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| Lisa, Adelisa, source: youtube video screenshot. |
Lisa, a nine-year-old with Albanian citizenship and the real name Adelisa, faces deportation to a residential home in Albania by the Swedish Migration Agency (Migrationsverket), even though she only speaks Swedish.
Born in Sweden, Lisa has been living with a Swedish family for the past five years. However, the decision to deport her to a residential home in Albania has been made, despite her guardianship being in the hands of the Backström family, consisting of Hans and Paulina, located in a remote area of Lindköping, local media reports.
She has been staying with the Backström family for about 7 years, and they have been her guardians for 5 years.
Currently, lawyers have reapplied to the Migration Agency to appeal against the deportation order. However, there is very little chance that the lawyers' request will be accepted. Such requests are usually systematically rejected. It is worth noting that the right-wing government of the Moderates, supported by the far-right Sweden Democrats (SD), is pursuing a strict anti-immigration policy.
Cultural Identity of Lisa and Her Emotional Trauma
Imagine for a moment that you are nine years old. You were born and raised in Sweden, having developed your Swedish cultural identity. The first words you learned were Swedish. Your earliest memories were formed in a typical Swedish environment, with your mother and father, with the family pet, with the forest, school, or playing with other children. You are deeply Swedish.
Now, imagine on an ordinary day in your life as a child, a letter arrives at home, and you see your parents, worried, talking to each other, looking at you with sadness. Then you ask, "What's wrong?" Because now, as a 9-year-old child, you understand things very well. And your parents try to explain some completely incomprehensible and crazy things.
"Lisa, the government has decided that you need to return to your biological mother's homeland. But we won't allow that to happen, dear, we will fight for you."
Can you imagine the psychological shock; the emotional earthquake that you would experience in such a situation?! How could you leave behind the life of a Swedish child? How could you accept that a piece of paper written by an authority you've never met, never asked for, would remove you from your family, from your mother, father, brothers, and sisters, from friends, from school, from books, and teachers?
Can you now imagine that this is happening to a child born and raised in Sweden? Because, in the end, what is the difference between a 9-year-old Swedish child and Lisa, the 9-year-old? Can you find any significant difference - except the blood that runs in Lisa's veins?
Is a person's cultural identity a result of the environment in which they grow up? And how does Lisa, a 9-year-old, feel - Swedish or Albanian?
The emotional trauma that little Lisa is going through is of extraordinary proportions. For her, it is incomprehensible how she can be taken away from her family, from her environment, and sent to a place she doesn't know, to be separated from her family, mother, father, friends, and playmates. She may suffer from severe stress and anxiety, feelings of abandonment and depression. Her well-being is shattered; her trust in normalcy is shattered, and uncertainty has taken over her entire existence as a child. She no longer has time to play with her friends; to go to school. She must wait anxiously to see what will be said about her fate and future on TV4 by an important manager in the Migration Service. Or what will be written in the decision that some adults called judges will understand about her mother Paulina, father Hans, and of course, about her.
To continue to maintain this high tension about the fate and future of a 9-year-old child, authorities must have a strong, unquestionable reason. In fact, besides unethical and illegal actions, authorities have no other reason. Holding on stubbornly to illegality is no longer a mistake but a fault, a crime against a 9-year-old child.