RESPECT International Blog

Here it is the very First Issue of the Magazine edited by RESPECT REFUGEES International that includes the most important articles from the E-zines published in 2009 and the beginning of 2010.

Hope you will enjoy reading the magazine and you will share this with your friends.

We’s like to thank the Authors of this issue:

Shannon Alderman

Raja M Ali

Maria Brundin

Trish Harris

Kenneth Karest Lewela

Abby Jenkins Macedo

Paulo Muller

Laura Premoli

Mohammed Riazuddin

Suzan Salem

Linda Salim

Marc Schaeffer

Kirsty Semple

Uma Sharma

Olivia Wallace

Atuu Waonaje

Barny Whitwham

To Dowload this Issue, click here

[ http://issuu.com/enjoythemarket/docs/respect ]

Country:

• Democratic Republic of the Congo

Description:

• Primary School Ase’Eci has 6 classes, but only 3 are running due to the difficulties in the country.
• The school is situated near the Uvira-Fizi road in DRC. It is bordered by Lake Tanganyika in the East, by the mountains in the West, by the Kahama village in the North and by the Pemba mountain in the South.
• Lessons are given in Swahili and French.
• A penpal programme is vital for us.

Comments:

• 66 students are interested by RESPECT International programme and would like to find a penpal.
• Our school has numerous problems. We would like you to guide us, advise us and assist us, as you can, to try and answer the needs expressed by the children in their letters. We have no support to help them.

Help this schoo or other refugee schools like it from our website: http://www.respectrefugees.org/

To celebrate the inauguration of the new Online United Nations Volunteer (UNV) site on December 5, 2008, Ashok Pillai, RESPECT University coordinator, was invited to participate through video conference as an online volunteer of RESPECT University at UNV, India, New Delhi.

The UNV headquarters are in Bonn, Germany, and held here the conference was attended by local online volunteers and officials. The event provided an opportunity to highlight the value of online volunteers. Ashok informed the audience of RESPECT International’s programs and the opportunities it creates for both refugee students and their online volunteer tutors, both of whom gain immense satisfaction from the experience.

“RESPECT University may be about post-secondary education to refugees and IDPs, but it also formed a bridge which brought people on both sides of the fence closer. RESPECT University is a virtual institution yet it holds out hope for a better tomorrow for the less privileged.

Those present seemed to appreciate the work of online volunteers associated with RESPECT University and its work and achievements may be documented in an effort to inspire others to join online volunteering.” Mohammed Riazuddin

For opportunities for online volunteering visit the Online United Nations Volunteer (UNV) site.

For more information on RESPECT International visit our website.

“Even Einstein was a refugee, and the difference between success and failure is determination.”

This is a quotation from Bilombele Asukulu: a refugee originally from Democratic Republic of Congo who fled to Nyarugusu Refugee Camp in the United Republic of Tanzania in 1996. Whilst living in the camp he was struck by the hopeless situation the youths of the camp found themselves in. After escaping violence in Congo they now had no education and no way to build a future for themselves.

What little that could be done for them was done. Holding classes under a tree with no blackboard or materials. Some of the youths gave up, some returned to Congo to join the militias whilst a few remained in education. Seeking to bring hope to the young people he started NECH: New Educational Center for Hope.

He made contact with RESPECT International in 2003 via the Internet. This contact enabled him to use RESPECTs experience and resources to affect change in his community. Some of the activities now available in the camp are letter exchange programs, RESPECT University programs, HIV/AIDS campaigns, human rights campaigns, peace and reconciliation education, conflict resolution education, orphans education sponsorship and unmarried mother support.

Currently, there are 130 children in NECH, with funding for materials coming from fees paid by students, founding members contributions and donations. In the future Bilombele hope to continue building on what he has started and provide more resources, including books, to aid the children’s learning.

To find out more about the work RESPECT is doing please click here.

Working to Empower
Forced Migration Review
Strategies for Hope
International Alliance for HIV/AIDS.

Kakuma Refugee Camp, Kenya, serves people who have been forcibly displaced from their home countries due to war or persecution from countries such as Ethiopia, Democratic Republic of Congo, Uganda, Rwanda, Somalia andSudan. It is administered by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and, according to their current statistics, the camp population stands at just under 50,000 refugees.

Produced by journalists from each of the countries of origin is the independant news magazine KANERE, or the Kakuma News Reflector. The magazine was started to create a more open vision of society within the refugee camp and a platform for fair public debate on refugee affairs. The magazine contents include:

• a letter from the editor introducing the contents
• Arts
• Community and Culture
• Education
• Health
• Peace and Security
• Human Rights
• News Updates

Also, international contributers add to the online magazine. A print version of this is distrubuted within the camp.

The opportunity for communication that this magazine provides in invaluable to the refugees. Once they are admitted to the camp they cannot move freely around the country but must apply for a permit. The refugees now have a voice and readerc can learn what life in a refugee camp is really like from the people who live there day in day out.

To read the online magazine click here: Kakuma News Reflector – A Refugee Free Press

Located in Kampala, Uganda, the RESPECT University students are urban refugees whose countries of origin include Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Somalia, and Burundi. Due to wars and genocides in the surrounding countries Uganda has witnessed an influx of refugees. Many of these people go straight to the capital Kampala while others move there from the refugee camps seeking more opportunities and better living conditions.

One of the problems the refugees face is that they don’t speak English. This hinders their day to day existence as they cannot communicate what they want. It also impacts their futures because they cannot study at English speaking universities, apply for jobs or testify in court against the people responsible for violence and discrimination against them. Also without regular paid work they cannot afford to pay for medical care or education.

This is where the RESPECT Functional Adult Literacy Program comes in. It offers refugees free adult literacy courses. This enables the students to improve their lives and the lives of their families.

The Functional Adult Literacy (FAL) at Refugee Law Project (RLP) is currently coordinating the following courses with RESPECT University: Early Childhood Development, International Human Rights (English), International Human Rights (French), International Relations, Business Administration, Small and Medium Business, Persuasive Writing, and Information Technology. A total of 62 students are enrolled in these courses.

The program started with the placement of a small notice inviting people who were interested to fill out registration forms. At this stage there were no tutors and so subjects that would be taught were yet to be decided upon. Therefore, the students were asked what they would be interested in learning, after which RESPECT University coordinator, Ashok Pillai, connected them with tutors. Interest in the program was far greater than initially anticipated.

Many students were keen to learn English. This would enable them to continue their education in English speaking universities or relocate to English-speaking countries. Some wanted to be able t read newspapers of listen to news broadcasts to keep up to date with world affair and the situations in their own countries. Others wanted to become English teachers or work as interpreters. Some simply wanted to make their daily lives in Kampala easier by improved communication.

Jenkins Macedo was born in Liberia, he was forced to flee to Sierra Leone after the Civil War broke out in the late 1980’s, then to Guinea, Ivory Coast and Ghana. His journey as a refugee lasted 14 years at the beginning of which he was separated from his mother.

“You are sometimes isolated from the greater society; you have lots of needs which include education, food, shelter, clean and safe drinking water, and so on,” he explained, adding that “refugees feel rejected because citizens of most host countries develop several stereotypes and prejudices which make it difficult to integrate or fit into their society.”

Jenkins recalled that “I lived in Ghana at the Buduburam Refugee Camp for about 11 years and the experiences there were much different from what I experienced in Guinea and Sierra Leone.

Each country has it’s own laws and policies to deal with where the refugees live and their access to basic services. Often depending on whether the refugees are integrated into the communities of their host countries or treated separately.

“Things became even more difficult living in a refugee camp. Without employment and means to generate income most refugees find it difficult to survive throughout the day and they mostly relied on the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) for the limited food supplies distributed per month,” he added.

In Ghana in 2004, Jenkins was intorduced to Marc Schaefer, founder and president of RESPECT. He then became program coordinator for RESPECT Ghana, which he did for two years before moving to the United States in December 2006 through the US Refugee Program.

He is now a student at Worcester State College, Massachusetts and still working with RESPECT as a technical advisor to RESPECT Ghana and a representative of RESPECT International based in Massachusetts.

“Working with RESPECT Ghana on the Buduburam refugee camp was great,” he said. “I was able to transform myself and overcome my own limitations, and develop the skills and zeal to help my people and unfortunate Ghanaians, Sierra Leonean refugees and countless other people from other parts of Africa.

“I like it and, someday, it is my hope to develop my own non-profit entity to help solve the issues of poverty in Africa by providing the skills that they can used to reduce poverty in their own communities.”

Helping People Help Themselves

Learning and education acts as a starting point for people to be able to help themselves out of poverty, in turn leading to a more peaceful society through increased prosperity. Jenkins Macedo held a book drive to supply educational materials, books and used computers to give people access to the education they want.

Mutual Inspiration

Linda St. Germain, a student at Worcester State College, United States, involved the student council in the book drive, taking the opportunity to benefit not only the African students but the students of her own college.

Another school to get involved was the Fanning Learning Center in Worcester: an alternative to mainstream school for students with difficult home lives. Theresa Venuti, a teacher at Fanning, encouraged her students to each bring books from home. The feeling of helping other people helped the students at Fanning to believe they can get over their fears and have hope in their own futures. The hope is that the students at Fanning will choose careers human service as a result of the first step taken here.

Further Information

For more information on the book drive click here.

RESPECT International website click here.

For updates please subscribe to our ezine.

Refugees in Uganda

Uganda is a haven for refugees from the surrounding countries who are escaping wars in Sudan, Somalia, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Burindi, Eritrea and the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Kampala’s Urban Refugees

The word refugee often conjures up images of rural refugee camps however the city of Kampala has some 30,000 refugees living there. Some have moved from the rural camps whilst others go directly there from their country of origin. They are drawn there by the promise of better living standards and job opportunities but the reality of living as an urban refugee does not always offer descent living standards.

It is difficult for refugees to find permanent jobs either because they do not have a permit, they do not speak english or because they are discriminated against as foreigners. Without work they cannot afford medical care, or education and find it difficult to improve their lives and the lives of their families.

Our Work in Kampala

Since 2007 Joan McDonald has been working with RESPECT International as a field coordinator. She works to coordinate RESPECT university courses to refugee students in Kampala, communicating with tutors, downloading lessons and uploading completed assignments.

Refugee Law Project

Putting her certificate in Teaching English as a Second Language to good use Joan works with the Refugee Law Project: a Ugandan organisation whose aim is to protect and promote the human rights of refugees through Legal Aid and councelling, research and advocacy and education and training.

Learning English is a tool that people can use to improve their lives and the lives of their families. For those who cannot find work and therefore can’t afford the school fees the Refugee Law Project free adult literacy classes.

Further Information

For more information on Joan McDonald please click here.

To visit our website please click RESPECT International.

Or to visit the Refugee Law Project website click here.