13 May 2019

Expert: Refugees in Aotearoa

From Afternoons, 2:26 pm on 13 May 2019

According to the United Nations, a refugee is someone who has been forced to flee his or her country because of persecution, war or violence. They have a well-founded fear of persecution for reasons of race, religion, nationality, political opinion or membership in a particular social group and most likely, they cannot return home or are afraid to do so.

There are 25.5 million refugees registered with the United Nations but less than one percent get resettled.

A Syrian refugee family at the Mangere Refugee Resettlement Centre.

A Syrian refugee family at the Mangere Refugee Resettlement Centre. Photo: 123RF

Dr Arif Saeid is the president of the Refugee Council of New Zealand

Originally from Afghanistan, where he was a medical doctor, Dr Saeid came to New Zealand in January 2000. He was a convention refugee – someone who comes as an asylum seeker and is accepted as a refugee.

“Every refugee will be asylum seeker first, either they’re processed offshore or in New Zealand, or any other countries," he says.

Quota refugees are processed by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees whereas asylum seekers are processed by New Zealand Immigration directly.

Dr Saeid worked under the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, which he says was very hard and he could not tolerate it anymore.

“Taliban are all against the women education, also with medical staff as well, we could not practice as freely as a physician will practice so life got very hard for me… my wife is also a medical doctor, we both worked under the Taliban regime.”

The war in Afghanistan started a long time before the Taliban, he says, and he and his wife did not want to leave so they stayed until the wars got worse. They loved the work they were doing, he says.

When Saied first came to New Zealand, it wasn’t possible for him to work as a medical doctor and wanting to work, he began as an interpreter and got involved in volunteer work with refugee communities.

For the last five years he has been the Refugee Council of New Zealand president.

Dr Saeid has four children, three of whom came over with he and his wife. They’ve gone on to study architecture, medicine, law and the youngest is in their last year of high school.

There needs to be research done to find out what kind of work refugees go into once here, Dr Saeid says, to quantify the contribution of refugees in New Zealand.

“There are a lot of contributions from refugee background people in New Zealand, definitely.

“New Zealand does not cherry pick, there are other countries who are cherry picking, New Zealand's quota refugee is based on humanitarian – whoever is in more need we will pick them first.

“So, we are not going to the refugee camps, we are not going to pick up who is a doctor, who is an engineer, but we pick up the pick the people who are really genuinely in need of settlement or protection.”

He says he is proud to be a refugee.

“That’s how I came to New Zealand, I’m also proud to be a Kiwi, I’ve settled here, my children, everyone in the family settled here in New Zealand, we are proud Kiwis.”

While he feels lucky, he says a lot of refugees have survivor’s guilt.

“Why I’ve survived, why I’m lucky to be in such a peaceful country, why not my brother? Because some people who’ve lost their family members, they feel guilty.

“We do have refugee background people who put the food on the table, but they can’t eat because they know where their mum, dad or brother or sisters, they know they don’t have food to eat.”

His family had a lot of hope for Afghanistan stabilising but no longer do.

“Hopefully one day it will get safer and better and one of my biggest wishes is to go but where I worked in the last five year with MSF (Doctors Without Borders) in a very remote area... people do not have access to medical as much as the big cities have. When we start working in that area there was population of 60,000 people and they did not have proper medical doctor, trained medical doctor, for 20 years because of the war.”

He says here in New Zealand, we can’t ignore that people face discrimination when applying for jobs when their name is Fatima or Mohammed. Some employers don’t understand and believe it’s taking a risk to hire someone of a different religion or who wears different clothing.

Some of these people are moving to Australia because of this, he says.

New Zealand has been taking in refugees from various places around the world for more than 100 years. The earliest were groups of Danes fleeing suppression of their language and culture under German occupation in the 1870s.

Polish refugees came to New Zealand after World War Two as well as Jewish children.

Nowadays, New Zealand accepts refugees from Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Columbia, and a small number from African countries.

“What happens in New Zealand, when New Zealand said quota for three years, for example, within these next three years we will accept people from these countries. Right now, at the moment, African refugees they are only based on family reunification and think it’s because of the cost… but also this new quota composition has included some refugees from Africa as well.”

New Zealand has gone from taking 750 refugees to taking 1000 refugees and this number will increase to 1500 next year.

“It’s wonderful,” says Dr Saeid.

“Some people may think, why should we accept refugees, why should will bring refugees, not only talk about the economic contribution later on but also when you have everything, you are living in a peaceful world, a peaceful community for example, when you see your neighbours, or other people are suffering, it’s a good gesture to hand some help to them.”

Syrian, Iraqi and Afghani refugees have come from countries that won’t forever be in war, he says, one day they may be able to return to their countries and contribute.

The majority of Bosnian refugees have gone back, he says.

Mangere Refugee Resettlement Centre's accommodation buildings.

Mangere Refugee Resettlement Centre's accommodation buildings. Photo: RNZ / Israa Emhail

What happens when a refugee arrives in New Zealand?

When a refugee first arrives in New Zealand, they are met at the airport by Immigration Officers and some people from the community they have come from in order to welcome them. They then stay in the Māngere resettlement centre for six weeks where they take English classes and NZQA assists with qualifications and they are assessed for employability. They go through medical tests and get immunisations and mental health support is given to anyone who needs it. Immigration processes them, and Red Cross staff meet with them.  A plan is made for the next steps to be undertaken once the person leaves the centre.

“For refugee’s it’s like honeymoon,” he says of the time spent in the resettlement centre. “Everything is in one place.”

Once they do leave the centre after the six weeks they will be under Red Cross care and every family will be allocated 2-3 support workers to help them find their way in New Zealand. Social workers will visit to make sure any extra needs are cared for.

 The model in New Zealand is very unique, he says.

“Refugees are not a burden, refugees are contributors, you can find out lots of businesses from refugees, lots of people are working from refugee backgrounds. They only time they need help is…when they first come,” he says.