A group of foreigners have taken social justice into their own hands in what they call the Wall Free Europe campaign by knocking a hole in the wall in Kosice segregating the Roma housing scheme Lunik IX from another scheme called Zapad, demanding that this should be done officially.
The activists, from the likes of Sweden, Switzerland, Spain, Czech Republic and also Slovakia, carried out their operation during the night using pickaxes and hammers, writes SME daily. Calling it a public service, they also sprayed the wall with the likes of ‘Stop segregation!’, noting how the wall had been built illegally with no building permit.
The local authorities plugged the hole as soon as they could and a police investigation has been launched into the EUR 150 or so damage done to what the police call ‘a private wall’. Even demands from Brussels to have the wall removed fell on deaf ears, as locals and the mayor of the Zapad district on the other side of the wall want to keep it.
The group say walls don’t belong in Europe and any form of segregation should be fought against. The daily notes that there are currently twelve of these ‘Roma’ walls or fences in Slovakia.
I have stumbled upon this site and cannot help but wonder Dave C if you are a Slovakian citizen, meaning were you born and raised in Slovakia ?
Group of foreigners – nice! thank you for showing respect towards your host country, I wonder if they would like me to visit their country and smash things – because “I don’t agree with local policies that have nothing to do with me”
Social justice? – really! who has given them the right to enforce their own beliefs upon others and why exactly are they so “special” that they “know” what social justice is for the region /city/people?
Before you try to clean your neighbour’s garden maybe first check if your own is clean!
Stop Segregation – Ok I had to laugh here. Wake up. We have been segregated since birth through your skin colour, your parent’s income, intelligence, body type etc… just to name a very few & I am trying to keep it non political.
It appalls and saddens me to think that people now feel so ENTITLED. Yes one has “human rights” and one also has obligations. Your right is to express you disagree and your obligation is to follow local processes in expressing your disagreement on the certain agenda.
Anyone thinking “one shoe fits all” I say , I salute you as I wish I could be as blind sighted and ignorant to believe that.LIVE and LET live comes to mind.
mmm! an international quandary.
They could of paid the Roma to build it themselves, problem solved! everything has its price, then who is keeping who out?
Mmmm ………. a Roma build something without permission and they fall over each other to remove it. Lilywhites do the same and not only is it not removed but public money and resources are used to repair it. When my car was vandalised for the third time the local plods informed me that “as the damage was below a certain figure we can not take any further action” yet here we have damage, estimated to be less than a tenth of the damage caused to my car, caused to an illegal structure that should not have been there in the first place, and the local Bill are launching an investigation. Double standards? or blatant discrimination?
I applaud this direct action, arguably a legal application of both Slovak Constitutional and EU Human Rights, to a clear situation where the territorial authorities have failed to take the required action.
Wall Free Europe should petition the EU Parliament directly over the issue of walls in Slovakia and ask them to reconsider the provision of funding to local authorities that clearly condone such structures. I’m sure that with the local elections on the horizon none of these tin-pot councillors will want to be associated in any way with the potential loss or suspension of EU funding.
I’d still like to know why Kosice was given the title of EC of C when this and other walls were already in place.