Allochtonen Weblog Roundup

Allochtonen Weblog is a Dutch language blog that collects news about the immigrant community in the Netherlands. Here’s a few interesting stories they’ve had the past couple of weeks.

Amsterdam: fighting corruption

According to a new plan to be debated next week in the municipal council, Amsterdam is going to give its immigrant workers special attention in order to fight corruption.

The plan states that workers from a specific cultural background run a higher risk of improper behavior “on instigation of family members”. For example, handing over official documents without authorization or changing data of family members.

While some politicians called the plan “stigmatizing” and said that such plans should focus on processes and not on people, others said that it was a sensible plan.

The plan doesn’t focus on more supervision but rather on more intensive training for immigrant workers so they’ll be able to handle such requests.

The plan was inspired by a case in Zuidoost in which Surinamese civil servants issued papers to family members against regulations.


Political attention to integration

According to a new survey, almost 70% of the Dutch think political parties give enough attention to integration issues.

25% think the issue of integration has no effect on their daily lives.

50% think that the Netherlands has done too little in the past to better the integration of foreigners.


Fighting the taboo of female circumcision

The municipality of The Hague will be setting up talks with various immigrant organizations in order to fight women’s circumcision and the taboo surrounding it. The plan in The Hague is a test of a nationwide plan and will last two years.

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