Midnight express

There's something macabre about the figure of six billion €uro which Turkey tabled this past Monday evening Brussels time.  That should be about 1 €uro for each world inhabitant who is presently at a place they would call home in a relative peaceful surrounding. 

But I guess it would be naïf to think of the refugee / migrant crises as a globally relevant issue in today's world, rather unlike we are taught in history books when Indo-Iranian civilisation first settled its marks pretty much up to where tens of thousands of people from the same geographic origin now have stranded in front of razor blade barbed wire.

I am somewhat shocked but certainly not surprised Turkey is grasping momentum to introduce a new currency denominated in number of individuals on the run into its diplomatically negotiable role in Europe or alongside the EU, which is wandering on for nearly 60 years. 

I am highly concerned and equally unsurprised with the stage the joint heads of state of one of the world's most developed regions are aiming to set, seeking to settle a nearly one off payment to outsource and offshore an issue they do not know what to with, under the control of a sovereign country they never really wanted to have anything to do with.

The sluggishness and indecision that become apparent at the very EU political top, each time there is serious trouble is desolating and the sudden call for action is an insulting paradox for any person on any side of a border.  A range of countries' political leaders obviously all with their own individual agendas they carefully try to balance with the pressure of electorates' desires.  € 6 billion over a 3 year time span, collected out of EU citizen's pockets to pay off a lack of vision and ability amongst a small group of individuals that were elected on grounds promising the contrary. 

€ 6 billion is about what the Red Cross, UNICEF and Médecins sans Frontières manage in a single year from private funds alone.  It would have suited political leaders well to not only admit their inability in between the lines but also at the bottom line and actively put forward and support private organizations which would do a much more efficient and humane job in the field while construing a vision for what is unfortunately not going to disappear in the next decade.

I would also think that those organisations would do a much better job in collecting funds directly from citizens who are either in favour of hosting or stopping migrants, if only governments would incentivise them to do so a bit better.