The Right to a Nationality and the Right to Adequate Housing
suppress the conditions that perpetuate discrimination and to rectify its
cumulative adverse effects on housing. 96
These affirmative actions include the development of national housing plans
that prioritise those most disadvantaged by identifying the necessary resources
for their implementation, outlining performance measures and monitoring
results. 97 States are also obligated to work progressively given their resource
constraints to address homelessness, improve essential physical infrastructure,
and provide public housing and housing subsidies for those unable to otherwise
enjoy the right to adequate housing. 98
States are obligated to fulfil the right to adequate housing by giving priority
consideration for the most disadvantaged, a category which must include
stateless persons, but they have often failed to do so for this group. This is
unsurprising given that states are often hesitant to recognise that stateless
persons exist in their borders at all, but this does not relieve them of their
obligations to prioritise them and other disadvantaged groups. In some cases,
instead of addressing homelessness among the stateless and fulfilling the right to
adequate housing, the state has actively persecuted stateless persons and
rendered them homeless. This is evidenced by the experiences of the Rohingya
in Myanmar or those expelled from housing in Kuwait. Even when the state has
not actively destroyed the homes of stateless persons or evicted them, stateless
persons are often still barred from accessing housing services and initiatives.
While states might argue that they are taking steps to fulfil their obligations to
all, closer inspection shows that this is often not the case for stateless persons. In
some situations, such as the Nubians of Kenya, the government has displaced
stateless persons and other low-income residents to build affordable public
housing, but then never allowed those displaced to benefit from these
programs. 99 Thus, even when housing projects are undertaken in areas with high
concentrations of stateless persons, they can fail to benefit those individuals and
instead simply be located in the same geographical area as the stateless. 100 In
Bangladesh, camps that have existed since 1980 and are home to predominantly
Urdu-speaking individuals still lack basic amenities and have limited access to
sanitation, water and garbage disposal after nearly forty years of occupation.101
In Italy, Roma are often effectively excluded from accessing social housing due
to the allocation criteria used by the social housing system. 102 Additionally, in
Slovenia, it has been noted that
Raquel Rolnik, Report of the Special Rapporteur on Adequate Housing as a Component of
the Right to an Adequate Standard of Living, UN GAOR, 65th sess, Agenda Item 69 (b), UN
Doc A/65/261 (9 August 2010) 10.
97 The Right to Adequate Housing (n 11) 34.
98 Kucs, Sedlova and Pierhurovica (n 72) 104.
99
Abraham Korir Sing’oei, ‘Promoting Citizenship in Kenya: The Nubian Case’ in Brad Blitz
and Maureen Lynch (eds), Statelessness and the Benefits of Citizenship: A Comparative
Study (Geneva Academy of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights and the
International Observatory on Statelessness 2009) 38, 45.
100 Karan (n 84) 11.
101 Muhammad Rehan Masoom, ‘Social Isolation of the Stateless and the Destitute: A Study on
the Refugee-Camp and the Sullied Slum of Dhaka City’ [2016] Urban Studies Research 1
<https://www.hindawi.com/journals/usr/2016/9017279/>.
102 Amnesty International, ‘Effective Human Rights-Based Housing Strategies: Submission to
the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Adequate Housing as a Component of the Right
to an Adequate Standard of Living and on the Right to Non-Discrimination in This Context’
(Amnesty International Ltd 2017) 7.
96
253