# taz.de -- Migration Policy in Sierra Leone: War, desease and no perspective | |
> Sierra Leone is located far from the typical routes for migration and | |
> flight. Nevertheless, the country has a very large and well-educated | |
> diaspora. | |
Bild: 2014: A burial team prepares an Ebola virus victim for interment | |
The small country of Sierra Leone with its population of about 6 million | |
made headlines in 2014 with the outbreak of the fatal Ebola virus, from | |
which at least 3,956 people died. During those months, a long-term, | |
noticeable trend with which the country has been struggling for decades | |
became especially clear: massive brain drain. As one doctor estimated in | |
November 2015 in a personal conversation, there are supposedly fewer | |
physicians with Sierra Leone passports in Sierra Leone itself than in the | |
USA. Their estimated number was lower than 200. | |
This development started during the civil war from 1991 to 2002, in which | |
more than two million people left the country, among them numerous | |
academics. In the year 2000, 52.5 percent of citizens with a university | |
education | |
were apparently living abroad. Due to the poor infrastructure and the lack | |
of economic growth with its corresponding low wages, bringing these | |
emigrants back was not successful. In any case, most Sierra Leoneans who | |
fled to neighbouring countries have meanwhile returned . | |
Yet those emigrants living in Great Britain, for instance, or in the USA, | |
are central to the country's economy. Their remittances for the year 2009 | |
made up between twelve and 25 percent of the gross domestic product, | |
according to various estimates. | |
Because of the Ebola outbreak and its consequences, northward migration may | |
have become more complicated, yet simultaneously more attractive: since | |
mid-2014, many airlines have cancelled their service to the capital of | |
Freetown. Furthermore, due to the total economic collapse, family members | |
could no longer pool their money to pay for the journey to Europe, as they | |
would have usually done. At the same time, this trend may also have made | |
emigration more attractive than ever before, as the GDP fell by 21.1 | |
percent in 2015 and will recover only very slowly. | |
## New Projects | |
One year before the civil war ended, the number of asylum applications for | |
2001 was just short of 14,000. In 2105, 1,262 Sierra Leoneans submitted | |
applications; the approval rate was 18.5 percent. 293 asylum seekers came | |
to Germany; Italy and Hungary ranked just below that. So far, return | |
agreements do not exist, neither with individual states nor with the | |
European Union. The country is also not among those scheduled to receive | |
funding from the EU Emergency Trust Fund for Africa. In any case, Sierra | |
Leoneans can take part in the REAG reintegration programme. They belong to | |
the second group and receive €300 upon repatriation. Around €266 million | |
were designated for the country up until 2013 in the 10th Development Aid | |
Fund of the EU. In the eleventh, investments are planned in three main | |
areas – good governmental leadership, support for state facilities and the | |
creation of essential infrastructure. | |
Some laws and strategies on flight and migration are being discussed only | |
since the Valletta Summit in November 2015 and therefore, likely at the | |
urging of the EU. For instance, a workshop on work migration took place in | |
April 2016 in the context of the ECOWAS project, “Support to Free Movement | |
of Persons and Migration in West Africa“ (FMM West Africa). | |
Since 2014, migration and border security have been linked with the Ebola | |
outbreak more often than with continuing journeys toward North Africa and | |
Europe. One example of this is a project by the International Organisation | |
for Migration (IOM) entitled “Health and Management of Borders and | |
Mobility“. Its goal is to curb the risk of infection that comes with the | |
free mobility to travel. Uncontrolled and uncontrollable borders were | |
viewed as one reason why the epidemic spread so massively throughout three | |
countries. At the same time, border crossings used to be the norm, i.e., | |
going to work or to shop in a neighbouring country was once a constant and | |
common part of life. | |
12 Dec 2016 | |
## AUTOREN | |
Katrin Gänsler | |
## TAGS | |
migControl | |
Sierra Leone | |
## ARTIKEL ZUM THEMA | |
Hochwasser in Sierra Leone: Hunderte Tote nach Erdrutsch | |
In Sierra Leone starben mehr als 310 Menschen durch Überschwemmungen. In | |
Freetown ruschte eine Berghang ab. Helfer befürchten weitere Opfer. |