Posts Tagged ‘UNHCR’

UNHCR Encourages Angolans to Return Home

Sunday, November 7th, 2010

By KELVIN SHIMOH*

Kawambwa, Zambia, Sunday 7 November, 2010: The UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) in Zambia has said it will continue to encourage Angolan refugees to consider voluntary repatriation.

UNHCR Representative in Zambia , Ms. Joyce Mends-Cole, briefing the press in Kawambwa District in northern Zambia following the holding of the Angolan tripartite meeting, said Angolans have limited time left. The tripartite meeting was held last week between the Governments of Angola and Zambia , including UNHCR.

“Angolan refugees should take advantage of the remaining period to repatriate. The Cessation Clause maybe invoked maybe invoked at the end of 2011. If this clause is invoked, it means that the refugee status of Angolans will cease refugees,” she explained. “As UNHCR, we believe the peace in Angola is durable.”

Ms Mends-Cole said while UNHCR is encouraging voluntary repatriation as the most preferred durable solution, other options such local integration and resettlement will be pursued.

The Zambian Government, together with UNHCR are currently conducting the spontaneous Angolan repatriation.

The UNHCR head in Zambia said her agency was currently conducting a re-verification exercise of refugees in the two settlements of Mayukwayukwa and Meheba, then the urban areas and the self-settled.

“So far, we have concluded the re-verification in Mayukwayukwa and we now have 9, 883, of which 8, 083 are Angolans. Of these Angolans in Mayukwayukwa, 52 percent want to return home, while 46 percent want to remain in Zambia , the rest are undecided,” she explained.

She said the Government of Zambia will decide on what to do with those Angolans who opt to remain in Zambia, while UNHCR will play its advocacy role to lobby for the refugees. She said there are a variety of reasons why some Angolan refugees don’t want to return to Angola. Some of the reasons she cited were the fact that some refugees were born in Zambia, others have lived in the country since 1966, while others are married to Zambians.

“The Government will decide what status to accord the refugees once the cessation clause is invoked. As for us as UNHCR, we will continue with our advocacy role to ensure that some alternative status is given to the Angolan refugees,” she said.

Between 2003 and 2007, UNHCR and the Government of Zambia repatriated 74, 000 Angolan refugees under the organized repatriation. An additional 2, 400 have been repatriated since 2008 under the ongoing Angolan spontaneous repatriation.

“The repatriation this year for Angolans has been slow. We have only managed to move two convoys,” said Ms. Mends-Cole.

*Kelvin Shimoh is UNHCR Zambia spokesman.

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40,000 CONGOLESE REFUGEES REPATRIATED FROM ZAMBIA IN THREE YEARS

Thursday, September 23rd, 2010

Kasama, Zambia Thursday 23 September 2010*. A total of 40, 000 Congolese refugees have been repatriated from Zambia since 2007, this is according to UN Refugee Agency Zambia Head of Sub Office for Luapula and Northern Provinces, Mr. Phillipe Creppy.

Meanwhile, the Zambian Government has expressed happiness for reaching the 40, 000 mark in the Congolese repatriation.

Mr. Creppy, speaking to the local media, on the sidelines of a Congolese repatriation technical cross-border in Kasama today, involving the Zambian and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) Governments, UNHCR and other partners, said the milestone has been achieved owing to the support from the two Governments, Donors and the willingness of refugees to return home.

The Cross-border Meeting will review progress made in the Congolese voluntary repatriation so far and find the way forward.

Since the Congolese voluntary repatriation programme for 2010 recommenced in March, a total of 6, 200 refugees had been repatriated.

“The plan for 2010 is to repatriate 7, 000. So we are way on target. The willingness of Congolese refugees to repatriate at Kala and Mwange camps to repatriate is very high,” explained Mr. Creppy.

Mr. Creppy announced that Mwange Refugee camp in Mporokoso District of Northern Province is planned to be closed on 28 September 2010, with Kala camp in Kawambwa, Luapula Province, earmarked for closure by the end of next month.

“This means that all those Congolese refugees who are not willing to repatriate from the two camps will be relocated to Meheba Refugee Settlement in North Western Province. But I am glad that more refugees are opting to repatriate to Congo,” said Creppy.

The Zambian Government’s Refugee Officer for Kala camp, Dr. Dominic Minyoi, under the Commissioner for Refugees’ Office in the Ministry of Home Affairs, said Government was happy for achieving the 40, 000 target.

He said this target had been achieved because the Government of Zambia had been firm with regard to achieving the most desirable durable solution of voluntary repatriation.

Dr. Minyoi thanked the chiefs in Luapula and Northern provinces for having given land to host the refugees.

“We believe the Government will put in place measures to ensure that the assets and land at Mwange and Kala is put to good use for the benefit of the host community,” said Minyoi.

UNHCR Head of Sub Office in Lubumbushi, DRC, Ms Mahoua Parums, also speaking on the sidelines Cross-border meeting described the situation in DRC’s Katanga Province as stable.

“As DRC we have planned for the repatriation and have so far received over 40, 000 refugees whom we are giving food and non food items,” she explained.

This progress could be attributed to the active support of the two Governments of DRC and Zambia, including other partners.

The Congolese voluntary repatriation from Zambia started in 2007 and will end in December 2010.

*Story courtesy of Kelvin Shimo, UNHCR, Zambia.

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TWO OF ZAMBIA’S REFUGEE CAMPS TO CLOSE DOWN

Monday, September 6th, 2010

By ZAMBIA NEWS FEATURES CORRESPONDENT

Mwange and Kala refugee camps in Zambia’s Northern and Luapula Provinces, respectively, will be shut down by December this year.

The two camps will join Ukwimi Refugee Camp in  Eastern Province which closed down several years ago when Mozambican refugees where repatriated to their country at the end of a civil war there in the 1990s.

The United Nations High Commission for Refuges (UNHCR) and the Zambian government said in a joint statement Monday that refugees, mostly Congolese, not willing to be repatriated to their countries, would be relocated to Meheba Refugee Camp in North-Western Province.UNHCR Logo

A total of 248 Congolese refugees from Mwange are being relocated to Meheba following a pilot relocation early in July in which 388 refugees were relocated to the camp near Solwezi which housed Angolan refugees for a long time.

“The refugees being relocated from Mwange are those who are not willing to repatriate to the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), and have not signed up for repatriation under the on-going Congolese voluntary repatriation. The relocation of those refugees from Kala camp not willing to repatriate to the DRC will also start in due course.

“Both Kala and Mwange are scheduled to be closed before December 2010 when the Congolese voluntary repatriation ends. The relocation is meant to consolidate the refugee populations from Kala and Mwange into Meheba to make provision of protection and assistance by the Government, UNHCR and other partners, cost effective and efficient,” the statement said.

The statement quotes Home Affairs Permanent Secretary Ndiyoi Mutiti as saying that the relocation was necessary to ensure that all those Congolese refugees still in the camps were moved before the two camps closed at the end of 2010.

“As Government, we will close the two camps at the end of the Congolese repatriation exercise. I wish to urge all Congolese refugees therefore to seriously think of voluntary repatriation as the first and more favourable option,” she advised,” Mutiti said.

UNHCR Representative in Zambia Joyce Mends-Cole assured that the relocation would be done in safety and dignity but also reiterated the need for Congolese refugees to consider going back to the DRC.

“For UNHCR, relocation is not a durable solution but is only a temporal solution arising from postponement of critical decisions that would have enabled Congolese refugees to start rebuilding their lives if they opted to return home. Congolese refugees should therefore take the opportunity to return home now rather than regret the decisions they make now in the future if they opt not to go home. Those Congolese refugees who come forward for repatriation will be assisted to return home, while those who have not yet decided to repatriate will be relocated,” Mends-Cole said.

The Government of the Republic of Zambia, UNHCR, together with the International Organization for Migration (IOM), commenced the voluntary repatriation exercise of Congolese refugees from the DRC in 2007. Since 2007 to-date, a total of 38, 169 Congolese refugees have returned home from Zambia under the repatriation programme. The Government and UNHCR will continue to sensitise and encourage Congolese refugees to seriously consider voluntary repatriation as the most viable option for them.

Zambia hosts some 20,350 Congolese refugees, with about 4,145 of them in Mwange and another 3,698 in the Kala camp in the far north of the country. Additionally, there are 3,280 in Meheba and 847 in Mayukwayukwa refugee settlements in the North-Western and Western provinces. Another 1,845 are in urban areas, while 6,535 are self-settled in the local communities.

(Edited by Gershom Ndhlovu. Contact Us at editor@zambianewsfeatures.com)

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