COVID-19 Crisis Exposes Plight of Migrant Workers in French Hostels

The figures communicated on April 10 by Adoma show that in Seine-Saint-Denis, the hostel structures have recorded 8 deaths, 37 suspected covid-19 cases and 22 cases of contamination. In Montreuil, "there was one death and one person is in intensive care. We hope he will pull through," says Mamadou Doucouré, a resident of the La Noue hostel. This hostel has 350 rooms of 9 square meters. "The administrative part is no longer there; there is no manager on site. Since the beginning of the confinement, they have deserted the premises. In a 13-story building, it’s not human, we’re abandoned."

Aboubacar Diallo, delegate of the residents’ committee of a migrant workers’ hostel in Saint-Ouen, managed by Adef, wrote to BB to inform him of the death of Samba Top, the delegate of the Grands-Pêchers hostel in Montreuil. Aboubacar himself was affected by the coronavirus because he had neither gloves nor a mask, no protection. "I almost died. I spent two weeks in my room. I could barely get up; I was cut off from the world," he recounts.

The living conditions of the chibanis in several hostels are not the most flattering. Yet the chibanis are already more fragile in terms of health. "4.5% of 60-69 year olds born in the Maghreb have dependency problems compared to 1.3% of those born in France," says the Union Professionnelle du Logement Accompagné (UNAFO). They sometimes have the profile of people admitted to nursing homes.

"With the epidemic, we’re going to have chibanis who have lived in 9 square meters all their lives, end up in Rungis. They will be buried like unknown soldiers; it drives me crazy," fumes Salem Fkire, president of the Cap Sud MRE association. He claims to have alerted the Moroccan authorities on this subject.