A Safe Haven for Somalis in Uganda?
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Rift Valley Institute Briefing Paper August 2014 RIGHTS & REPRESENTATION A safe haven for Somalis in Uganda? By Gianluca Iazzolino Key points • There are growing numbers of Somali migrants in Uganda, where a Somali community has existed since colonial times. • Changes in the wider pattern of migration among Somalis in East Africa are driven by pressure on Somali refugees in Kenya and a more favourable legal framework The Horn of Africa (Der Spiegel) for refugees in Uganda. in neighbouring Kenya. Once they reached the • Ugandan security forces and Somali border, they re-applied for refugee status in community leaders share intelligence to Uganda. Others have applied as refugees in minimize the risk of attacks on Ugandan Uganda for the first time, after illegally venturing troops in Somalia and of terrorism in through Kenya from Somalia. This number does Uganda. not include Somalis with foreign and Somali • Uganda has emerged as a haven where passports based in or regularly travelling to Somalis can accrue financial, legal and Uganda. educational assets which facilitate This briefing examines the emergence of the physical and social mobility. Somali migration route to Uganda and its • As the Somali community in Uganda has significance in the long history of Somali migration expanded business has grown, and clan- in East Africa. It discusses the factors underlying based Somali student unions have the decision-making processes of Somali refugees emerged where political aspirations are in relation to cross-border movement. And it asks cultivated. whether the Somali flows to Uganda are a short- term trend in response to a deterioration in living conditions and security in Kenya—the main recipient of Somali displaced people since the Introduction collapse of the Somali state in 1991—or whether they are part of a larger phenomenon, the In recent years, a growing number of Somali formation of a diaspora with a longer time horizon. refugees have moved to Uganda, settling in some areas of the capital Kampala or in the Nakivale The new pattern of mobility may reflect an idea of refugee camp, located in the south of the country. mobility not only as a coping strategy, but also as According to Uganda's Office of the Prime Minister an investment of resources in the expectation of a (OPM), the main administrative body which deals return. This return can take the shape of assets— with refugee affairs, the number of registered legal documents such as identity cards and Somali refugees in the country increased to 41,515 academic qualifications, but also hard currency in the year to March 2014. The influx rose from derived from business opportunities—which 27,143 in December 2012 and 8,239 in 2008. 1 The enables both physical and social mobility. Indeed, overwhelming majority were previously refugees the dynamics informing the pattern of movement Rift Valley Institute | Nairobi Forum | Briefing Paper | A New Home in Uganda| August 2014 | Page 2 of 9 examined here relate not only to security needs of the Kampala. Then, it narrows the focus on the but also to aspirations and desires in a current situation, analysed in the light of the legal multifaceted Somali refugee populations of framework which regulates the rights of refugees entrepreneurs and prospective students. in Uganda, and on the heterogeneous—in terms of aspirations and legal status—population which This analysis of the growing Somali diaspora in makes up the Somali diaspora in urban Uganda, Uganda thus questions assumptions about conflict- with a focus on students and businesspeople. related displacement, suggesting that they may Eventually, it discusses the implications of this oversimplify the phenomenon by adopting a growing Somali presence in Uganda for Somalia. monolithic view of refugees. Somali mobility in historical New patterns of movement perspective Somali migration across East Africa is not a new Mobility is often considered a deeply ingrained phenomenon.2 The novelty of this steady influx to feature of the Somali culture and society, and is Uganda lies in the key drivers of migration at still used in defining current coping strategies.4 regional level: the growing pressure on Somali Most literature derives this argument from the refugees in Kenya, where state security concerns pastoralist livelihoods practiced since pre-colonial have increasingly permeated public discourse on times by Somali-speaking groups moving through refugee issues; Uganda's ‘progressive and human the dry lands of the Horn of Africa in search of rights oriented’3 refugee legal framework, based pastures and sources of water for their herds. on the 2006 Refugee Act and implemented in However, over time, others from the Somali 2010; and ease of access to neighbouring areas, territories, mainly from urban coastal areas, have particularly the Uganda–Democratic Republic of pursued different migration projects, embedded in the Congo (DRC) borderland, Rwanda and, until colonial armies or as seafarers, students or recent upheavals, South Sudan, where fresh labourers in the Gulf oil industry in the 1970s.5 business opportunities have drawn the interest of Other communities, particularly those settled resourceful refugees. But also to Somalia, thanks along the rivers Jubba and Shebelle and living off to direct flights connecting Entebbe to Mogadishu farming or small-scale livestock keeping, have a and to a visa policy which allows Somali passport- very limited history of mobility, at least prior to the holders to re-enter Uganda. outbreak of the Somali conflict in 1991. However, These drivers define the socio-political landscape at the regional level, nomadic groups have through which Somali refugees navigate, according established a broad presence, throughout the to individual skills and aspirations but also pre- colonial partition of the region and the subsequent existing configurations of power, often based on independence period. Since the Republic of clan. As this briefing argues, in recent years Somalia was born out of the merger of British Uganda has become at one time a safe haven in Somaliland and Somalia Italiana, irredentist claims troubled times and a place where many refugees over the Somali population scattered across from Somalia wait for resettlement to a third Djibouti, Ethiopia and Kenya have affected regional country, advance their education, manage their relations, resulting in tensions and wars, most business in the region and closely follow Somalia's notable the 1963 Shifta Wars, still haunting Kenyan winding path to recovery. relations with Somali citizens. At the same time, clan affiliations across state borders have proved a This briefing first describes the background against critical safety net in troubled times. This aspect which this Somali route to Uganda has emerged, became particularly significant as the Somali state providing an overview of Somali mobility across began to crumble during the 1980s and eventually East Africa and of the deterioration of Somali collapsed in 1991. Mass displacements initially refugees’ living conditions in Kenya. Next, it occurred in the northern regions, ravaged by the describes the Somali presence in Uganda, briefly war between the central government and the retracing its historical origins and the development Somali National Movement (SNM), and eventually of Kisenyi, as a new ‘Little Mogadishu’ in the heart Rift Valley Institute | Nairobi Forum | Briefing Paper | A New Home in Uganda| August 2014 | Page 3 of 9 to central and southern Somalia, following the authorities for the treatment of Somali refugees. overthrow of Somali president Siad Barre and the Despite the political prominence acquired by many eruption of an internecine conflict. Somali Kenyans during the Kibaki presidency (2002-2013), the business success of the Somali The ensuing humanitarian crisis displaced scores of diaspora in Kenya made refugees increasingly people, who crossed into Kenya and sought shelter appealing to corrupt police, who indiscriminately in humanitarian camps or urban centres. In targeted their victims as ‘walking ATMs’. general, refugees without resources headed Moreover, the degradation of security in Somalia towards the camps while those who were able to following the Ethiopian invasion in 2006 that secure their properties in advance or could rely on continued to displace people, the rise of al- kin in Kenya resettled in urban centres. A major Shabaab, its regional threat and growing insecurity pole of attraction was Nairobi's Eastleigh suburb. in the borderlands and in the Dadaab refugee Previously a residential area for Indian and Somali complex, increased the risk of a spill over of the Kenyans, the neighbourhood has acquired a Somali conflict into Kenya. Following a number of distinct Somali identity during the 1990s, to the attacks against Kenyan police, foreign point of being dubbed 'Little Mogadishu'. The humanitarian workers and tourists, the Kenyan steady flow of refugees initially fostered a government launched Operation Linda Nchi hospitality economy, drawing a growing number of (Protect the Country) in October 2011, officially to Somali Kenyans and Somalis from the diaspora, but strike al-Shabaab strongholds in southern Somalia also Kenyans and ethnic Oromo and Borana. As and prevent terrorist infiltrations into Kenya. many refugees were granted resettlement to a Instead, the operation achieved the opposite, third country, money transfer operators (MTOs) triggering a spiral of terror attacks, for which al- proliferated in the neighbourhood