In many offices, the problem of staff shortages and the associated limitations in their ability to act is currently apparent to varying degrees. This is currently culminating in the conditions in and in front of the Foreigners' Office in Stuttgart. Here, the problems have become so acute that one can speak of a current inability to act on the part of the office. The sufferers of these conditions are above all all those people who do not come from the FRG and now see their livelihoods threatened. Many of them start in their desperation to spend the night in front of the office despite the cold.
Actually, these are scenes which one does not many times see in the FRG. Rather, these scenes are reminiscent of places in the world, in which there is now war or strong disasters have taken place. Pictures of crowds of people, which hold out for hours, sometimes for days in places to get neccesary things such as food, medicine and warm clothes. Similar pictures we see now also from Stuttgart. Only that it is not about these things, but about the processing of bureaucratic procedures.
For the lives of those people, however, these bureaucratic processes are often as vital as food, drink and a roof over their heads. Without the completion of these, virtually nothing is possible for many. Housing, work, and generally being allowed by the imperialists to continue living in this country are things that depend on the processing of bureaucratic procedures.
Months ago, there were already reports in the social media of catastrophic conditions in the Stuttgart Foreigners' Registration Office, as well as of waiting and camping crowds in front of the office. In the meantime, the civic media have also taken up this issue and are reporting on it. Since then, however, the situation in front of the foreign' Office has not improved at all. Rather, the opposite seems to be the case. The months of camping in front of the office have led to the fact that currently small stores in the vicinity have extended their opening hours in order to somehow still provide sanitary facilities for the waiting people. Even the German Red Cross (DRK) is now on site to supply the waiting people with water.
But not only the hardships of waiting affect people, also the fact that many do not get appointments despite camping in front of the office hits some very hard. There are reports on social networks and in the press from people who say that because the immigration office does not get back to them to issue documents regarding their residence permit, they lose their jobs and cannot pay their bills. Others are in danger of slipping into homelessness, now facing the loss of their apartment, or not even being able to rent one because of the lack of documents.
Of course, the untenable situation at the Foreigners' Office also has a negative impact on employees. In interviews with the civic media, some employees report increased workloads and increasing stress to which they are subjected.
"We are only 'driven', we can only react and try to do at least the most important things." Is, for example, once expressed in this way to SWR.
The frustration of the workers is very understandable and legitimate. However, various politicians who are responsible for these conditions are trying to shift the blame away from themselves and play off the workers against the refugee and migrant sections of our class. The CDU in particular is using this situation as an opportunity to fuel the chauvinistic mood against refugees and migrants. Thus, in a meeting of the so-called "international committee" of the Stuttgart City Council, Stuttgart's Mayor Nopper (CDU) referred to the people waiting in front of the foreign Office as "A public that is not easy," subtly attempting to assign partial blame for the conditions to those most affected by them. The Stuttgart CDU is also otherwise eager to take this situation as an opportunity to call for "limiting migration."
The state of affairs in front of the Stuttgart Foreigners' Office and the way politicians deal with them simply shows how little they care about the people who are suffering as a result of their policies. Yet it is they who are responsible for the situation of these people. Not only because of the situation in front of the foreigners' office, but also because of the misery created by the plundering of oppressed nations, which has driven most of these people to flee their country in the first place.
