Hundreds of illegal Tunisian immigrants to Europe have returned home, many of them putting an end to a sad adventure, writes Mourad Teyeb in Tunis Waves of illegal Tunisian immigrants to Europe left the country after the January uprising that ousted former president Zein Al-Abidine bin Ali, with at least 25,000 Tunisians, mostly teens and young men in their 20s, but also adults, children and girls, landing on the Italian island of Lampedusa and profiting from the chaotic situation in Tunisia to take their chances in Europe. Nearly 10,000 of the immigrants remained in Lampedusa, creating a security and economic crisis for the population of this tiny Italian island. Many more of them, however, continued on their way to other European countries, such as France, Germany and Switzerland. European onlookers wondered why so many young people, many of them university graduates, were leaving a country that had just overthrown a dictatorship and now offered real hope for freedom, equality and dignity. "The future of hundreds of thousands of unemployed young people is in Tunisia, not Europe," cried many Europeans. "The future of investment, equal opportunities, and demand for labour lies in Tunisia, not Europe," said experts from northern Mediterranean countries. However, according to sociologist Mohamed Jouili, "the influx of illegal immigrants to Europe is due to economic reasons rather than political ones." Since the ousting of the Bin Ali regime, there have been incessant protests in Tunisia due to the poor economic situation, and many reporters and human rights activists have talked to the immigrants in Italy. "The immigrants we visited said they were fleeing poverty and continued unrest in the country," Jouili told Al-Ahram Weekly in Tunis. "We found that most of them are young, uneducated and jobless. We also found that they come from Tunisia's most underdeveloped and under-educated regions and social classes." A large part of those who left the country during the first three months of 2011 come from the south-east, centre-west and north-west of Tunisia. Towns like Zarzis, Bin Guerdane, Mareth, Remada, Dhehiba, Moulares, Methlaoui, Thala, Regueb, Jelma and Gardimaou account for 60 to 80 per cent of those who have left, paying sums of 700 to 1500 TND ($500 to 1,200) to leave the country, sometimes under the most dangerous conditions. Shortly after the collapse of the Bin Ali regime, the situation in Tunisia was chaotic, with sit-ins, strikes and demonstrations everywhere. Violence and unrest were common occurrences, and the first transitional government failed to restore stability and confidence. In the absence of a police presence from the end of January to April, the Tunisian army was called in to control the situation in many Tunisian cities, along with on the country's borders with Algeria and Libya, where a civil war started in March. Dollar rates for illegal sea voyages from the Zarzis, Gabes and Mahares ports on the south-eastern coast of Tunisia to Lampedusa were the cheapest in the history of illegal emigration. Guarding the 1,400-kilometre-long Tunisian coasts against such emigration, which also included illegal Libyan and African immigrants, proved impossible. Some even accused the Tunisian authorities of ignoring the waves of illegal emigration during the first weeks after the January 14 Revolution in order to "get rid of" unemployed people. Lawyer Taieb Bessadek saw in these early waves of emigration "signs of mistrust and doubt as to whether the new regime would be able to tackle the problem of unemployment and corruption." For him, "people's trust in the government is still too small to make potential emigrants change their minds." For many Tunisians, the dream of succeeding in Europe is so important to them and their families that nothing can stop them from trying to emigrate, not even a revolution that has ended half a century of oppression, corruption and inequality. The January events could thus do nothing to stop many young people from attempting to achieve their dream of emigrating to Europe, and it may even have encouraged it by facilitating cheaper travel and removing a police or military presence from the coasts. Many emigrants left the country because their peers, family members or neighbours had successfully done so first. It was only when they reached Europe that they became aware of the often tough economic and social problems in Europe and the difficulties that they could face as illegal immigrants. Educated and professionally-qualified immigrants manage in Europe either by joining relatives or friends in Italy, France or Switzerland, or getting residence permits and starting the integration process. However, such immigrants are the minority. The most unlucky are the poorly qualified illegal immigrants, desperate for official recognition but lacking an adequate background to help them integrate into Europe. Sometimes, such immigrants ask for political asylum even if they have had little to do with politics and have never been persecuted. "For some, this has been a kind of alibi to gain European support," explains Bessadek. When they fail to integrate, and many of them do, they further damage Tunisian emigration to Europe, many of them hoping for European recognition and thus the regularisation of their situation and then being disappointed. As a result of the European countries making it clear that they will not allow the southern Mediterranean countries "to export their social problems," the number of illegal emigrants from Tunisia has drastically decreased over the past two months. European arguments over the passport-free Schengen space and the deportation of hundreds of Tunisians who had illegally arrived in Italy and France have shocked the Tunisian population. Many are now beginning to understand that the solutions to unemployment and social unrest will have to be found inside the country, with investment, patience and regional development being the roads to prosperity and stability. The government of Tunisia also understands that only the country's prosperity will prevent its young people from risking their lives to go to Europe. According to many observers, the focus in today's Tunisia should be to bring in greater investment to help to balance the country's budget and to create more jobs. "Tunisia's friends and economic partners should focus on job creation and the restoration of stability and confidence, instead of criticising each other on the complex issue of illegal immigration," says Bessadek. Illegal immigration from Tunisia "is also Europe's problem", he says, and it should be dealt with as such.
