Many people do not accept refugees because of the lack of understanding. Refugees do not choose to migrate, in fact many struggle to leave their homes behind. The crisis in Myanmar is linked with the mass persecution of the Rohingya population in the country, many were forced to flee as the military led violent attacks against their communities. – Sulaiman’s story
Misconceptions and myths regarding Refugees
In our country, we will find many refugees here in our local communities, who fled in terror from genocides, war, civil unrest and other forms of conflict in their home countries.
My name is Sulaiman. My family and I lived in terror in my country as they were shooting and killing our people day and night. Source from the official report, until 2018 more than 25000 Rohingya have been killed due to religious persecution and genocide, ten of thousands of women were raped and more than 700000 have fled abroad. We made the decision to flee despite the long and perilous journey by boat.
In 2013 after nightfall, hundreds of us were crammed into boats without food or water, with the desperate hope of landing safely. Many did not survive the voyage and worse still, many fell into the hands of human traffickers. But it was a risk we had to take to survive, and at least to give my children a hope to live. May God be praised that we safely made it to Malaysia.
Life is extremely hard as an asylum seeker. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) grants asylum seekers an identity card, which protects and enables refugees with a level of protection which may reduce the risk of arrest, prevents deportation to their country of origin where their freedom or lives may be at risk, and allows limited access to health services, education and other essential support services from UNHCR, its partner organizations or other parties. The wait to receive this card, however, is very long. I received my UNHCR card in 2018, which enabled me to work with an NGO as a teacher for refugee children. I teach English and other subjects to the refugee children, as I strongly believe that Education is the way out of poverty, to give these children the hope of a better life.
Schools for refugee children are not part of the national school system, and therefore do not receive the same syllabus and resources. It is our hope that people will come forward to volunteer as teachers to teach our children English, Bahasa Malaysia, Mathematics, Science, Arts, Computers, etc. Most of our children like to draw.
Because of political conflicts, Rohingya were forced to leave their own country. Now repatriation to the country of origin is not possible, resettlement to other countries is slim so local integration is the only option for Rohingya refugees in Malaysia, and Malaysians can play a big role to make it possible. Remember Jesus said in Matthew 25:40 “Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.”
Yahweh protects the stranger, he sustains the orphan and the widow. Yahweh loves the upright, but he frustrates the wicked. – Psalm 146:9
