GLOBAL REVIEW OF STATELESSNESS
AFRICA
* Algeria * Burundi * Democratic
Republic of Congo *
* Egypt * Eritrea/Ethiopia * Kenya * Libya * * Mauritania * Rwanda * Senegal * Swaziland * * Uganda * Zimbabwe * Algeria After a Moroccan invasion and the withdrawal of the colonial power of Spain in 1975, Saharawis fled Western Sahara to neighboring Algeria. Estimates of the population range from 110,000 to 155,000. Most of these individuals are still in four camps near Tindouf, a historic oasis town in southern Algeria. They have been stateless for about 28 years, and Morocco, which continues to occupy the territory, has prevented efforts by the United Nations to allow the Saharawis to participate in an independence referendum. Saharawis have faced the continual dilemma of whether or not to hold out for their right to vote on their political future, a right fully endorsed by a 1975 ruling by the International Court of Justice and subsequent United Nations resolutions. Thirteen percent of children under five are acutely malnourished. Insufficient quantities of water and inadequate water distribution pose serious problems for the Saharawis. Dryness also prohibits the development of agriculture. Another problem in Algeria is that Algerian citizenship is derived exclusively from the father. Consequently, children of an Algerian mother and a non-Algerian father are not eligible for Algerian citizenship. Burundi Some 70,000-87,000 Pygmies, the Batwa, live in Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). Before the opening of several parks in Uganda, the World Bank required an assessment of issues that would be faced by Batwa. Four years later, Uganda reported on those challenges and made several suggestions to aid the Batwa in their transition. Among these suggestions was compensation for land and integration programs. But, as Batwa are not members of local governmental institutions, compensation or profit-sharing did not include them. While citizens are issued birth certificates and identity cards free of charge, Batwa must undergo an involved bureaucratic process. Without these cards, it is difficult to enroll in school and receive government-funded health care, benefits which are guaranteed to other similarly vulnerable people in the country. Without the resources of the forests and the ability to sell their once popular pottery in a highly competitive market, an estimated 80 percent earn capital from begging. Some also work as day laborers, servants, and tenant farmers or other unskilled jobs. Democratic Republic of Congo Among the Banyarwanda, the Banyamulenge are ethnic Tutsis who came to Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo) from Rwanda centuries ago and settled in the hills called Mulenge, found between Lake Kivu and Tanganyika, between the towns of Uvira and Bukavu in what is now referred to as South Kivu. Over time, the population of Banyamulenge has become an estimated 300,000 to 400,000. Relations between the groups grew strained during post-Independence in 1964 when Mulele rebels advocated a type of communism in which property, land and cattle were to be shared among the local people. The ethnic groups in the Kivu province supported the rebellion. The Banyamulenge, however, did not; they helped the Congolese National Army crush the rebellion in the Kivus. In January 1972, Mobutu signed a decree collectively granting Zairian citizenship to all Rwandan and Burundian natives who had settled in Zaire prior to 1950. In 1981, the highly unpopular 1972 decree was retroactively invalidated by the Zairian parliament effectively rendering the people of Rwandese origin stateless. During the genocide in 1994, thousands of Banyamulenge crossed back to neighboring Rwanda and joined the Tutsis led rebels (Rwanda Patriotic Front) to topple the elected government of President Juvenal Hyriabimana. In 1996, a local official warned that all Banyamulenge must leave the country within a week and threatened to confiscate their property. As violence increased, the Banyamulenge armed themselves and counterattacked, repelling the Zairian offensive. The areas rapidly fell into the hands of the rebels. The group later joined the RCD rebels led by Laurent Kabila, inspired to oust President Mobutu. Kabila’s support among the Banyamulenge eroded in August 1998 when he decided to expel Rwandese and Ugandan contingents from his army. In December 2004, a new citizenship act was adopted which only partially addresses access to Congolese citizenship by the Banyarwanda populations. As noted in the Burundi profile, the DRC also hosts a Batwa population. Egypt The collapse of the Russian and Ottoman Empires in the early 20th century led to large-scale displacement. Prior to the Egyptian revolution of 1952, the number of Armenians residing in Egypt was about 70,000-75,000. Subsequently, an agreement between the Egyptian government and the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in 1954, and later ratified in May 1981, assigned the UNHCR the responsibility of caring for stateless populations living in Egypt, individuals of Russian, Armenian, Yugoslav, Albanian, Hungarian, Czech, Bulgarian, Polish, Romanian and Estonian origins. Some 130 stateless persons remain of concern to UNHCR. Another problem of statelessness occurs in Egypt because only males may confer citizenship, making children born to Egyptian mothers and non-Egyptian fathers stateless. They cannot attend public school or state universities, are barred from certain professional schools, and cannot work without meeting foreign residency requirements and obtaining work permits. There are believed to be 400,000 to more than a million such children in the country. In 2003, President Hosni Mubarak closed the annual ruling party conference with a number of announcements, including a statement that the Interior Ministry would begin processing citizenship applications for children of Egyptian mothers and foreign fathers. It has been predicted that if the president's assurances are implemented, Egyptian women will gain the historic right to pass their nationality on to their children. Excluded, however, are Palestinians (estimated at 55,000-77,000), based on a 1959 agreement not to give Palestinians citizenship in order to preserve their national identity. Also, Palestinian men who have left the country to work abroad face further difficulties because Egypt has closed the office that issues return visas. They live abroad illegally and cannot return to Egypt, a situation that makes them stateless. Eritrea/Ethiopia The conflict between Ethiopia and Eritrea has rendered many people in mixed marriage situations or being descendents thereof, effectively stateless, unwelcome, and persecuted in both countries. Following war in the 1990s, Ethiopia decided to denationalize Eritrean citizens (mother or father of ethnic origin), of whom there were more than 200,000. At the start of the dispute, in 1998, there were an estimated 600,000 Eritreans, or persons of Eritrean origin living in Ethiopia, including approximately 200,000 persons living in the Tigray border region. An estimated 100,000 Ethiopians were living in Eritrea. Between 1998 and 2000, an estimated 70,000 people believed to be in favor of Eritrean independence were expelled, and many reside in a UNHCR-administered camp. Those who were issued blue identity cards like Eritrean citizens preserved their rights to return. A smaller unconfirmed number (1,000-2,000) were not given blue identity cards, but rather yellow temporary cards, leaving them in a precarious situation and one in which they must pay to annually renew their card. A few individuals were not accepted back by Eritreans and attempts were made to expel them again. These individuals became stranded in a no man’s land. The detention conditions they face are notably poor. In Eritrea, unspecified umbers of Ethiopians were reported expelled immediately after the conflict erupted in 1998 and again in May 2000 when the fighting resumed. Those who were not expelled and remain (an estimated 150,000) are not considered Ethiopians, but have not acquired other nationality. They face lack of access to employment, and education, and remain subject to deportation (although in 2000 there was a policy change which resulted in somewhat fewer deportations). A proclamation on Ethiopian Nationality was promulgated in December 2003 and in January 2004 the Security, Immigration, Refugee and Returnee Authority of Ethiopia adopted an internal directive concerning reacquisition of citizenship by ethnic Eritreans living in Ethiopia. Outside of Ethiopia and Eritrea, still further challenges arise when individuals try to secure travel documents. Increasingly they are subjected to an assessment of their political views by the issuing embassy and face difficulty securing passports, leaving them stranded in all parts of the world. Kenya In the early 1990s, the total number of Somalis in Kenya was estimated at hundreds of thousands, but the number has steadily declined with Somali clan elders placing the number of at some 10,000. Citizenship of those who are nationals is not fully recognized by the government, especially in disputed border areas. Political restrictions against the group include limits on the freedom of expression, voting and recruitment to the police, military and civil service. There is no automatic naturalization of foreign male spouses for Kenyan men as there is for foreign spouses for Kenyan men. Libya Palestinians in Libya live under threat of deportation, physical attack, humiliation, arrest, and are denied the rights to work and travel as well as other basic rights. There are no precise statistics on Palestinians in Libya, but in the mid 1990s, it was estimated that 20,000 remained after the mass deportation in the summer of 1994. The majority of these Palestinians came in 1970s seeking work opportunities. They are denied the rights to housing, work, and education. Mauritania In 1989 and 1990, Mauritanian leaders and the majority of the nation’s lighter-skinned population of Arab-descent began a campaign to “purify” the nation. They expelled tens of thousands of Mauritanians of sub-Saharan descent from their homes, claiming that none of them were truly Mauritanians due to their skin color. In this period, some 75,000-100,000 individuals of sub-Saharan descent left Mauritania, and 15,000 nomadic Mauritanians who were in Senegal during this period were not allowed to return to Mauritanian territory. During the 1990’s, there were claims of progress in repatriation of this population (estimates vary from 20,000-60,000), but in 1999 UNHCR ended its work, and there is little information regarding how many of these people remain, nor of the conditions in which they live. Sources vary widely on how many Mauritanian individuals remain in Senegal and Mali. In 1999, the UNHCR claimed there were 25,000 persons who had not repatriated, while other estimates are 45,000 to 60,000. Children born outside the camp do not have a nationality and are in a shaky situation. Those who do return to Mauritania face numerous obstacles to full and sustainable repatriation: the native “moors” who expelled them also confiscated their property while they were gone and do not offer them citizenship or try to integrate them into society, although the Saharawi refugees from the Western Sahara occupation by Morocco and other refugees from Mali and Sierra Leone were offered citizenship. There is some disagreement about the conditions faced by returnees. Some say those who repatriated did not receive official citizenship cards and lacked freedom of movement inside Mauritania. UNHCR has offered a more positive assessment, however, reporting that most returnees recovered their land and identity papers. There has been no recent evidence to support either claim, but Mauritanians inside and out of the country speak of strong racism as the continuing source of their oppression and abandonment. Rwanda Rwanda hosts a Batwa population as noted in the Burundi profile. Senegal See Mauritania. Swaziland Non-ethnic Swazis can obtain passports and citizenship documents; however, it should be noted that individuals seeking these documents sometimes experience lengthy processing delays, in part due to the prejudice that mixed-race and white persons are not real citizens. Political dissenters had their citizenship questioned and experienced difficulties in obtaining travel documents. The Constitutional Review Commission made a recommendation that could render a child stateless if born to a citizen mother and a foreign father; however, it was not included in the final draft. Uganda Details about Uganda’s Batwa population can be obtained in the Burundi profile. Zimbabwe Farm workers of foreign origin represent one of most vulnerable groups in Zimbabwe. One-fifth (approximately 80,000 workers and their families) of the former farm workers are descendents of migrant workers from Malawi, Mozambique and Zambia. Many were born in Zimbabwe. Most lack birth certificates or national identity cards. They have also lost ties with their country of origin and have no place to return to when evicted from the farms. Unlike other former farm workers, they cannot rely on traditional or local government leaders to gain access to land or humanitarian assistance. Reversing a previously complex and expensive procedure that effectively disenfranchised the foreign workers, the 2004 Amendment to the Citizenship Act now grants citizenship to all people with parents from the Southern African Development Community who were born in Zimbabwe. But since many farm workers did not have the opportunity to register for birth certificates, there remain significant doubts about the administrative capacity of the government to provide national identity registration. |
Nationality: A Fundamental Human Right No Right to Reside: Conditions that Create Statelessness No Country to Call Home: The Scope of Statelessness Whose Job Is It Anyway? UNHCR’s Second Mandate “Citizen,
Third Class”: Findings from RI’s Statelessness Project Global Review of Statelessness --------------- |
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Lives on Hold: Africa
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