ANPA asylum seekers arrive at the registration center in Ter Apel
NOS Nieuws•vandaag, 06:00
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Isa Huizing
editor Domestic
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Isa Huizing
editor Domestic
The municipality of Westerwolde, to which Ter Apel belongs, wants to enforce in court today that the Central Agency for the Reception of Asylum Seekers (COA) adheres to the agreement of a maximum of 2,000 asylum seekers in the reception location. Since November, there have been structurally hundreds of too many people staying there.
The number of 2,000 asylum seekers was already agreed in an administrative agreement in 2010. If the COA does not strictly adhere to this, the municipality of Westerwolde wants a penalty of 25,000 euros per day.
Unsafe and unsanitary
This week, nine Groningen municipalities and King’s Commissioner René Paas expressed their support for Ter Apel in a letter to the outgoing ministers Yeşilgöz and Van der Burg. They described the situation in the reception center as critical.
The Groningen authorities say in the letter that continuously exceeding the maximum occupancy has serious consequences. “The shelter does not meet hygiene requirements and is physically unsafe.” This is in line with the conclusions of a report by the Justice and Security Inspectorate a few weeks ago. Entrepreneurs also complain that asylum seekers cause nuisance in and around the village of Ter Apel.
Last weekend we published this video about the nuisance in and around Ter Apel:
How residents of Ter Apel are (still) suffering from nuisance
The summary proceedings, which start at 9:45 am in Groningen, are the result of the many fruitless conversations between the municipality and the COA. A mediation process led by the National Ombudsman also failed to bring the parties closer together.
Special situation
The fact that the municipality has now decided to enforce in court that COA complies with the administrative agreement is quite unique. “Litigation is often initiated against the COA,” says special professor of decentralized authorities Geerten Boogaard. “But what is special now is that a municipality, part of the government, files a case against an organization that carries out government tasks.”
According to Boogaard, the credibility of the agreement made is primarily at stake. “COA often concludes management agreements with municipalities. If it turns out that COA does not have to adhere to the agreements, then the question is what such an agreement represents.”
On the other hand, COA is in a split. The asylum chain is clogged. This is partly due to matters over which the COA has little influence: the asylum influx is high, people have to wait a long time for a decision on their asylum application and status holders cannot move on to a house, which means they have to occupy a place in reception. There is a chance that COA will therefore invoke force majeure.
Spread law
The dispersal law will be discussed in the Senate next week. With this law, municipalities could be forced to receive asylum seekers. That could alleviate the situation in Ter Apel, but it remains to be seen whether the law will receive a majority.
The municipality of Westerwolde does not want to wait for that. Whether the municipality is right by the judge will probably only be known in two weeks, when the ruling is expected.
2024-01-10 05:00:01
#Municipality #COA #summary #proceedings #Ter #Apel
