Names marked with an asterisk have a leg changed to protect identities.
Paris, France – When Moussa*, a worker of undocumented construction, joined a strike of wild cats at the construction site of Adidas Arena de Paris in the early hours of October 17, 2023, hoped that the protest would lead him to get the documents that needed Toel to Mali.
Since he arrived in France in 2019, after first approached a boat from Algeria to Spain, Moussa, 25, has no single vacation. After his grandparents died of his time, he felt the need to return and cry with his family.
For eight months, he worked at the Arena, which has been 8,000 seats and was being prepared for the Summer 2024. More than 400 construction workers operated on the site.
It was compensated with normal salary slippers through the use of another person’s documents, a common strategy among documented workers of UND. They paid around 75 euros ($ 85) per day for 10-hour exhausting shifts to the Arena-A rate, he said, that he did not include transportation expenses, masks or other protective equipment.
Moussa’s prayer was worth it.
The workers occupied the site before dawn, blocked it and then negotiated all day. For the event, they had a deal.
After intense discussions between the Employer of Moussa, the city of Paris, the workers and their union, a list of 14 undocumented people who worked on the site were delivered to the prefecture of the French Police, who deal with processed, for their work.
They signed a framework agreement that would lead to a residence permit and health insurance. It was signed by the city of Paris, the construction company Bouygues and several subcontractors.
But 18 months later, the files have not yet approved the leg. Only one of the 14 has given an appointment in the Prefecture of Paris.
Several of undocumented workers are beginning to wonder if the delays are by design.
“We do not ask much, just a residence permit and a health insurance card. It is our right. To this day we have no right to work in this country,” said Moussa.
Three of the 14 workers and Rafika Rahmani, a lawyer of the CNT-SO union that focuses on the rights of the expatriates, told Al Jazeera that they presented all the information requested more than a year ago.
“We have payment receipts, we have everything. We are playing according to the rules. But so far, we house that it had only one citation,” said Adama*, one of the builders. “We have no idea why the files are walking so long. We have sent them again twice.
“It’s like being in prison in France,” added Adama, who has also struggled to find a comfortable home. Sleep in a room with another 11 people in the Eastern or Montreuil suburb. “It’s as if you don’t have documents in this county, you have no value.”
Despite the thesis challenges and their long shifts in construction work, Adama takes night classes to learn French.
‘Is revenge’
In January 2025, CNT-SO, which represses construction and cleaning workers, collectively forward 13 archives to the Paris Prefecture.
“The files are still blocked, despite the fact that I have re -applied to these 13 people,” Rahmani told Al Jazeera.
She suspects that the lack of response is a form of violation of rape, since the attacks made known the conditions of duet in France in the period prior to the Olympic Games.
“It’s revenge,” Rahmani said. “For them, the [striking workers] gift [France] A bad image, even if it is reality. “
The project developer and two subcontracting companies, who have not responded to the request for comments from Al Jazeera, have allegedly prevented some workers from returning to construction sites, which means that they have lost jobs and homes.
According to Adama, at least three colleagues have not worked since October 2023, and they trust the lacks to subsidize their food and homes.
“We have information that the company that employed them did not restore them. It was a disciplinary measure against the strike in which they had participated,” said Jean-Francois Coulomme, representative of the Left Party France, Al Jazeera. “It is an ostracism strategy for thesis employees in particular.”
In February, Coulomme wrote to the Minister of the Interior of France through a mechanism of responsibility of the Government on the “destiny of the archives presented to the Prefecture of Paris”, demanding “the regular regularization of thesis workers.”
The letter remains unanswered.
“The case of Arena workers is representative of a systemic problem. It is a good illustration of the fact that thesis workers are silenced due to the [precariousness] Of his administrative situation, “said Colomme.
The CNT-SO Union and the so-called Gilets Noirs, or black vests, a group of mostly undocumented migrants who work to obtain administrative regularization and housing rights for migrants in France, tried to accelerate the process through the city of Paris, since the city was one of the negotiating parties.
“We have plugged some more holes when passing through the mayor of Paris, because they are the intermediary between the contacts and the Prefecture of Paris. We want to know what the situation is,” Doerms, a spokesman for the Gilets. “Today, the situation is still, let’s not say totally blocked, but a bit blocked to the prefecture level.”
Colomme suggested that the Ministry of Interior prevents the archives from being approved.
“The prefectures take their orders from the Ministry. Therefore, in that we are groups, the prefects simply apply the directives of the minister in charge,” said Coulomme.
Al Jazeera contacted the Interior Minister and the Prefecture of Paris, but did not receive a comment at the time of the publication.
The rapid initial response and negotiations are a typical reaction when a city is analyzed before the main international events, but there is no follow -up when the exaggeration goes out.
“The state of exception provided by the Olympic Games can be really important to take advantage of profits for workers,” Jules Boykoff, researcher and author of the book Power Games, told Al Jazeera: A political History of the Olimps. “The key is to block those profits, while the hot glow of the Olympic Care Center still shines in its city. After that, it becomes much more difficult to take advantage of that Olympic moment to make promises to these workers.”
This may be a moment of opportunity for people to drive rights, but Olympic Games and other important sporting events also open exploitation, special for people in precarious situations such as undocumented workers.
“This is just an atrocious example of taking advantage of people to create a sporting event that claims to benefit the many but in reality it only benefits the few,” Boykoff said. “The Olympic Games tend to highlight what we could call surplus populations, whether we are talking about expendable athletes or expendable workers that make the Olympic show possible.”
Rahmani said: “Duration of the strike, all these people came and made great promises … These deputies and senators reach a demonstration or strike and commit themselves to the periodic workers, but in the end, there is no monitoring and my tea tea tea tea tea tea tea.” “
‘This ideology is currently affecting our country as a whole’
For years, the government of France has hardened its position against immigration.
In December 2023, the French Parliament approved a controversial immigration law that differentiates between foreigners “in an employment situation” and those that are not. The measure made it harder to receive social benefits for expatriates outside work.
The new regulations have been developed in workplaces.
Between 2023 and 2024, according to official figures, the number of undocumented workers who were regularized fell by 10 percent. Deportations, on the other hand, increased by more than a quarter.
“This ideology is currently affecting our country as a whole, with an instrumentalization of the migration problem, which we are adopting a totally utilitarian approach,” said Coulomme.
In the field, Doerms said that the Gilets Noirs have observed the same phenomenon.
“The political situation in this country with respect to immigrants and foreigners is becoming increasingly complicated,” said Doerms. Even so, he insisted that the group would continue to press for their rights. “We are not going to stop there. Just after the regularization of the 14 people, we will not stop.”
