https://www.thelocal.dk/20180712/denmar ... -residents
Denmark's so-called ghetto plan, which has received broad coverage in domestic and international media, is unlikely to to have any real effect on social challenges in underprivileged areas, residents, representatives and experts told The Local.
The plan, which was passed in part by parliament last month with further consultations due in the autumn, comprises 22 initiatives to ‘integrate’ the ‘ghettos’. These include including demolition of housing units, double punishment for certain crimes in certain areas, stricter rules regarding social welfare benefits, mandatory day-care for children to learn Danish, easier access for municipalities to residents’ data and financial incentive for municipalities to achieve high levels of integration.
Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen and seven ministers presented the ‘ghetto plan’ in Mjølnerparken, one of the so-called ghettos in Copenhagen, in March this year.
It has since received considerable attention at home and abroad, including in international media such as the New York Times and the Guardian.
The manager of the residents' association in Mjølnerparken said how he did not understand why his four-block neighbourhood was classified as a ghetto.
“People from Mjølnerparken and other people agree that it is not a ghetto,” Muhammed Aslam told The Local.
The Danish Ministry of Transport and Housing classifies 27 underprivileged areas around Denmark as ‘ghettos’, based on criteria including residents’ heritage, levels of education, employment rate and crime rate.
Nathalia Patrick, a Ukrainian immigrant who spoke to The Local's reporter while she was walking with her child in the park in Mjølnerparken, said conditions in the area compared favourably to those in underprivileged neighbourhoods in France and Ukraine, where she has also lived.
“I don’t think it [Mjølnerparken] is ghetto,” she said. “I come here sometimes to play with my child because I think it is a peaceful area.”
The government proposal, meanwhile, states its aim to solve problems in specific areas.
“We need a more precise effort, whereby we do not inconvenience Danes all over Denmark. Action must be taken where the problems are greatest, and there only,” as Rasmussen said in his New Year's speech.
While the government dismisses criticisms that the ghetto plan is specifically targeting people with certain ethnicities or religions, residents of the areas in question have disputed this, primarily because of the criterion that labels an area as a ghetto if more than 50 percent of its residents have non-Western origins.
Aslam recalled the day when the plan was presented in Mjølnerparken, with the high-profile political announcement met by demonstrations calling for “equality of the law”, to which the minister of integration Inger Støjberg, writing on her Facebook page, rhetorically asked “which law”, in reference to Islamic Sharia law.
“[The government] doesn’t say it directly, but indirectly they just want to split Muslims from living together. And now they blame all problems on Muslims,” Aslam told The Local.
A 19-year-old resident of Mjølnerparken, who preferred to remain anonymous, said that she felt the law was tailored against a certain group of people.
“It is very discriminating and makes us feel like outsiders, and promotes a bad image of us in society, it is very stigmatising” she said.
Aslam said his four children, who were born in Mjølnerparken are enrolled in higher education, are still considered to be ‘ghetto’ because they live in a certain neighbourhood.
“What they [the government] are saying is that if you come from Africa or Asia or the Middle East then you cannot be Danish,” Aslam said on what the ghetto plan meant to him, adding “integration comes from both sides, not just one side.”
,inače naši novinari se takmiče u tome ko će ispasti nepismeniji i neobrazovaniji tako da nikakvo čudo nije.
