Habib made the call and Johannes made sure that the call was recorded.
Habib explains the context, refugee tech hackathon, contact person in 46elks.
Habib explains that information process is the main reason from the call.
Q: When did you come to Sweden
A: 16 october 2014
Q: First thing you did was?
A: First, I was in hotel in Malmo, slept there, third went to migrationsverket, presented ID and military credit card from Syria. I did not have my passport, only a syrian ID and military credit card.
Q: what were you handed after interview
A: Fingerprints were taken and check if those fingerprints are registered in other EU country. I got an LME kort copy and received the original after two weeks. Got a credit card 700 SEK/month. And then given second appointment.
Q: When was that?
A: Jan 9 2015.
Same questions, why did you come, from where, job, why Sweden. I was told if you have your passport you can work right the way, but if you have only an ID then you need to wait until your ID is checked in a service in Stockholm. you can work any job.
In the second interview my ID was checked so I could work.
In my opinion most refugees do not have passport. If you have not been to military service you get only 2 years passport that was impossible to get after the war.
The investigator told me that there was a lot of pressure on Migrationsverket and then ID decisions take longer times.
Q: Did you have other meetings?
A: No, but even if i was allowed to work, but i could not work, because as a doctor i have to get language course first and get complementary courses. This is specially for my case, mechanics, and some engineers have managed to find faster jobs.
After the second interview by 3 month I got residency permit. I could work other jobs than doctor. But language is mandatory to work as doctor.
Q: Are you studying language/ doctor courses now?
A: I have a problem to validate my courses as i lack documents that are in the interior minister and university in Syria. I need some more weeks to fix that.
There are people who after the second meeting had not their IDs checked so they needed even more meetings.
Q: The problem is time?
A: After 4 months I got the final decision on ID, but in general it is a year to two.
Q: What happened to you after you got residency permit?
A: After RP is got, you need to find your own accommodation, or AF finds you accommodation. It is though hard to find accommodation because allowance money is only 6800 SEK. AF helps with Accommodation, for example my room is 4000 SEK per month,I pay 1800, AF pays the rest.
AF has Etablering period of 2 years, language and insertion.
Accommodation problem is that no agency gives us accommodation as we do not have job contracts.
I had my RP from april 2015, I only found accommodation after 6 months.
-- In some districts, you can take swedish course while waiting or even have doctor/high educated people course to get familiar with Swedish work values.
However, I was not asked about my qualities (job) when I arrived. It would have been greater.
I was assigned my district two days after my arrival, been a doctor was not taken into account. If it was taken into account that i was a doctor before assigning me a district, that would have been great.
In the camp we were at least 5 doctors. They tried getting job/internships but were told it is impossible if you do not speak the language.
-- Refugee Camp suffer from bad conditions, sometimes 9 people per room.
No Kitchens in the camps.
-- Food was OK, languages were given by Red Cross once a month, problem was that they gave the same course every month
-- Most of the people in camps, who had RP, needed to find a new adress in which they did not live, and live instead in other places, not working makes it harder to find accommodation.
-- The process is taking longer today, it takes around 3 months before the first interview ...
We keep in touch, if we have further questions, we could call.