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by Doug Rutledge, Ph.D.
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Most people living in the first world fail to realize how desperate people are to flee the violence in Somalia. The numbers alone only begin to tell the difficult story of trying to escape internecine fighting and foreign invasion. In 2008, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates nearly 20,000 Somali refugees have put their lives at terrible risk to escape the violence of the Somali civil war and the Ethiopian invasion by attempting to reach Yemen. That number has doubled since 2006, when the UNHCR estimates just a little over 10,000 people attempted to make the dangerous journey across the Gulf of Aden to a land where Somalis are inadequately warehoused instead of being given a home. To even begin to understand the toll that migration takes on Somali people, you must interview the people who have endured these horrifying journeys.
Unfortunately, many of the people who try to cross the Gulf of Aden from Somalia perish in the attempt. If you talk to a few of the Somali refugees, who have survived the journey, it is not difficult to understand why. Even while coping with daily violence, family members must raise a substantial amount of money. The smugglers charge each refugee as much as much as they can. That is often hundreds of dollars, sometimes, as much as $1,000. When they have finished making phone calls to friends and relatives in the Diaspora network in a frustrating effort to raise money, a family must put their loved one on a bus to Boosasso. When the soon-to-be refugee arrives, he or she must begin looking for the smugglers. On the boat, things can get difficult. Abdulahi, a refugee we interviewed in Europe, explained that he was in the third of a group of three boats that the smugglers were employing to cross the Gulf of Aden. For a while, the journey seemed serene enough. He was enjoying the calm waters and the sunset. However, at some point the boat made a turning and began to catch up with the other two boats. Abdulahi began to see something in the water, red as blood. Suddenly, he noticed that the sea was full of bodies. As events unfolded, Abdulahi came to realize that the first boat had run out of gas, and as it was not seaworthy, the crew of that boat was getting onto the second boat. All of the refugees on the first boat were being abandoned, and many of those on the second had to be thrown overboard to accommodate the smugglers from the first boat. When refugees refused to jump into the ocean, the smugglers would threaten them with a gun. If they still refused, they were shot. When people struggling in the water attempted to grab hold of the side of one of the boats still floating, their hands were beaten with the butts of guns. So Abdulahi’s journey toward freedom was punctuated with the bodies of comrades floating in the sea.
Once the smugglers receive their pay, they often put refugees on a vessel that is barely seaworthy and without a crew. Salad Mohamed Iber was 22 years old when we interviewed him in Greece. He was 16 when he left Mogadishu. By the time he was ready to leave Somalia, he only had five dollars left. He set out from Boosasso on what he called a raft carrying 130 people. Those 130 souls were in the sea for three days and three nights without food or water. Salad said many people were ready to jump into the sea. Finally, when they could see the shore, a boat came to pick them up. The 130 people were so excited that they all moved to one side of their boat. Because the weight on that side was so heavy, the boat flipped. As Salad struggled to survive, 74 of the 130 people drowned. Simply because they were happy to be alive, more than half of the original passengers died. Salad was in Yemen for over three years. He slept on sidewalks and washed cars for money. In the wintertime, people would put money together and rent a room, where they could put enough mattresses together to accommodate 30 or 40 Somali refugees. Finally, Salad walked to Saudi Arabia. He walked for 25 days.
Of course the danger does not always arise directly from the smugglers. Sadia Mohmoud Hasan was 16 when she left Somalia. She paid $70 dollars to a smuggler in order to be transported on what she called a raft. She was on this boat for two days and two nights when the engine stopped working. Luckily for her, the smugglers towed the boat back to Boosasso and repaired the engine. Then they tried again. When they approached the shore on their second voyage, the refugees saw what appeared to be fishermen with guns. The fishermen and the smugglers soon exchanged fire. Then the smugglers ordered the refugees out of the boat. Sadia says that the boys knew how to swim, so they helped the girls survive. When the refugees reached the coast, they started walking. They walked for a full day and night without food or water. Finally they reached a refugee camp called Maiafa. Soon they were transferred to another camp the residents called Al Jahima, which is another word for Hell. The residents of this second camp told them that conditions were so bad there, they would never survive, so they made their way to Saudi Arabia.
The Saudis often send refugees back to Somalia. According to the Geneva Conventions, this is illegal, but the Saudis send people back anyway. That is what happened to Ahmed. Ahmed wasn’t making enough money in Yemen to support himself and his family, so he attempted to go to Saudia Arabia. He explains that smugglers hide refugees in the undercarriage of a truck, but they are often detected. When the Saudis catch Somali refugees, the Saudis regularly send them all the way back to Somalia. For many, Ahmed explains, this is an endless cycle.
Ahmed has been in Yemen since just after the civil war began in 1991. It is easy to understand why Ahmed felt desperate enough to try to escape Yemen holding onto the underside of a truck. He says that in Al Kharaz refugee camp, the UNHCR gives Ahmed and his family approximately $20.00 worth of food every month. In Ahmed’s view, he needs $200 more a month to support his wife and four children. To make up the difference, Ahmed attempts to wash cars. However, in order to keep his ration card in the camp, he must be present in Al Kharaz for two weeks a month. This only leaves him two weeks every month to work. Nevertheless, in order to work in city, he must rent a portion of a room that houses 5 or 6 other men for an entire month, at the price of $20 a month. For the two weeks he is free, Ahmed works 12 hours a day, 7 days a week. On the best of days, Ahmed says that he makes about $5.00. Often, he makes nothing.
But consider the conditions. It is not as if Ahmed could get a job at the local car wash. Indeed, in spite of the right of refugees to work, which is guaranteed in the Geneva Conventions, Somali refugees cannot be employed in Yemen. Therefore, Ahmed must get himself a bucket and a rag, go to the parking lots of offices, restaurants and cinemas and beg for the privilege of washing someone’s car. The patrons then decide how much they are willing to pay Ahmed. Usually, of course, he is simply brushed off, but occasionally, people will agree to pay Ahmed the change in their pocket or a dollar or two to have their vehicle cleaned. Sometimes, people agree to pay, and then when the work is done, they refuse to give Ahmed his due. Unfortunately, there are other times when the police will have been alerted to thieves working in a certain parking lot, so that Ahmed will show up and find himself arrested or chased off by police without understanding why.
In spite of the frustration, Ahmed continues to wash cars. “I don’t have any choice,” he says. Ahmed explains that if he earns $30.00 a month, he is very lucky. That leaves him about $170 short of what he needs to support his wife, two sons and two daughters, the youngest of whom is only two years old.
Therefore, Ahmed has decided to find families to care for his children while he leaves Yemen and makes his way through the difficult refugee route that leads to Italy by way of Libya. According to the International Organization for Migration there are an estimated 1 to 1.5 million African refugees already in Libya waiting to cross the Mediterranean to Europe. The IOM also estimates that more than 31,000 refugees crossed from Libya to the Italian island of Lampedusa in 2008 alone. This is double the number who tried the year before but a small percentage of the refugees waiting to cross. On March 31, 2009, two boats capsized carrying 270 immigrants. More than 200 are feared to have drowned. No one knows the percentage of would-be refugees who drown every year trying to make that crossing, but the numbers are high, perhaps as high as 30%. Moreover, in order to reach Libya would-be refugees must cross Sudan and the Sahara desert, and many more perish crossing those treacherous barriers. When asked if he understood the risks he was about to undertake, Ahmed said, “Yes, I know, but what else can I do?” It was difficult not to wonder aloud what would happen to Ahmed’s children if he were to perish on the way to Europe. “I understand what you are trying to say,” Ahmed responded, “but I have no other choice.”
As we learned from Sadia, Somali refugees have referred to one of the camps in Yemen as Al Jahima, the name of a very punishing hell in Islam. It is easy enough to understand why. Ahmed reports that it is extremely hot there, and people in the camp have no electricity. They don’t get enough food, either. Because of this lack of nourishment, medical problems like diarrhea and dysentery are rampant, and medical care is ridiculously inadequate. Reaching Yemen is a dangerous journey for the refugees, but leaving is even more difficult. The only thing harder, apparently, is trying to live in Al Kharaz.
Doug Rutledge, Ph.D.
Writer
The Somali Documentary Project
[email protected]