(Last month The Khronicles featured a short report on a communiqué by Alikarnassos Mayor Vangelis Sisamakis headlined: FINAL SOLUTION SOUGHT TO ROMA GHETTO PROBLEM. Due to immense reader interest we sat down with the outspoken Mayor for a detailed interview. Due to the length of the interview, it will be presented in two parts.)

 (Khronicles): In your report, you list numerous programmes, such as housing loans, health care, and education that are available to the gypsies in the ghetto. Will the taxpayer foot the bill for these enormous sums?

(Mayor): First, let me say I made the proposal during our municipal meeting with all the agencies involved and I think it is complete. I stated the municipality's objective, what we have done in order to achieve this objective, what actions the gypsies have taken and why this situation still exists.

The programmes mentioned are European Funded Programmes, like the Medi-Social Centre, job training and others because we consider their social integration into the local society as the solution. We took the initiative and found these programmes.  

(Khronicles): Regarding the housing loans, you say they have taken the money and used it for other purposes?

They are crafty as far as looking how to profit and reap the biggest possible fruits, but not otherwise keeping their part of the agreement. We, helped by the District, were able to secure those housing loans. The gypsies all signed agreements that if they take this financing they will indeed use it to acquire housing and will leave the settlement. And in fact it is the only gypsy settlement in the entire country that the sum total of all loan applications was satisfied.  They took 60,000-euro loans which are preferential in that they are interest free and guaranteed by the Greek State. These monies were paid out to 157 families that have indeed purchased real estate, but continue to live in the settlement. Most of the real estate was purchased out of Crete as the bank records indicate. We don't know the condition of the purchased properties. Most gypsies purchased property for a lot less, declared that the purchase price was 60,000 and pocketed the difference buying cars or whatever.

There were some that did buy property here and have built some kind of housing. Someone might think that 60,000 euros is not enough for housing but if you go 10-15 kilometres away from the city you can buy four stremmata and comfortably build a house for that amount.

The fact remains that they are all real estate holders but still remain at the settlement illegally.  Even those who only secured plots with their loans, why can't they pitch their tents on their plots rather than on the municipality's grounds?  

(Khronicles): Is there a way for the municipality to prove that a family does indeed own a house so they can be made to leave the settlement?

(Mayor): We have the bank documents. Of course a big percentage, like 30 to 40 percent, of those at the settlement own apartment houses in the mainland and/or have substantial bank accounts. Because I am handling this situation for years, I know that this ghetto existence gives the possibility to some of their own who exploit them to practise a pile of illegalities and living in this ghetto gives them a shield of protection. If you sell narcotics and reside at a normal address you can be arrested at your home. But at the settlement at the first sighting of police they all pile up in the front and a riot-like atmosphere develops. Living in the ghetto provides them with a singular immunity. Also the homeowners from the settlement collect rents and don't spend a cent by living in the ghetto.  I want to note that we all feel a responsibility and sensitivity towards the gypsies but I can no longer watch a group of people who continuously mock us. They think that they, as citizens, only have rights and can demand, without any obligations, and we are the idiots who must maintain them.  We are not the racists. They are the racists with a singular immunity. Our policy is the social integration. "No," they say, "we don't want your society. We want ours and you must provide it for us." Hence, who is the racist?

(Khronicles): You stated they steal their electricity and water. Why is it that the agencies involved cannot gain access to the settlement and put some order?

(Mayor): I'm telling you straight that the State does not exist in this country. No other country allows its citizens to simply take over municipal land or siphon electricity from the electric company's poles or break the main water pipeline that feeds Iraklion. No other Greek citizen can be mixed up in road accidents and not pay anything. Greece is a country where State does not exist. The laws must be formally applied by bodies of State. I cannot rouse the Alikarnassos residents to throw them out because then we apply the law of the jungle. There is a justice department and also a police department who are obliged to enforce the law. And we don't want the rights of any Greek citizen to be trampled but we do say that all citizens must be treated equally under the laws of the land.

(The Khronicles): Are you saying that the police are not doing their job where the settlement is concerned?

(Mayor): I'm saying that the State allows the gypsies to be a race of people who only has rights but no obligations. I'm saying that we all treat them with kid gloves. I'm saying that some 26 years ago there were only 10-15 families who were only to stay in Alikarnassos for a matter of months until works finished in the Yofiro area on the other side of Iraklion. Little by little, however, under our overly tolerant and overly sensitive attitude towards the gypsies, an "illegality-is-legal" attitude was automatically created in their society. 

(Khronicles): Is the District supportive?

The support that we have in the existing situation is null. Last year the District really helped in the approval of all the housing loans applications. But since then, in the day to day existence, they don't involve themselves.

(Khronicles): What about the terrible sanitation problem at the ghetto?

(Mayor): Regardless of our efforts, the same conditions return within a week's time. If we really want to keep the settlement in a condition of absolute hygiene we must abandon all other areas in the municipality and only deal with the settlement.  Of course, all other citizens pay municipal dues and taxes, the gypsies pay nothing

(Khronicles):  Is it true that neither the police nor the sanitation want to enter the settlement?

(Mayor): When the police go in, the gypsies rise up claiming that they are being discriminated upon. And the police are afraid because they do not have political cover. If a political decision to apply the law equally to everyone does not exist, then nothing can be accomplished.  And, so I won't be misunderstood, I am not just talking about the current government. The problem has been on-going for many years now.

(Khronicles): What is the population in the settlement, and has it been increasing?

(Mayor): Currently, it is around 500 individuals. In the past few years the population is stagnant. But obviously from 1983 it has grown tremendously.

(Part two will appear in the October issue)