On June 12, the European Pact on Migration and Asylum comes into force, the latest attempt by the European Union (EU) to harmonize the management of the flows of migrants and refugees arriving on its territory. Although its implementation will not be easy, given the enormous disparity in criteria of each Member State, there is an undeniable reality: the rightward movement of Europe leads us to a continent that is increasingly restrictive in terms of rights. In the medium and long term, the pact will have an impact on human mobility and young Africans seeking opportunities on our soil, who will be among the most affected.
In addition to the system of distribution of asylum seekers within the European territory – one of the weak points of its implementation, given the reluctance of many countries – the three pillars on which the new regulations are based are the heavy hand at the border, which includes more exhaustive controls, detention centers where people’s rights are suspended and accelerated returns; the frontal fight against irregular routes of emigration and, finally, the externalization of the border, with a European Border and Coast Guard Agency (Frontex) strengthened in the countries of origin and even expulsions of migrants to third countries with which agreements are reached.
In other words, the neo-fascist policies that until just five or six years ago scandalized us with measures such as the attempted expulsion of refugees from the United Kingdom to that “safe country” called Rwanda (see MN 703, pp. 30-35) or the strict closure of the fences in the cold winter of Idomeni – which had as ideological references Giorgia Meloni in Italy, Le Pen in France or Vox in Spain–, now acquire the status of law in Europe. The extraordinary regularization of half a million migrants, the objective of the Government of Spain for these three months, is thus drawn as the last ray of light of a disoriented center-left that knows that a long and dark night is coming.
And Africa? The collapse of the world order and the resort to threats and brute force as the new axis of international relations predicts difficult times. The emergence of liberticidal regimes in a divided continent whose resources, increasingly precious, the great powers are trying to share, as if it were a jug from the times of the Berlin Conference, the economic shocks of conflicts near and far, the enormous burden of debt, the obvious demographic reality and the inability to articulate a common response suggest that migratory pressure will not decline. These days siren songs are being heard due to the decrease in arrivals on the Atlantic route. They learned nothing about the solidity, complexity and resilience of this phenomenon.
Faced with a scenario marked by tensions, the violation of rights, interference and institutional mistreatment of migrants, there is only one response: in the face of the parliamentary arithmetic of hatred, the street semantics of hospitality. Faced with social networks dominated by the monotonous and simplistic story of invasion, replacement and fear, against those who want to replicate the Trumpist spirit of ICE in the heart of old Europe, the answer is truthful information, analysis, slow reflection and, above all, the exercise of hospitality converted into the trench of an exercise of resistance that is becoming increasingly necessary.
