26 Years in Limbo: Why Somali Refugees Should not be Forgotten
When I met Somali refugees who have been displaced for decades they told me they long to reestablish their lives at home, but they also explained their fears of going back.
26 years. That is how long Somalia has been riven by conflict. A conflict that has driven millions of its citizens from their homes to other parts of the country or across borders. Through all this time, my organization, UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency has never stopped aiding the displaced and advocating for peace. All refugees tell us they want to go home and help rebuild their country, but only when they feel safe.
Last week, I visited Somalia with the High Commissioner for Refugees, Filippo Grandi. This was my fourth time in the country, and I was pleased to see progress: zones of stability, signs of economic activity and schools opening. But I also saw buildings reduced to rubble or pockmarked with bullet holes and acutely felt an atmosphere of fear and insecurity. During meetings in Mogadishu with the newly elected leaders, it was encouraging to hear their determination to do everything in their power to forge peace, defeat terrorism and revive the economy.
There is no better measure of a county’s stability though than the sentiment of refugees. Before going to Somalia, we spent time with Somali refugees at the Ali Addeh Refugee Camp in a remote treeless valley of land in the hills of southern Djibouti. I had been there seven years before and the hopelessness of the place stuck in my mind ever since. On that visit, I met a bright 14 -year-old Somali girl at her primary school and I asked her about her studies. I was dismayed by her reply, “I have no future,” she told me. “My schooling days are over.” Because, I learned to my astonishment, there was no money for secondary education in the camp. What a waste of a mind, I thought. What a missed opportunity to educate a change agent for a peaceful Somalia. With just the bare minimum of funding, all we were doing was helping refugees to survive, but we fell short of enabling them to thrive.
On this visit, however, I was pleased to see there is a secondary school in the camp and that Djibouti has adopted enlightened new legislation that will allow refugees to leave the camp and seek work and permit children to join local schools. Djibouti is one of the 13 countries that have adopted the so-called Comprehensive Refugee Response Framework — in exchange for progressive policies, they will receive meaningful development assistance and infrastructure investment for hosting large numbers of refugees. Under this framework, refugees will be able to learn and contribute while in exile and also become more self-reliant. When the time comes for their return home, they will be much better prepared to contribute to rebuilding their countries.
But after 26 years and now the third generation of Somalis being born in refugee camps, when can Somali refugees finally go back? At UNHCR, there is nothing we like better to do than to help people go home and reestablish their lives when they feel safe to do so. Over the last three years, we have returned over 100,000 people who made informed, voluntary decisions to go back. We met several of them in Kismayo, Somalia’s third-largest city where UNHCR, together with the American Refugee Committee, is building simple settlements for returning refugees in greatest need of housing, and providing vocational training to help them find work or create businesses. Although they were concerned about security, they expressed joy about shedding their refugee status and determination to contribute to rebuilding their country. Driving through the streets of Kismayo, Somalia’s third largest city, we saw enormous physical damage from 28 years of conflict but also visible signs of restoration and economic activity in the streets, including new small businesses run by returning refugees.
On the outskirts of the city, we met a family about to move into a UNHCR-constructed house in a self-contained settlement which also a provides a school, a health clinic, a covered market and a mosque. They had spent the last 28 years in Ali Addeh refugee camp in Djibouti. Visibly gleeful, the eldest son, Farah Hassan Abdi, 24 declared his happiness to be “back to my country that I love,” and his plans to become a doctor or even a surgeon so he could help his people. As a refugee, he had no such hope. The simple, sturdy houses were built on land provided by the government on the sandy outskirts of the city. The project is designed to provide returning refugees but also a percentage of people who had been internally displaced as well as people from the local community with a decent living environment so they can focus on educating their children and pursuing work.
Not all returns have been so successful. Small numbers found their home towns too dangerous, and joined the over two million people who are internally displaced and living in precarious conditions. A small percentage of returnees, around 400 people, found the conditions too harsh or dangerous and made their way back to the Dadaab Refugee Camp in Kenya. But the majority are relieved to have left refugee camp limbo behind.
After our visit to Somalia, we traveled to the Dadaab Camp, where we met some of the 18,000 people who are registered to return to Somalia soon. Even though many had lived in the camp for more than two decades, they all told us they see Somalia as their true home. But most of the ca. 230,000 camp residents are still too scared to return.
Even Somalia’s President, Mohamed Farmajo, called for return to be gradual at a time when the country is facing massive challenges. A terrible drought has forced over one million Somalis to leave home and move to other parts of the country, mostly to urban areas. Thanks to a large-scale humanitarian response this year, famine has been averted. However, one in two Somalis are acutely food insecure and the risk of famine remains. This has meant the global response has focused more on humanitarian relief and less on development, and has increased the population of internally displaced people to two million. A small percentage of returning refugees have been unable to return to their original homes and have resorted to settling in camps for internally displaced people. “We want our people back. This is their home,” the President told us. But he added that it must be a gradual and organized transition. “We need to avoid returning refugees becoming IDPs.”
For those who do come back, the President urged to move people out of the dependency they knew in the refugee camps. “People know how to be given fish, we need to teach them how to catch fish,” he said.
Regrettably, it seems that international donors are tiring of providing support for refugees in the Dadaab camp. Because of lack of funding, food rations provided by the World Food Programme have been cut to the barest of minimum. Refugees are living hand to mouth. But there is hope. The Kenyan government also recently signed onto the Comprehensive Refugee Response Framework. It has received a $100 million loan from the World Bank in recognition of its contribution as host to so many refugees. Much of this investment will go to revive the environment and infrastructure of Dadaab. UNHCR will also contribute to the government’s plan to build a vocational education programme for host communities and refugees.
UNHCR believes closed refugee camps should be consigned to history. Instead refugees should be free to seek asylum communities, as they do in Uganda. There, they can contribute to the economy and their children can continue their education by integrating into local schools. In exchange, the host countries will receive important development support for the villages, towns and cities that take them in.
It is time to recognize that how we treat the uprooted will shape the future of our world. For who else but the victims of war hold the keys to lasting peace? Who else but the refugees returning home can demand a stop to the cycle of violence?
