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Losses of blocked tasks prevent many vulnerable Venezuelan refugees and migrants from having a roof over their heads.
But then the coronavirus pandemic arrived here, which first entrusted him with his homework and then his house, forcing Dulce María, her sister and their five children to go out on the streets.
“We believe that our young people here can have a better life, but the pandemic has made everything so difficult,” said the 29-year-old domestic worker, who fled mistrust and persecution, as well as food shortages and galloping inflation. in your local country Venezuela.
“It’s as complicated here as it is here. We ourselves are in the same situation,” added the mother of 3 children, the eldest of two, four and six.
Situations like yours are not extraordinarily unusual in Latin America, which remains one of the most sensitive coronavirus hot spots in the world.
Months-long home-stay measures aimed at reducing the spread of coronavirus have had a very strong effect on Venezuela’s more than 4 million refugees and migrants such as Dulce Maria who have sought protection throughout the region and who, for most, manage to escape a meaqual life in the informal economy.
“We slept on the park bench or, if we were lucky,” he said.
Now at a disadvantage compared to anyone to make money, countless Venezuelan refugees and migrants are suffering to have a roof over their heads.
After strict home maintenance measures came into effect in Riohacha at the end of March, Dulce María lost her homework and the circle of relatives was temporarily found without being able to pay her the monthly rent of US$75. After losing two months of delay, they were deported.
With nowhere to go, the circle of relatives found itself in a position they had never imagined: on the street.
“We slept on the floor or, if we were lucky, on a park bench,” recalls Dulce María, a local in the northern Venezuelan shopping center in Valencia. “There were days when my children didn’t eat, and others when we couldn’t swim. “
The harsh situations wreaked havoc on his children, especially the two-year-old, whose asthma broke out and took him to the hospital.
There, Dulce Maria was assisted by UNHCR, the United Nations Refugee Agency, which first housed the family circle in a hotel for a month and then provided emergency rental assistance that allowed them to temporarily move into an apartment.
Across Latin America, UNHCR has responded to the most demanding situations through the pandemic by providing refugees and the most vulnerable migrants with transitional housing and rental vouchers, as well as legal assistance to combat deportation orders.
“They said to me, “We’re sorry you have to go. “
Governments in the region have implemented transitional bans on forced evictions amid the pandemic, but some of these regulations have already expired or are expected in the coming weeks, raising considerations about an increase in evictions.
Where such measures remain in the books, they are not enforced, and many landlords simply reject tenants with back rents on the street, where protection from coronavirus is even more difficult.
The challenge is for the whole region. Eduardo García, an administrative assistant of 31 years also from the Venezuelan town of Valencia, made a living as a street vendor in the Ecuadorian capital, Quito.
But after losing 4 months in his hiring the closure, he was evicted from his apartment despite a freeze of forced evictions in the country that remains in force until mid-November.
“They said to me, “We want the money too, so either you have a way to pay or we’re sorry but you have to go,” he recalls, adding that he understood that his owners were also in a delicate situation. I put myself in their place, because they also have the money. “
Eduardo, who is HIV-positive, was monitored to stay off the street after locating a position in a UNHCR-supported transitional shelter and then won rental assistance from HIAS, a UNHCR spouse organization. But for him, like many other Venezuelan refugees and migrants in situations, the specter of homelessness still weighs heavily.
The housing assistance that Dulce María earned after the two weeks she and her circle of relatives spent on the street is exhausted, and now they live again worried about homelessness.
“Now we’re almost on the same stage again,” he said. With the disease, things get very complicated here. “
The call was for coverage reasons.
© UNHCR 2001-2020
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