Chechens Cheated of New Homes
Hundreds of Grozny residents homeless despite legal requirement to re-house them.
Chechens Cheated of New Homes
Hundreds of Grozny residents homeless despite legal requirement to re-house them.
The thousands of Chechen families whose homes were destroyed by war are officially entitled either to claim compensation or to have their homes rebuilt at the government’s expense, but two groups of Chechens are not being re-housed because of bureaucratic obstacles.
The first category is former owners of homes that have been inhabited since 2000 by federal soldiers. The people in the second group are onetime residents of apartment blocks who decided to wait for their flats to be rebuilt rather than seek compensation, but now say the civilian authorities have failed to keep their promises to rehouse them.
As a result, hundreds of Grozny residents are practically homeless, staying with friends or relatives, hoping that some day the government will take notice of their plight.
Experts estimate that up to 85 per cent of homes in Grozny were destroyed, mainly by artillery and bombing in 1994-6 and 1999-2000. Only a small proportion has been restored. Compensation payments are paid out for 350,000 roubles (over 12,000 US dollars) but, even if they manage to surmount the bureaucratic obstacles needed to get the money, it is not enough, particularly for larger families, to buy a new property. Some 45,000 Chechens are yet to receive housing compensation.
That is one reason why many hope to rebuild property on the land where their houses once stood.
Raisa Apayeva has had the address No. 2 Selskaya ulitsa stamped in her passport for over 30 years, though for the last six years Apaeva, a pensioner, has been living with her relatives far from the pile of rubble that used to be her home. Apayeva and her son fled to Ingushetia when the second Chechen war broke out in 1999, but never returned because there was no home to return to.
“We did not want to live in a temporary refugee settlement,” said Apayeva. “I’m too old to live in a dormitory where you have to haul water buckets upstairs. I would prefer to end my days in my own home. As long as we had the land, my son and I could build something on it, but they took our land away. There’s nothing to build on.”
The problem Apayeva and her neighbours face is that the military has taken several hectares of land on her street and four others, and are deaf to appeals to return it to civilian use.
“The security zone around the police headquarters and the commander’s office takes up between 1.5 and two hectares,” said Tamazi Gaurgayev, deputy head of the Oktyabrsky district administration. “This means that around 100 families have been displaced. Many of them received compensation, but they cannot build on their land. Even if they got a permit to build, the military would not let them for security reasons.”
“This is done out of concern for civilians’ security,” explained district military commander Aleksander Sharov. “It is against the basic precepts of security to let military facilities be surrounded by private homesteads, which guerrillas may use for an attack. In which case, we will respond and civilians may get hurt. So they need this security belt as much as we do.”
But families that are unable to reclaim their land are not convinced.
“They say that peaceful life is coming back to Chechnya. So why won’t soldiers go back to their barracks? What are they doing here, in our homes and on our land?” said Mareta Bakrieva, who used to live on Ukrainskaya Street and cannot recover her home and land.
The issue reflects the problem of the civilian authorities trying to exercise control over the military. Recently, the Chechen government in Grozny managed to win back control of the boarding school in Urus-Martan, which had been occupied by soldiers since the winter of 2000. Between 2000 and 2003, the school was used as a remand prison and allegedly as an interrogation centre employing torture. The building will now be renovated and used as a school once again.
However, in Grozny’s Oktyabrsky District, the troops seem determined to stay put and the future look bleak for the residents of the land soldiers have claimed for security reasons.
The homes that were once five-storey brick blocks of flats on Kosmonavtov and Krasnykh Frontovikov streets in central Grozny are now a distant memory for their former inhabitants. They were bombed out in 1995 and then locals took away the bricks. A new block of flats is now being built. But former residents have not been told whether they will be rehoused there, and are urging the authorities to provide some clarification.
Salman Zakriev, who heads the construction committee in the Chechen parliament, told IWPR his committee had filed an inquiry with the Grozny mayor’s office, on the former residents behalf, as they are virtually powerless in a situation where ordinary citizens have very little influence over their own future.
“The former residents of the houses at Kosmonavtov and Krasnykh Frontovikov are not the only home owners wronged in Chechnya,” said Rashid Yunusov, a Grozny-based lawyer. “Grozny is just beginning to be restored. A solid legal framework is needed to prevent similar disputes from recurring. Post-war Chechnya needs new laws with more emphasis on civil rights.”
The legal twilight zone of housing entitlement in Grozny affects the occupants of dozens of blocks of flats, which are officially on record as due for reconstruction. All these flats were once private homes, but it is far from clear when their former residents will get a chance to be rehoused.
Amina Visayeva is the editor of Vecherny Grozny newspaper.
The first category is former owners of homes that have been inhabited since 2000 by federal soldiers. The people in the second group are onetime residents of apartment blocks who decided to wait for their flats to be rebuilt rather than seek compensation, but now say the civilian authorities have failed to keep their promises to rehouse them.
As a result, hundreds of Grozny residents are practically homeless, staying with friends or relatives, hoping that some day the government will take notice of their plight.
Experts estimate that up to 85 per cent of homes in Grozny were destroyed, mainly by artillery and bombing in 1994-6 and 1999-2000. Only a small proportion has been restored. Compensation payments are paid out for 350,000 roubles (over 12,000 US dollars) but, even if they manage to surmount the bureaucratic obstacles needed to get the money, it is not enough, particularly for larger families, to buy a new property. Some 45,000 Chechens are yet to receive housing compensation.
That is one reason why many hope to rebuild property on the land where their houses once stood.
Raisa Apayeva has had the address No. 2 Selskaya ulitsa stamped in her passport for over 30 years, though for the last six years Apaeva, a pensioner, has been living with her relatives far from the pile of rubble that used to be her home. Apayeva and her son fled to Ingushetia when the second Chechen war broke out in 1999, but never returned because there was no home to return to.
“We did not want to live in a temporary refugee settlement,” said Apayeva. “I’m too old to live in a dormitory where you have to haul water buckets upstairs. I would prefer to end my days in my own home. As long as we had the land, my son and I could build something on it, but they took our land away. There’s nothing to build on.”
The problem Apayeva and her neighbours face is that the military has taken several hectares of land on her street and four others, and are deaf to appeals to return it to civilian use.
“The security zone around the police headquarters and the commander’s office takes up between 1.5 and two hectares,” said Tamazi Gaurgayev, deputy head of the Oktyabrsky district administration. “This means that around 100 families have been displaced. Many of them received compensation, but they cannot build on their land. Even if they got a permit to build, the military would not let them for security reasons.”
“This is done out of concern for civilians’ security,” explained district military commander Aleksander Sharov. “It is against the basic precepts of security to let military facilities be surrounded by private homesteads, which guerrillas may use for an attack. In which case, we will respond and civilians may get hurt. So they need this security belt as much as we do.”
But families that are unable to reclaim their land are not convinced.
“They say that peaceful life is coming back to Chechnya. So why won’t soldiers go back to their barracks? What are they doing here, in our homes and on our land?” said Mareta Bakrieva, who used to live on Ukrainskaya Street and cannot recover her home and land.
The issue reflects the problem of the civilian authorities trying to exercise control over the military. Recently, the Chechen government in Grozny managed to win back control of the boarding school in Urus-Martan, which had been occupied by soldiers since the winter of 2000. Between 2000 and 2003, the school was used as a remand prison and allegedly as an interrogation centre employing torture. The building will now be renovated and used as a school once again.
However, in Grozny’s Oktyabrsky District, the troops seem determined to stay put and the future look bleak for the residents of the land soldiers have claimed for security reasons.
The homes that were once five-storey brick blocks of flats on Kosmonavtov and Krasnykh Frontovikov streets in central Grozny are now a distant memory for their former inhabitants. They were bombed out in 1995 and then locals took away the bricks. A new block of flats is now being built. But former residents have not been told whether they will be rehoused there, and are urging the authorities to provide some clarification.
Salman Zakriev, who heads the construction committee in the Chechen parliament, told IWPR his committee had filed an inquiry with the Grozny mayor’s office, on the former residents behalf, as they are virtually powerless in a situation where ordinary citizens have very little influence over their own future.
“The former residents of the houses at Kosmonavtov and Krasnykh Frontovikov are not the only home owners wronged in Chechnya,” said Rashid Yunusov, a Grozny-based lawyer. “Grozny is just beginning to be restored. A solid legal framework is needed to prevent similar disputes from recurring. Post-war Chechnya needs new laws with more emphasis on civil rights.”
The legal twilight zone of housing entitlement in Grozny affects the occupants of dozens of blocks of flats, which are officially on record as due for reconstruction. All these flats were once private homes, but it is far from clear when their former residents will get a chance to be rehoused.
Amina Visayeva is the editor of Vecherny Grozny newspaper.
