The Lunacy Of Asylum-Seeking

"THE HEALTH system, schools and universities were all better in Bosnia than they are in Ireland. I didn't come here to take money from the Government but because there were people in my country who wanted to kill me."

Bosnian Community Development Project officer Zdenko Stanar is reflecting on the fact that while "refugee scrounger" stories have been epidemic of late, the media have ignored the personal and financial losses incurred by many asylum-seekers in coming here.

"The newspapers have a very bad attitude, accusing the Bosnian community of things we did not do," he charges. "Most Irish people are not racist but when they're continually told, 'oh, it's the refugees fault', it's bound to cause problems. No one notices me because I'm white, but there are black asylum-seekers who won't go out at night because they're afraid of being attacked. I blame that on journalists who only write negative things about us. They never talk about the benefits of having a multi-ethnic community or the many refugees who've found work and are contributing to society with their expertise and taxes.

"They should also remember their history. The millions of Irish who sailed to America in the 1840s were refugees as well."

A "programme refugee" who'll soon be eligible for Irish citizenship, the 27-year-old originally elected to remain in Sarajevo but was forced to leave when his father, a soldier with the regular Bosnian army, was shot and seriously wounded.

"I came over to Dublin in 1994, six months after my parents who applied for a visa on my behalf. It took me a while to accept that the fighting wasn't simply going to go away. You grow up only knowing peace and then, suddenly, your neighbours are your enemy. We all knew there were problems but a week - even days beforehand - we didn't think it would turn into a war."

Life up until then had been pretty good. "The former Yugoslavia was a communist country which meant certain freedoms were denied us, but it wasn't repressive in the same way that East Germany or the Soviet Union were. There were drugs and crime, sure, but nowhere near as bad as you have now in Ireland. I finished school when I was 18 and went to work for a building company. I spent a year doing military service which is an obligation in my country and then went back to my job. I had money, friends, everything I wanted."

The Bosnians are in the same category as the Vietnamese, in that they were effectively invited here by the Irish Government in conjunction with the UN. It hasn't all been céad míle fáilte, though, with a new Refugee Resettlement Research Project survey throwing up some worrying statistics:

• A significant minority of refugees from both communities have suffered racist abuse.

• 33% of Vietnamese and 20% of Bosnians have never attended English-language training.

• 25% of Bosnians and 15% of Vietnamese have no English at all.

• Up to 50% of Bosnians and Vietnamese say they talk with people outside their communities at most only once or twice a month.

• 33% of Bosnians are unemployed and have been for over 12 months.

• Of those Bosnians working, virtually all of them feel they have the skills to do a more demanding job.

• 50% of Bosnians are finding it difficult to make ends meet and most feel their economic circumstances have worsened since coming to Ireland.

"I arrived here with not a word of English," Stanar recalls. "The only things I knew about Ireland - apart from U2 - were that the men drank a lot and the women were pretty with red hair. My parents came to collect me at the airport and I remember being very disappointed driving through the city-centre because there were no big tall buildings like in London. Everything was different to what I was used to in Bosnia. My first time in a pub, I didn't know how Guinness was poured and took the pint from the man before it was ready. Now it seems funny, but at the time it made me feel like I didn't belong here."

The upside to the Refugee Resettlement Research Project report is that the "children of both communities are adjusting well to school and their future seems bright".

"Not only are they fluent in English but some of them have reasonable Irish. The key for me, and everybody else, is learning the language. After six months of classes, I was able to start communicating with people and now I have many Irish friends."

Much of Stanar's work is done in Tallaght where over half of the 826 Bosnian programme refugees have settled.

"I live there myself and our neighbours have been very supportive," he proffers. "The Bosnian Community Development Project's job is to help our people with the process of integration - in other words, to participate as fully as possible in Irish life. At the same time, we're opposed to assimilation, which is why we encourage the children to learn more about their history and keep speaking their own language. You must know and be proud of who you are."

While he feels "each community should speak for itself", Stanar is quick to voice his support for other refugees who, in most cases, are unable to work while their status is being determined.

"That's something else you don't read in the papers. People want a job but aren't allowed to get one until they are granted asylum which can take several years. How are they and their families supposed to live in the meantime? Another problem is that our degrees and professional qualifications aren't recognised in Ireland. I know solicitors, doctors, teachers, lab technicians and a Professor of English Literature who are unemployed because of this.

"What I'd like to say, finally," Stanar concludes, "is that there's no difference between a Bosnian refugee and somebody who's from Algeria or Congo or Romania. The cameras mightn't have been there to show their war or persecution, but they've suffered just as much as we have. They deserve the chance of a new life too." n