What role can ACRC play?

ACRC has partnered with the Nairobi County Government, through its collaboration with SDI-Kenya and the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED), to support the rollout of the refugee integration strategy. By aligning with the county’s existing framework, the consortium aims to support Nairobi’s vision of becoming a model for progressive refugee integration in Africa, while contributing valuable research and policy insights that could benefit other cities facing similar challenges.

Designed as an action research project, this partnership aims to explore ways of improving the seemingly intractable, and indeed global, challenge of integrating foreign migrants and host populations.

The partnership hypothesises that if development investments aimed at refugees benefit not only them, but also the wider communities where they are housed, then perceptions towards migration may be softened and lead to increased integration. For instance, instead of building a school for refugees, schools in refugee-hosting communities would receive higher financial and development assistance when they enrol children from migrant families.

The uptake goal, which aligns with the NCRIS, aims to improve current methods of supporting refugees. This will be achieved by moving away from reliance on international humanitarian aid and encampment policies. Instead, the focus will be on investing in urban communities that host refugees. The implementation of the NCRIS will serve as a transitional phase until the city government gathers enough evidence to support its own investments in these refugee-hosting communities.

The primary objective of the uptake strategy is to target Nairobi’s urban community, particularly the resource-constrained areas where many migrants reside. While typical projects aim to change the actions of governments and service providers, this project seeks to shift the perceptions of host communities towards migrants, aiming for a significant positive change.

This initiative goes beyond short-term aid. It is a long-term commitment to social cohesion, economic empowerment and shared prosperity between refugees and host communities. Its success depends on collaboration between government agencies, NGOs and local communities, and could set a precedent for other cities grappling with similar challenges. By turning obstacles into opportunities, Nairobi is paving the way for a more inclusive, dynamic and prosperous future for all its residents, refugees and hosts alike.

Photo credits: Sue Mwanzia

Note: This article presents the views of the authors featured and does not necessarily represent the views of the African Cities Research Consortium as a whole.

The African Cities blog is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), which means you are welcome to repost this content as long as you provide full credit and a link to this original post.

A neighbourhood in Kampala, Uganda. Photo credit: Random Institute / Unsplash

The downside, however, is that they receive less social and economic support from international aid agencies than refugees in rural settlements. This exerts a toll on their physical and mental wellbeing, as they grapple with the challenges of adapting to an entirely unfamiliar environment. As a result, depression is prevalent among the demographic, with female urban refugees being more affected than their male counterparts. The situation is exacerbated by rising tensions on the part of host community members, fuelled by xenophobic stereotypes that have arisen from instances of crime and insecurity perpetrated by some urban refugee youth.

Gaps in social inclusion policy

Consequently, urban refugee youth often have to rely on social networks and infrastructures of care and solidarity with other refugees, in order to access economic opportunities. Though quite robust, these refugee networks, particularly those among Somalis and Congolese, are often hindered by a lack of eligibility to claim public services that could potentially formalise their business start-ups. This is reflective of gaps in the existing refugee-related legal and policy framework for social inclusion. Oversight in the education, skills development and justice and legal services policies have resulted in urban refugee youth struggling to gain employment, access finances, access education and access legal services in Kampala.

With self-employment in the informal sector as the main available income-generating activity, lack of capital remains a major constraint for potential microentrepreneurs. Urban refugee youth interviewed seemed to have limited access to banks or formal savings or lending institutions. Additionally, managers of education and training programmes for refugee youth are of the view that they cannot hope to meet the scale of the need for their services.

Most urban refugee youth face a major educational disadvantage in their host community. Uganda has government schools that offer free education and the refugee legal and policy framework allows for refugees to enrol in these schools. However, overcrowding means that refugees are often required to compete with Ugandan students for school places. With Ugandans regularly being favoured over their refugee counterparts, most refugees are never re-integrated into the school system. Though opportunities for technical and vocational education and training (TVET) are not completely out of reach for this cohort, these trainings are usually outdated and thus do not promote integration into the labour force for either refugee or Ugandan youth. Taking into consideration these limitations, it is no surprise that refugee youth within informal settlements turn to crime, fuelling rising tensions.

Potential for empowerment

Overall, enormous untapped potential exists that could be realised through the empowerment of refugee youth within Kampala’s informal settlements. There are opportunities and resources that, if harnessed or utilised effectively, could lead to the empowerment and improvement of their lives.

To empower and create opportunities for refugee youth, actors should focus on addressing the gaps in the current legal and policy framework. Issues that need to be addressed include: enabling urban refugee youth to enrol in government schools; discrimination in the formal and informal work sector; and access to legal services to combat the aforementioned discrimination. In addition, there is an urgent need for initiatives and programmes to ensure better integration of refugees into host environments. These programmes and initiatives should combat the rising tensions by reviving the virtues of Obuntubulamu.

Header photo credit: AnjoKanFotografie / iStock. People travelling home from work in Kampala, Uganda.

Note: This article presents the views of the author featured and does not necessarily represent the views of the African Cities Research Consortium as a whole.

The African Cities blog is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0), which means you are welcome to repost this content as long as you provide full credit and a link to this original post.