Vienna is one of the very few European cities that are coping well with the migration crisis that started back in 2015. Good organization, great integration programs, and mostly tolerant citizens are the main reasons why around 20,000 people sought asylum in Vienna. In the 90’s of last century, citizens of BiH massively fled to this city during the aggression on our country, and they are now very successful people.
“Already from the first day, we want to conduct a conversation with people. As soon as they get their accommodation or are financially stable with the basic things, we determine which course of the German language they are suitable for. We also have an institution for education in which we can establish the level of knowledge of a person when it comes to language, how fast they can learn foreign languages and in which course they can be included,” said Head of Magistrate Department of the City of Vienna for Integration and Diversity (MA 17) Ursula Struppe.
She said that a lot of attention is given to the determination of qualifications and competences that refugees have when they come to Vienna, but that, in comparison to Sweden, they have a big gap in this context. She explained that Sweden, unlike Vienna, has a program for refugees to quickly integrate them into the labor market, and in accordance with their skills.
She added that there is a large number of people who have no qualifications and that it is almost impossible to expect that a person with no qualifications will find a job in the labor market. This is the reason why Vienna is giving migrants the opportunity to develop in a professional sense.
Struppe also talked about the integration of citizens of BiH who fled to Vienna after the aggression on our country. She said that many Bosnians are very successful people in Vienna today in the professional sense and that there are present in all positions, from the restaurant owners, managers, IT professionals and many others.
“According to my experience, they kept the commitment to their homeland. They are Bosnian Austrians and Austrian Bosnians at the same time. That is a great mix of two identities. However, not everything is so perfect. There are people in my private environment who experienced repeated trauma in their retirement because of what happened to their families. These are the wounds of war that have left their marks. When it comes to the integration aspect, Bosnians are citizens of Vienna who are more alive, warmer and more emotional and they enrich the city in that sense,” said Struppe.
When it comes to economic migrations, Struppe said that Vienna is already facing with this kind of migrations by the citizens of the countries of the European Union, in particular from Romania and Hungary. She stated that this number is much greater than the number of asylum seekers.
“People forget that we have another great migration within the European Union. Vienna became the second largest city in the German-speaking world, after Berlin, last year. We have a very dynamic growth in comparison with other EU countries. That is resulting in other problems, such as the need for a larger number of schools, buildings, streets and everything else that these immigrants need,” concluded Struppe.
(Source: Er. M./Klix.ba)
