Stories of Courage
Cape Town Courage: Refugees,
Yes – Victims, No
Refugees who make it to Cape Town, at
the southernmost tip of the African continent invariably
come from countries thousands of miles away. Thus Cape Town
undoubtedly hosts some of the most resilient and most courageous
among Africa’s
refugees. Leading up to World Refugee Day, UNHCR spoke to
four of them. Different as their fates may be, they have
one thing in common, they did not allow themselves to be
victimised: Medi the uncompromising footballer, Maria Magdalena,
the caring lawyer, Jean Pierre the dental therapist and double
refugee, and Abdullah, the underpaid vet.
Professional mind in a professional body
Medi is a well trained and good-looking
young man. A professional footballer from a francophone country
in Central Africa, he was full of hope when he got asylum
in South Africa. At least he had a profession that was
needed everywhere, he thought. But his hopes were nearly
shattered in time to come. “I played for many teams, in all leagues and on all levels. Everywhere I gave my best, full heartedly,” he tells in impeccable English, “But
I never got back what I deserved.”
Incredible things happened to Medi. He would play in a
club for several months, help the team climb up in their
league and never get paid. He would find another club that
wanted to employ him, but the former team would withhold
his playing licence and leave him in limbo.
Several teams invited him to join in for a friendly game “to see how he played”. He’d
play his heart out only to realise later that he was being
taken for a ride. The soccer club just needed a strong player
to enhance the team for that particular game, but never intended
to keep him.
Once he got a very attractive job offer from a club. “But my agent got too greedy. He wanted a much larger commission than they were prepared to pay and in the end I lost that opportunity.” The
agent got nothing, and Medi was on the streets once again.
How did he stay in shape and keep up his form during these
periods? “I did my own training. My mind is professional.
My body is professional. I did not let go.”
It is only his friend who takes me aside and tells me that
Medi was sleeping in an asylum and the streets for long periods
of time and that for many months he survived on nothing but
bananas and bread – and yet he never gave up.
“I am not the only one who has experienced that.” A lot of foreign soccer players, refugees and others, went through similar ordeals, Medi explains. This is why he decided that enough was enough. He teamed up with other footballers of foreign origin and they founded a team of their own, “Africa United”.
Medi is the coach, a player, the captain and the manager
of the team. They do not have a training ground, nor jerseys
or money. “But we will not be left at the mercy of managers!” says Medi. He is currently negotiating with a potential sponsor and is very confident. “We
have some of the finest soccer players in Africa and in two
seasons from now we will play premier league, he says. And
he is dead serious about it.
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God wanted me to experience the lows
Maria Magdalena has come a long way. The
lawyer from West Africa says she “experienced the highs
and lows of refugee life.”
Today, she is a well known and respected figure in the
Captonian NGO community, working for an organisation that
counsels and assists women in South Africa. She completed
her post graduate law diploma, published a book on refugees
and privately supports refugee women wherever she can.
But things were quite different a few years ago, when she
first arrived with two small children (one and two years
old) and her husband left her.
To make a living during those first years Maria Magdalena
tried selling in the streets. As she knew no one and could
not afford a crèche, she had to lock her small children in her room while she went to work. To be able to work at home she took up washing and ironing other people’s
laundry. The money was hardly enough for her little family
to survive.
To keep herself from going mad from worries, hunger and loneliness
she talked to their baby children as if they were adults.
They did not u nderstand a word of what she said “I
had to talk to someone!”
At some point in time she even considered killing her children
and herself. “But the taught of my mother kept me alive.” That
woman had sacrificed so much to give Maria Magdalena a good
education and a good live. She could not throw that way.
In her darkest hour a neighbour gave her the address of the
Refugee Forum, an NGO dealing with refugees in Cape Town.
She went there and, being articulate, being a lawyer and
being fluent in English and French, got a job: helping other
women.
Gradually her situation improved. Today she is recognised,
integrated, a strong professional woman in her own right.
But she did not forget where she came from. “Unlike
many others I was privileged to have an education. But I
do come from the gutter and I understand people who are in
a similar situation.”
Maria Magalene is deeply religious. God, she says, put her
through this experience with a purpose. To learn from it
and to help others. “That is my mission and I will
stick to it.”
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Dental therapy as mental therapy
Jean Pierre is
31 years old and has experienced more in his young life
than many an octogenarian ever has. From his country of
origin in Central Africa he had to flee to a neighbouring
country a few years ago. He was recognised as a refugee
and applied for a scholarship with UNHCR to finish his
studies of economics. When the only available scholarship
was one for dental therapy, he did not think twice but
took it. Better to have a second choice career than loiter
in a refugee camp without hope, he thought. When finished,
he immediately found work – as a dental therapist
among his countrymen in a refugee camp. Receiving all these
refugees at his office made him suspect among the spies of
his home country who were active in the camp. They accused
him of clandestine political work and he started receiving
death threats.
This is when he had to flee for a second time. He ended up
in Cape Town and for the first eight months did not know
where to turn and what to do. He started looking for refugee
assistance —and ended up giving assistance to refugees.
Today Jean Pierre is running the integration and orientation
programme at the Bonne Esperance, a shelter for refugee women
and children. And while he helps them to become self-reliant
and economically independent, he also does dental screening
and dental hygiene training for the refugee children as well.
Jean Pierre is happy to have a job and a meaningful one for
that matter. But what he really hopes for is peace in his
country so he can return and get his real life back.
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Struggling
for animal lives and for his own
While Maria Magdalena and Jean Pierre
made it, Abdullah (not his real name) is still struggling.
He is a veterinarian from the DRC and has been in South Africa
for 18 months. “They need vets here,” he says,
and one would expect South African authorities to be pleased
with receiving a full fledged vet for free. But the obstacles
are high.
In order to have his diploma recognised,
Abdullah would have to pay a fee of 5,000 Rand upfront
to be admitted to a veterinary exams and another 1,500
Rand for a language test. This is way out of his league,
he says. Abdullah is
not unemployed, on the contrary. His services are needed. He leads
the emergency squad of a veterinary clinic, rushing off to animal
emergencies in and around Cape Town for first aid interventions.
A demanding job indeed, even for a seasoned vet. But Abdullah only
earns 2,000 Rand whereas the veterinary nurse assisting him gets
5,000. “This
is not fair! They take advantage of my plight. But what
can I do? I do not have official papers so I have to accept
this pittance.”
How he will ever get the money to
pay the exam fees, he does not know. But he will fight
on. “I want to continue my
studies. I want to specialise in epidemiology. Africa needs such
people and I know I will make it one day,” he
says and off he goes to save another animal.
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