homeless. In spite of
many initiatives, the capital is without
a single care center for the homeless,
although these people need help
to be brought back into the society
that left them on its margins.
Science treats homelessness in its
medical, economic and social
aspects. Homelessness is defined as a
consequence of past events, such as
unemployment, exile or domestic
abuse, but also as an incapacity to
provide a home. Although homeless
people are classified in a particular
social group of heterogeneous individuals
with various economic and
social structures, most of them come
from the working class or from poor
families and they have no secondary
education.
However, homelessness is not
always a permanent condition. Apart
from being chronic, it can also be frequent,
episodic or temporary.
Chronic homelessness usually occurs
among people that are unable to provide
either social or financial support.
These homeless people often suffer
from disturbed social relations and
serious illnesses. Episodic homelessness
is a result of short-term crisis
periods or problems, whereas some
families or individuals are becoming
temporarily homeless due to natural
disasters. There are also cases when
women or children become homeless
due to sexual or physical abuse in the
family.
HOMELESS FAMILIES
Last summer, the Social Services
Center of Skopje surveyed 52 homeless
persons from the streets, chosen
by chance. The results of this survey
show that 63 percent of the homeless
in the capital are men and 37 percent
are women, says Ljupcho Cvetkovski
from the Center's department for
analysis and research. Most of them,
52 percent, were in the age group of
30-45 years, slightly more than the
percentage in the 15-30 year age
group. 63 percent were not educated
at all, followed by those with primary
education only. Some 63 percent
were Roma, 28 percent Macedonians
and 9 percent were Albanians. The
marital status of the surveyed people
was various, says Cvetkovski, but
there were many couples, which
points to a special category of "homeless
families." These families are a
serious social problem in the country
and, what makes matters even worse,
their number is rising sharply. As
many as 56 percent of homeless people
lost their home due to financial
reasons and 47 percent of them had
their own home before they were
forced to leave for the streets. Their
financial situation was clearly the
most common cause for their homelessness
since all of them were unemployed.
The other significant causes
were family conflict, illness, and
leaving the orphanage, but also
migration: 28 percent came from
other cities.
According to the survey results,
59 percent of the homeless visit a
doctor, and the same percent suffer
from some illness, says Cvetkovski.
He adds that providing medical care
for homeless people is difficult
because they don't have any documents.
Some 55 percent of the homeless
were hospitalized because of
psychological disorders, which
demonstrates that mental imbalance
is one of the most common causes for
homelessness. On the other hand, 61
percent said that they cared about
their hygiene, but they didn't have
conditions to maintain it. Some 55
percent get permanent social aid and
the others get through in life as they
know best, most usually picking food
from the garbage-bins.
The survey showed that homeless
people can be found literally everywhere
in the city, as the term "homeless"
itself is used for a person without
a permanent address. Cvetkovski,
though, says the most of them are
concentrated in the municipalities
Centar and Kisela Voda. Their traditional
shelters are the bridges on river
Vardar, the river bank, the area under
the railway station and the city park,
where, on the benches, the homeless
spend their nights.
(The author is a journalist in
Nova Makedonija)
109
Life on the margins, February 2003