Ensure dignified housing for all, NGOs insist after migrant evictions

NGOs have called on the government to fulfil its "legal and moral responsibility" and ensure access to dignified housing for all, after a raid on an Qormi farm that left some 80 African migrants homeless.Planning Authority enforcement officials on Monday shut down a farm which had housed more than a hundred migrants, many paying around "100 a month, in inhumane conditions. Many of those evicted said they did not have anywhere else to go. In a statement, a group of 21 NGOs described the incident as a "story of exploitation, abuse and dehumanisation" and expressed their shock at the fact that the occupants had been treated with "such contempt and disregard for their dignity".

"It is now a well-established fact that sustaining economic growth in Malta is dependent on diverse forms of migrant labour," the organisations said. "And yet, there appears to be very little acknowledgement of the fact that the migrant labour force forms the backbone of economic growth. Without this acknowledgement, there remains very little space for respect, let alone appreciation and inclusion."The organisations said that more people - Maltese, Europeans and migrants - across the socio-economic spectrum...

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