Moroccan Family in Italy Still Pays €500 a Month for Evacuated Apartment
For nearly nine months, a Moroccan family living in Italy has continued paying off an apartment they were forced to leave. In Ferrara, Ahmed, Fatna and their daughter Imane now live apart, with €60,000 still left to repay on their mortgage.
Every month, Ahmed and Fatna pay their bank around €500 for an apartment on the 12th floor of a tower in Ferrara, northern Italy. Yet they have been unable to return since February. The couple, originally from Casablanca, now share temporary accommodation with another family, while their daughter Imane is staying in a shelter for women in difficulty. Their story was reported by the Italian weekly La Voce di Ferrara-Comacchio.
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Ahmed arrived in Italy in 2001, and his wife and daughter joined him two years later. An employee in public transport in Bologna, he works night shifts, among other things, to keep up with his mortgage payments and condominium fees. Fatna works part-time in Ferrara. In 2005, after renting for a time, the couple bought an apartment in the Grattacielo residential complex.
On January 11, Ahmed finishes his shift at two in the morning. He waits for the first train home to Ferrara and, at 4:45 a.m., finds firefighters outside his building. A fire has broken out in Tower B, prompting the evacuation of more than 200 people. His family lives in Tower A, but safety concerns later lead authorities to order the evacuation of the entire complex.
From homeowners to emergency accommodation
On February 12, Ahmed, Fatna and Imane leave their apartment. They are first housed in a former residence in San Bartolo, where they share one room until June 30. They then spend several weeks in temporary accommodation, with two small rooms, a mini-fridge and an electric oven to heat their meals.
Since September, the family has been separated. The parents, both over 65, share a kitchen and bathroom with four other people. Imane, a communications student at the University of Reggio Emilia, has found shelter in another facility. Social services, with help from Caritas, provided temporary accommodation for the parents.
Finding a long-term rental has proved difficult. Imane says she has seen candidates treated differently depending on their origins: homes advertised as available to Italian volunteers were no longer available when foreigners called a few minutes later. The family says it faced the same difficulties.
The young woman also criticizes local authorities for failing to find a lasting solution, despite her parents’ repeated efforts. She is worried about the condition of their apartment, which they can no longer access, and about the future of the building, now deserted.
After more than twenty years in Ferrara, the family still owns a home it can no longer live in. They have ten years of mortgage payments left, with around €60,000 still owed to the bank. Imane, who is continuing her studies away from her parents, does not know when the three of them will be able to live under the same roof again.
