Editorial by Natacha Nikolaeva and Pierre Jaccard, Association Nochlezhka, Russia - Switzerland

They have no shelter, no identity. Faceless for the Russian administration, they roam the streets, surviving abandoned by everyone, like transparent shadows.
THEY? Undocumented children. The "biez", an adequate nickname meaning without in Russian and echoing the French sans-papiers. Without parents or family support, the "biezprisorniki", the guardianless:  there are about 5 millions of them in Russia.

“At four, I became an adult”
The story of Dima, a sixteen-year old, sums up well the plight of these outsiders : alcoholic parents, abuse, orphanage, absence of State protection, and the haunting fear, the fear not to survive.

I met him during the daily meal distribution by the St-Petersburg NGO Nochlezhka, one of the few associations to worry about needy persons deprived of an identity. Dima, standing alone in the queue of hungry people of mixed ages, did not speak to anyone, and squatted down on his own to eat his soup. With frightened eyes, he tells us :

“My mother had epilepsy. It was terrible, especially when she was drunk. She used to drink heavily, that terrified me. I was so scared when she had fits. I do not remember anything about my father : what I’ve been told is that he found another woman and left us. In our apartment, there was no furniture, not even a fridge, a TV-set or a bed. We used to sleep on the floor. There were only bottles. And nothing to eat. Aged four, I took to the streets to beg. I eked out a living, feeling a bit like an adult. One day, a policeman arrested me next to a metro station. I ended up in the Pavlovsk orphanage, in the outskirts of St-Petersburg. My mother died when I was eight : I had never seen her again after I got arrested.”

From orphanage to streets
According to a report by the international organization Human Rights Watch, about 15’000 teenagers (aged 18 and sometimes less), get out each year from Russian specialized institutions (orphanages, State schools, children’s centres). In the first year after coming out of a facility, about 3’000 youths (20%) become bomzh (homeless), 5’000 (30%) face prosecution and next to 3’000 (10%) commit suicide.  In St-Petersburg, 10’000 children roam the streets, and about 3’000 of them are allegedly HIV/AIDs infected.

At the collapse of the Soviet regime, the phenomenon of children abandoned by their parents soared to a massive scale. This generation of orphans today faces serious problems. According to Russian Education Department data, about 60% of youth released from orphanages has no lodging.

“A policeman has grabbed my apartment”
For Dima, another ordeal started when he came out of the orphanage. He was informed he had no more official domicile.

“My aunt, also an alcoholic, was attributed the apartment at my mother’s death; she rents out rooms with the help of the building’s landlord, police constable Andropov. He finds her tenants in exchange for very lucrative payment : 90% of the rent! That’s how it works. When I came out of the orphanage, I spoke with Andropov to retrieve the room who belongs to me. Seeing my determined air, he feared to lose the money and threatened to send me to prison. Ever since I’ve been in hiding : otherwise I’m lost.”

The grabbing of real estate by civil servants and corrupt local policemen is commonplace in Russia. Children and adolescents without parental support are the major victims of this State corruption.

Propiska, or the hell for undocumented people
Dima is currently jobless. Without a domicile, he has lost his propiska.

Whatever the reasons for this legal inadequacy : if you lose your apartment, bye bye propiska. And without propiska, impossible to look for a place to live, a job, impossible to travel inside the country, to stand up for your rights as a citizen : shelter, employment, vote, social welfare, Courts.

For Dima, expedients like metal collection (copper, stain, bronze) and window-cleaning at traffic-lights make up a daily survival. Three Euros per day, not high over the starvation limit, and to sleep, he hides in damp basements.

Dima concludes :

“Fortunately, there is the night bus of Nochlezhka. Thanks to them I can swallow hot meals, receive medication when I do not feel well, and get some solace by the volunteers.”

The night bus
Today, Dima and other homeless are worried : the vital food distribution is seriously at stake due to lack of funding. The crisis has struck : its effect have forced numerous partner NGOs of Nochlezhka to downsize their humanitarian contribution.
Nine thousand monthly meals are bound to be cancelled, if the means to carry out the rounds for the South and North outskirts of St-Petersburg are not found.
To avoid such a tragic issue, the Swiss NGO Nochlezka Suisse Solidaire has launched a campaign to raise 25’000 Euros.
An essential aid for the St-Petersburg homeless to accede simply a statute of human being.

Link : Nochlezka Suisse Solidaire
Read : Moscow Parliament Plans to Abolish Office of Ombudsperson for Children (Source : CRIN)

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