The Chief Refugee


Artykuł pochodzi z pisma "New Warsaw Express"

Poland is not known as a very welcoming place for immigrants, but Simon Mol is among those working hard to change things. A published poet, journalist and the chairman of the Association of Asylum Seekers in Poland, he's been striving to get local bureaucracy to alter its generally unsympathetic treatment of refugees for almost five years now.
This is no small job, but even getting the organisation off the ground was a tough task. Simon admits that at first he was sceptical when a group of asylum seekers came to him with the idea of setting up the association.
"In Poland, you have to be resolved to carry on anything to its logical conclusion," he recalls. "I am a hardliner and I didn't want to work with people who were not resolved." Indeed, it took over two years and fifteen rejections before the organization was accepted and registered.
The association represents and organises support for refugees in a variety of different ways. Simon notes that even though Polish politicians are generally progressive when it comes to migrant issues, integration and accommodation are still major problems.
After leaving refugee centres, asylum recipients are guaranteed one year's accommodation as part of their integration program, for which they pay 20% of the rent. However, after this period, they must pay their own way, which means they need to have a job and to have overcome the language barrier - in which they get relatively little support.
One particular place where the organisation is trying to make a difference is by lobbying politicians directly on the treatment of refugees in Polish courts. Anyone who has dealt with our local justice system knows that it's no model of efficiency. But sometimes the ineptitude takes on gross proportions, as Simon alleges is true in the case of Cameroonian refugee Oben John.
Charged with rape on what Simon says is very tenuous evidence, Oben John has been detained for two years while his trial drags on through the courts. Little has been written about the case, possibly due to the reluctance of the Polish press to recognize the possible human rights violation. However, with the trial due to continue in February, some light may be shed on the matter. Simon has been paying close attention to the case, as he considers it a case study of human rights issues in Polish society.

Simon himself was born in Buea, the former capital of Cameroon, 1,500 metres above sea level, and just a couple of kilometres from the Atlantic ocean. Voicing his beliefs has robbed him of his homeland, and there is no guarantee that he will be able to return. Still, he does not intend to succumb to the pressure to silence him. Along with organizing activities for refugees in Poland, he has published several books, including "Africa… My Africa" and "Cameroon's Tower of Babel". His newest, "Life In The Kingdom of Efasamoto", is a collection of folk tales from Cameroon.
"There is no place like home," he says with a hint of sorrow, "I come from the most beautiful place on earth."

NANAKO SUGIYAMA

For more information check the Asylum Seekers in Poland website:
http://republika.pl/assref/
and Simon Mol's website:
http://republika.pl/molsimon/

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