Chapter 3: The experience of exile
Refugees who reach Britain, compared with those remaining in the camps in Sri Lanka, can perhaps be considered lucky: at least their physical distance from the conflict and chances of living a decent life are greater. Yet they too face problems and hardships which make this, in most cases, only a stop-gap solution. The problem causing most anguish, perhaps, is the difficulty of getting asylum, and the consequent insecurity and fear of being sent back. Statements like these were common:
• We are still on tenterhooks: any time a letter may come asking us to get back to Sri Lanka. We don’t have a proper stay – it’s a psychological problem.
• I’m still always scared of being sent back.
• I keep thinking I can be deported at any time. I can’t do any work or studying; I have no peace of mind.
But in some cases the fear was more acute:
• The reason why I don’t feel at home is because I don’t feel well at the moment, mentally or physically… After 1985 March, April – that was the beginning of my terror. Before that I felt well. Right now, the situation for me is like I’m at home and every time I see a car pass by, my heart starts beating. Every time a car parks outside my window, I just feel that somebody’s come to pick me up.
What happened?
I had my visa till October 1985. From 1985 March my brother, my whole family, they just cut off from me. And then in October 1985 my money ran out. So I just wrote a letter to the immigration officer. When I wrote the letter I was at one address, and I wrote the letter saying that I’m going to move into another address with some of my friends who are going to put me up because I cannot pay my rent any more in this place, so any further communication should come to me there. And the usual procedure is, the Home Office normally acknowledges the passport, but any extension of visa or your passport coming back, it takes six to eight months.
That’s what happened to me the first time – I mean, after the first year. So I was there for seven to eight months expecting a reply to my letter – I mean, I wrote to them: look, I haven’t got the money, I cannot go back to my country right now, you know the situation is tense out there, I’ve lost touch with my family, I don’t want to go to the airport and just give myself up to the officials, so what can I do? Since I didn’t get any reply after eight months, that’s when I got worried. I said, okay now, this officially means that I’ve been staying in England illegally. The thing is, I did not register the letter which I sent, so you know, that was the beginning of the problem. So I just took off with my bags, and carried on from there, living in several places.
Did they have your passport?
Yes, I sent my passport to them.
But not registered?
My passport was registered; the letter that I wrote was not. I mean, I was not short of money then – I wouldn’t have thought about forking out another £1.69 or £2 for a registered letter. It’s just that I didn’t take it that seriously, I thought that they would receive it anyway.
You never got any response?
No. And that was the beginning of my horror. I just went everywhere, doing odd jobs and paying my rent wherever I went. My friends helped me a lot at that time – my Malaysian friends, guys from the college…
Then they came and arrested me. I was working in a restaurant at that time, and when they arrested me there was nothing I could do. I used to take sleeping tablets – three or four, just to sleep the night. And I used to sleep for something like 26-30 hours, or sometimes I’d just sleep till all I wanted to do is get up. If I had something to eat, I’d eat; otherwise, I’d just go back to sleep again. I was living like that for about two-and-a-half years. And when they arrested me, I thought to myself, okay, the worst has happened to me, and I’ll just have to find a way out of this.
Then they put me in a police cell for the first time. I had no lawyer: when they asked me if I wanted a lawyer I said, ‘No, I don’t want a lawyer,’ because I had only three pounds in my pocket. So there was no way out but to say: ‘All right, you can send me back, but just get me out of this prison.’ You know, I stayed in the police cell eight days – just locked up in one room for eight days – and the only alternative for me to get out of the place or to see some sunlight was to sign and say, ‘Okay, I’m going back’. You know, that was my idea, that’s the way I thought. And I couldn’t hire a lawyer to represent my case because I had no money. And I couldn’t get in touch with my family anyway.
When they came, they said, ‘Okay, this is your case: by 1985 October you didn’t get in touch with us, so that makes you an illegal immigrant for so long: we are deporting you.’ So when they said, ‘We are deporting you,’ there was nothing else I could do. At that time, I didn’t tell my political involvement to these people because I thought: I’m not going to give them any information which will make things difficult for me when I get back, you understand. So I just said, ‘Okay, fine, if you are going to send me back, send me’. You know, it was like the end of the road for me, practically. So I just signed, and they took me to Harmondsworth detention centre.
That is when I met two Tamil friends there. They said, ‘You get in touch with TRAG [Tamil Refugee Action Group] and they’ll help you.’ I got in touch with TRAG and told them, ‘Look, this is my situation.’ They said, ‘Okay, apply for political asylum, we will back you up.’ After two days they took me to Lakshmi House – that’s a so-called detention centre, but it’s a prison: all prison rules apply there. And when I went there, I saw another 17 Tamils all locked up for similar offences, and that’s when I really understood the kind of difficulties the Tamils are facing in Britain. Not that I committed any offence: in their view I have absconded, but at no point did I abscond. I still don’t want to do it because I’m not here to make money or anything – I mean, I have no one to send this money to, anyway: my family is much more well-off than I can ever imagine being in this country! So I mean, money is never a problem for me – I don’t have to make pennies and send them to my family. But I have fears of persecution back home like all Tamils there, and my family is in danger and everything like that – hopefully they’re alive. I just don’t want to go back yet.
Anyway, about two months ago, the Home Office finally decided that my political asylum was refused and that they were going to deport me. And my counsellor at UKIAS told me, ‘See, they’re going to deport you, but we’re going to appeal against it.’ Anyway, I was in Lakshmi House for about three months, then they released me and said that I should sign with the police station every Monday, which I’m still doing.
So your appeal is being considered?
No, my appeal right is cancelled because when I signed a form in the police station, in effect I signed against my appeal – that’s what they’re saying now. I am a person who is liable to be deported if and when they wish – any time – so I’m just on a limb, hanging on. And so that has affected me – physically, mentally. Everyone may think I’m a normal-looking guy, but there’s nothing in here – it’s all gone.
The fate hanging over this refugee has been suffered by many Sri Lankan Tamil refugees. The most celebrated case was that of the five who won the right to apply for political asylum in Britain in July 1989. They had arrived in Britain on different dates between February and June 1987 and applied for asylum; all claimed personal experiences of violence, including periods of detention and the killing of close relatives, and one showed evidence of having undergone torture. Their applications were refused in August and September by means of a notice which stated: ‘The Secretary of State, having considered the individual circumstances of your case and in addition the situation in Sri Lanka, has concluded that you have not established a well-founded fear of persecution in Sri Lanka.’ (Adjudicator’s Determination, Immigration Appeals Tribunal, 13.3.89, p. 3)
The five were deported back to Sri Lanka in February 1988, but their lawyers subsequently lodged an appeal against the rejection of their asylum applications with the adjudicator of the Immigrations Appeals Tribunal, who in March 1989 ruled that all five had a well-founded fear of persecution; at least two had been interrogated and one tortured since being deported; that they had been entitled to political asylum at the time when they were deported, and the Secretary of State’s decision was therefore not in accordance with the law; that they were still entitled to political asylum since the situation in Sri Lanka had not substantially changed; and that they should therefore be returned to the UK with the minimum of delay. (Adjudicator’s Determination, pp. 25–6.)
However, further delay did follow because the then Home Secretary, Douglas Hurd, appealed against the decision. The High Court ruled that the Home Office had an ‘arguable case’, and scheduled a judicial review of the Tribunal’s findings in mid-July. On 26 July the Court of Appeal upheld the Tribunal’s original decision and said the government should pay the cost of their return to Britain. A subsequent attempt by the Home Secretary to suspend the ruling, pending a further appeal, was finally turned down in the High Court on 31 July. (British Refugee Council, Sri Lanka Monitor, May 1989 and July 1989)
Other refugees have been surprised by the treatment they have received in Britain, with its implication that seeking asylum owing to persecution was somehow a crime or offence:
• First they put me in a detention centre for about three weeks. So I had to contact my relations to help me, and two relations signed a surety that they will look after me, they will help me, and they said that they know me well. Then they allowed me temporary admission, and for that they didn’t give me proper papers or anything – only the surety paper. But with the surety paper I couldn’t get anything from the benefit office – they didn’t give me an insurance number for two years. They only called me two months ago and gave me a one-year visa on a piece of paper, because one page of my passport is torn. Because I couldn’t get a visa from Sri Lanka – they don’t give visas to Tamils – I had to pay some money to an agent, and he did the work to get me from there to here. So he sent me, and the page was torn by him.
I have been to England earlier – I came here as a tourist – so I know about England and everything. I thought, it is a democratic country, according to the law they will help me – that’s the reason I came here. But I suffered for about two years.
• When I came here, they say Britain is a democratic state and that and this. But they treated me so badly and put me in prison. I fought over there, but I never went to prison; if they had caught me, if the Sri Lankan army catches anyone in the movement, they always have cyanide capsules, so if they had caught me, I would have died – I was willing to die. I came here without anything, expecting to be better treated, but they put me in prison. And the colour of my skin made a difference to the way I was treated – I had a lot of experience of that in prison.
One of my friends, when he was in prison with me on the prison-ship – the Earl William – they beat him very badly. And they told him, ‘If you take any action, we will make things even worse for you.’ So he was frightened and didn’t take any legal action. Whether it’s in a police station or in prison, if they see a white man and me, they treat me differently. I never expected it to be like this here. In Sri Lanka it’s obvious – everyone knows the problem is there, a struggle is going on. But here they are always saying, ‘There is no problem.’ So it’s worse here.
Another refugee commented bitterly on the fact that the very circumstance which showed he had no intention of leaving Sri Lanka until forced to do so – lack of a passport – was being used to question the validity of his asylum claim:
Some Tamils have decided to settle down and make their life in Britain; what do you feel about doing this yourself?
• No, never! Never in my life! I had a chance to leave Sri Lanka since 1975, but I never left – I studied, and got a job, and worked for the people. Only now, because I can’t live there, that’s the reason why I left. But when I came here, that’s the reason why they put me in prison! Because I worked for eight years in a government department, but I didn’t get a passport, a Sri Lankan passport. I worked in Colombo, I could easily have got it, but I didn’t, because I wasn’t thinking of leaving. But here they’re asking, ‘Why didn’t you get a passport?’ I didn’t want to leave!
The following couple (A is the husband, B the wife), already traumatised by the loss of their home in Sri Lanka, were shocked by the treatment they received in Britain:
What were your major problems after getting to Britain?
• A: I think the threat of deportation. As a matter of fact, they served a notice to us within one week, for no reason. That is a kind of fanatical thing, I would think – I think they picked up a few people just to show off that they are serious about stopping refugees.
B: Then we got help to stay on, but that shock was still there.
A: I was terribly shocked by that. The shock was for two reasons. One is the impression I always had about the UK as highly democratic and human; but that was the biggest shock for me – the way they turned on us. Secondly, the way they reported it on the mass media really, really knocked me down! I think that feeling is still there. Sometimes we feel like getting out – honestly! – but where can we go?
B: The same problem is there in other countries.
For some refugees, their inability to get family members out to join them is an agonising problem, since they are deprived of the option of going back:
• My wife and children are in India, and I’m missing them. I can’t go there because of the boys and the Indian army, so I want asylum in Britain. When I get asylum, I can call my wife and children here. Then, if there’s a peaceful settlement, we can go back to our country, Sri Lanka. I don’t like to stay here for a long time – I don’t like it here. But at least I am safe here!
This woman, having spent four years trying to get a visa for her husband to join her, was on the verge of a breakdown, if not already over the edge:
• Sometimes I hate it very much here… Sometimes I feel like killing my children! You know, my children always hide the knives every day. I get back pain and headaches all the time, so I take pills and all. My son, every day when he goes to school, he’ll give me only a few pills and go. He hides the bottle away. Sometimes I tell them, ‘You know I had a peaceful life in Sri Lanka, with my husband. Only thing I had some problems with the military and with the Tigers. But after I came here, daily I have to do so many things, I get so tired.’ And especially our Sri Lankan people, they always ask, ‘Where is her husband? Why isn’t her husband coming?’ Then they gossip. I don’t speak to anybody now. Nobody. Go to church, do the shopping, look after the children, stay at home.
Do you think you will feel all right once you get your husband out?
Yes. But now he doesn’t have a job – because he wants to come to Britain, he didn’t sign a new contract. So that’s a problem, no? Sometimes I send him money – five pounds, ten pounds, like that. I wrote everything – I told them in the last paragraph. The same statement I gave when I came to London, still the same statement I’ve been giving again and again. This is the last statement, and after this, I’m not going to give any statement. I told my son and daughter that I’m going to hang myself with his pyjama tape. But my son said, ‘Mummy, don’t you know that nowadays they don’t put tape, they put elastic!’ Sometimes I talk to myself. So they say, ‘You were talking just now’. I say, ‘No, I didn’t talk.’ They say, ‘No Mummy, you were talking.’ I told them, ‘If something happens to me, go to the police commissioner, he’ll send you off to Mother Teresa.’
I don’t sleep at nights also, every night there is something. If I hear a cat noise even, I will get up and go and see. So when I get up and go to my daughter’s room, my daughter thinks I’m coming to kill her. So she says, ‘Mummy, Mummy, what are you doing on the stairs?’ I say, ‘No, I just came to kill you.’
I told them, ‘If before this December your Daddy doesn’t come…’ One of my friends died. So her parents, brother, his wife and two children got visas to come. So I said, ‘If I die, your Daddy will come here, your Daddy will get a visa.’ So my son said, ‘Mummy, you don’t die, I will die, then Daddy will come,’ he says. So I said, ‘One thing: your Daddy must come or I must die before Christmas.’
When it is remembered that these people have already been through traumatic experiences – torture, bereavement, loss of all they possessed, etc. – the extreme cruelty of such treatment is evident. In effect, they are being punished for having been persecuted – a strange notion of justice, but one that is by no means new. Indeed, as an interesting little pamphlet entitled From the Jews to the Tamils argues, the attitude of the British authorities towards refugees has remained essentially the same since their hostile treatment of Jewish refugees and political asylum seekers fleeing Nazi Germany:
The second and main wave of internment came in May 1940… The second wave was the most significant as it manifestly contained the largest numbers of internees who were either the victims of Nazism or the opponents of Nazism or both… In the third week of July 1940, a census was held of the 1500 inmates of one typical men’s camp by statisticians interned in the camp. The results are very revealing. 82 per cent of all the men were Jewish… Lafitte also makes it clear that many ‘politicals’ – communists, trade unionists and other anti-Nazis – were interned… Quite clearly, none of these were allies of Nazi Germany or foes of the British war effort. It is obscene to think they were. In fact the drive for internment came very much from popular anti-semitism and anti-communism, with Jews, socialists, spies and aliens being seen as indistinguishable and all being seen as subversives…
If one looks at the overall history of the treatment of refugees, what is remarkable is the persistence of the myth of free entry existing alongside the reality of restricted or no entry. Indeed every time further controls on asylum seekers are introduced, there is invoked some preceding mythical ‘golden period’ where British liberalism supposedly welcomed all in danger…Why has all this history been forgotten? … One explanation is that any revealing of the truth would show Britain’s complicity, to a greater or lesser extent, with those regimes from which refugees are trying to flee. (Cohen 1988, pp. 28–30, 54–5.)
In the understandable anxiety to oppose an Asylum Bill which makes things even worse for refugees, it should not be forgotten, as this quotation points out, that the previous situation was far from ideal. The endless waiting in nerve-racking uncertainty, brutal consignment to detention centres, heart-breaking separation of families – all these could be eliminated by more humane legislation and more efficient processing of claims. The complete impossibility of all travel while waiting for an asylum decision, and the ban on travel to the home country after attaining refugee status, can also cause distress and needs to be reconsidered. It should be understood that one may, for example, be willing to risk one’s life to see a dying parent for the last time without necessarily wanting to stay on after the funeral and get detained or killed. Moreover, the possibility of visiting home without being forced to stay on there would actually assist voluntary repatriation, by enabling refugees to find out for themselves whether it is feasible to return without compelling them to burn their bridges in order to do so.
It is important to note, as the quotation above also points out, that refusing asylum to refugees fleeing from a particular situation is not simply a matter of keeping them out, but also involves taking a political stand on that situation. For example, in the case of the five Tamils whose deportation orders were reversed, counsel for the respondent, in requesting the adjudicator to dismiss their appeals, ‘strongly urged that Sri Lanka is still a democracy and Tamils were not liable to be persecuted as Tamils’ (Adjudicator’s Determination, p. 16).
For reasons which have never been publicly explained, the British government has for a long time been taking such a stand with respect to the ethnic conflict in Sri Lanka. During the 1983 riots the British Foreign Office Minister, referring to Sri Lanka, made a similar statement in the House of Commons: ‘There is no dictatorship there. There is a thriving democracy, which has a serious problem with its minority.’ (Piyadasa 1988, p. 46) This writer comments, ‘What was a “thriving democracy” to Mrs Thatcher’s government was to Sri Lankans an unprecedented reign of state terror,’ and this is indeed the impression one gets from the experiences recounted by the refugees. For anyone who lived through those pogroms or knows what happened in them, the Foreign Office statement is almost like saying that in 1933 the German government was having a problem with its Jewish minority. What problem, one would like to ask? The problem of exterminating them? Presumably Mr Ray Whitney would not have recommended gas chambers as the final solution to this problem?
Given the stand taken by the British government, it is not surprising that some refugees felt that Britain’s responsibility for the conflict was not merely historical, as the former colonial power in Sri Lanka, but contemporary, as providing support and help to a Sri Lankan regime engaged in human rights violations:
• Actually, when we come here as refugees, the Sri Lankan government doesn’t like it. So what they say, the Home Office also says. The Sri Lankan government says they are economic refugees and all this, so this is what the Home Office also says. So in one way, both are the same – there’s no difference, in that way.
• The Western governments have their part to play.
What sort of part do you think they could play?
First of all, let them stop supporting the government that is committing so many human rights violations! They are supplying personnel and ammunition… anti-guerrilla squads, people trained to drive or to pilot their helicopters, and so on.
Which countries, do you know?
As for me, I don’t have first-hand information, but people blame Britain too.
For supplying personnel also?
Yes. And when these things are happening, you are keeping bloody silent. When it suits your need, you talk. And when it suits your need equally, you don’t talk. Rather than trying to kill the very root, and trace the root and remove it, you say, all right, don’t cut. The Western governments don’t ask themselves why this is happening. They have to cure the problem there. But instead of treating the cause, they are treating the effect at the airport! That’s folly on the part of Western governments.
Would it have any effect if they put pressure on the Sri Lankan government to stop violating human rights?
Certainly! That will go a long way. If these people are sincere about their purpose, if they have real integrity, they can interfere and do something about it. But they don’t. It is there where we blame the British government also.
In attempting to find out if there is any basis for the charge that Britain has been supplying ammunition and personnel to the Sri Lankan government at a time when it was known to be committing human rights violations, I came across this account in a pamphlet published by the Tamil Information Centre. I quote from it, complete with references, for anyone who is interested in following up the matter:
In 1984 the Sri Lankan government hired the Channel Island Company of Kini Meeni Services (KMS) to recruit and train a 900 strong commando unit. (Financial Times (UK) 3.9.85) Former British Special Air Services (SAS) personnel provided by the Company have been training the police commandos in alleged counter-insurgency methods. The commandos are now in operation in the Eastern Province, particularly the Batticaloa and Amparai districts, and have proved themselves as the most ruthless killers the island has ever seen. (The Sunday Times (UK) 23.2.86) They have killed hundreds of Tamil civilians and burnt thousands of houses and shops belonging to Tamils (Amnesty International Report ASA 37/14/85 of 16.10.85)…
The British government, which said that no sales would be made to states guilty of torture (Guardian 9.6.80), has allowed supply of arms to Sri Lanka although evidence of torture has been placed before it by its own member of Parliament (Sri Lanka: A Nation Dividing, Robert Kilroy-Silk and Roger Sims)…
It must also be borne in mind that veterans of the former Special Air Services (SAS) (from the Kini Meeni Services) usually do not operate in foreign countries without the tacit approval of the British government. (India Today 31.3.86). Furthermore, British pilots have been flying helicopters and airplanes in attacks in Tamil areas and other British mercenaries are reported to be leading ground attacks. The air attacks by the mercenaries have resulted in many civilian deaths and destruction of property. Although this has hitherto been denied by the British government, evidence has been provided by Times reporter Simon Winchester who discovered during the first week of May 1986 that two Britons and a South African have been manning helicopter gunships which regularly bomb targets in the Tamil areas. These mercenaries receive a fee of £2,500 a month. (Sunday Times (UK) 11.5.86) (Tamil Information Centre, pp. 29, 33–4)
It is this suspicion of collusion between the British and Sri Lankan Governments which accounts for the reluctance of some refugees (like one quoted earlier in this chapter) to reveal to the British authorities information about their political involvements which would in fact support their political asylum claims – the fear being that this information will be passed on to the Sri Lankan authorities and expose them to further repression if and when they are deported back. We have no evidence that this has actually happened, nor that the British government refuses asylum to Tamil refugees because it supports human rights violations in Sri Lanka. However, support of the government which has been committing those atrocities has been substantial, and has taken a variety of forms. Since it is these violations which create the refugees in the first place, it is fair to point out, like the refugee quoted above, that Western governments are treating the effect while ignoring – and perhaps even encouraging – the cause. As another refugee forcefully put it:
• When the citizenship Act was passed, one million people were made stateless overnight. Who spoke against it? Nobody! And the Western governments, they continued to give aid. If you see, after every act of discrimination, these people have been increasing the aid! Now the government is openly massacring people on a large scale, but still nobody cares, still these Western governments continue to give aid. They must use that to put real pressure on the Sri Lanka government, they must say that ‘If you don’t respect human rights, then we will not give you aid’. And in the case of the Tamils, when the Tamils started fighting, the Western governments started increasing military aid so much! The British government was giving military aid to Sri Lanka – but they don’t admit that, they say, ‘We are not involved, private companies are involved.’ But of course, for private companies to sell arms to anybody, the government must give them a license! So these things must be stopped.
Solving the problem of refugees from another country is not merely a matter of having decent asylum provisions, although that is an essential part of it. There is also the question of trying to stop the creation of refugees. While there are limits to what can be done from outside, human rights is an international issue, and there are forms of pressure that can be exerted on governments which violate them. However, this requires, first and foremost, that the violations should be acknowledged. Paradoxically, by denying that Tamil refugees have justifiable fears of persecution in Sri Lanka, the British government perpetuates the refugee problem by encouraging the Sri Lankan government to continue the policies that are causing the problem in the first place. In this sense it does have some responsibility for the exodus, and cannot attempt to wash its hands of that responsibility by pretending that it is entirely someone else’s problem, or, alternatively, that the problem doesn’t even exist.
If there is no fear of persecution, why do hundreds of thousands of Tamils suddenly decide to leave Sri Lanka? The Home Office explanation, apparently, is that they are in search of better jobs and economic prospects. In the case of Sri Lankan refugees, this is really the ultimate irony. Those who have been able to get to Britain are precisely those who come from relatively affluent families in Sri Lanka, most of which own at least their own home, and often additional land as well. The adults among them are mostly well-educated and qualified (skilled workers and upwards), and many have held prestigious jobs in Sri Lanka. To them, one of the features of refugee life causing the most distress is the inability to get work which is in any way commensurate with their previous jobs, and the precipitous fall in status which results:
• I was an aircraft technician in Air Lanka there, so I was looking for a similar job here; but I tried, I failed, all attempts failed. I left my job when I came, and here also I am not getting a good job.
You haven’t got a job now?
No. I wanted to get into the aircraft field – that may be the problem.
• I was teaching for 15 years – English as a second language – and I have a teacher’s certificate in the English medium. When I came here, I couldn’t get a teaching post, so the British Refugee Council helped me to get into Employment Training – it’s for one year. During my training I have done an RSA office procedure course. The Royal Society of Arts: it’s recognised internationally, so supposing I go to some other country it would still be useful. At the start they said, ‘You’re an English trained teacher: why should you sit for this exam?’ I told them it is because they value the certificates which are given here. Even if you have your degree, PhD, everything from another country, they want their own exam.
What were your major problems in settling in Britain?
• The first thing was to keep myself occupied while I was unemployed. You know, just going to the library, reading the papers, teaching my son… It was something I’d never faced – I had remained very active, you know, all the time. It was a terrible situation. It’s not so much the financial consideration, but the fact that you are not employed. The fact that there is nothing to do.
What was your post in Sri Lanka?
I was Deputy Director in one of the Ministries.
How does your present work compare with what you did in Sri Lanka in terms of job satisfaction?
I enjoy doing it, but the amount I can do here compared with what I was doing there – it’s about a tenth of what I was doing there! [In terms of the standard of living]… I can say I was better off there than here.
• I was a teacher in Sri Lanka… now I’m unemployed. If I were in Sri Lanka, I would be a useful person to other people. So I feel worthless.
• I was employed in the Agrarian Service in Sri Lanka… [Here] I am an ET trainee. From the beginning I found difficulty in getting a good job. First I went to a disco and worked as a porter. Then I worked as a cashier at a petrol pump for four years, but it was closed down, so I came here. I’ve been working here to make a living, but without any satisfaction.
• I was Senior Assistant Legal Draughtsman – one of the most highly paid government jobs. [Here I am doing] community work with Tamil refugees. I would still like to practise my profession as a lawyer, but because of this racism, I am not able to do that. But I am still hoping to continue. Job satisfaction, until I am able to practise my profession, I won’t have. But as somebody who is interested in Tamil and Tamil issues, this work gives me some satisfaction. I am able to serve my community – that satisfaction I have, yes.
But it’s more a personal than a professional satisfaction?
Yes, exactly. I’m glad you got the point.
This man’s self-confidence had been completely destroyed by the menial nature of his present job compared with his previous one:
• I have no language barrier or cultural differences or anything. The only thing is, the people here don’t recognise our qualifications, even though they are recognised by international standards, and they are not giving proper jobs to us. I can’t get a job appropriate to my qualification, which is approved by international standards.
What was your post in Sri Lanka?
Assistant Archivist – the position was equivalent to Assistant Director in any other government department. At the moment, I am working as a library assistant – that’s a very low grade, cleaning books and that and this. Daily I think how I was then, and how I am now; it affects me mentally. Even though ‘library assistant’ is a minor post, I was holding a big position in my country, because I was managing about 150 staff below me, who were doing the same job which I am doing here now. There I was supervising, but here I’m in the bottom grade.
His wife, who was working as a cashier in a supermarket, confided:
• He is qualified as a librarian, but still he is working as an assistant. In our country, that is peon’s work! All the time he has to see to the books and serve the customers – no peace. Now he is 52 or something; he can’t stand all day! He has to work very hard.
Did you have property in Sri Lanka?
Yes, my dowry house is there, and land also. My house was burned [twice]. The first time was when I was in Colombo. The second time, I heard about it here. My brother-in-law, he took a photograph and sent it to me. It’s all burnt, completely burnt. Nobody can live there now. It has to be built again.
What were your major problems in settling in?
Financial problems. In our country there was no problem because my husband was earning enough for us. Now we are both earning, but it is not enough. We applied for a council house, we waited a long time but we couldn’t get it, After that, we decided to go in for this flat – just a two-bedroom flat. There’s not enough room: this is the sitting room, we are using it as a bedroom, but there’s still not enough room. We have three teenage children. We can’t invite anybody because there’s not enough space. Only my brothers, sister, brother-in-law – they visit us, but no friends at all.
Have you been losing much sleep over worry?
Yes, definitely! The mortgage problem, you know. Today I checked my bank balance: only £42 there; only 15 days have gone, how can I manage another 15 days? I don’t know how to manage. After that the bills come. My husband, he pays only for the mortgage, only for that. Sometimes I even have to get him his travel card. Already there are two bills to be paid; the postman came, and I said, ‘Oh no, no!’ Sometimes I don’t want to open the letter. My husband, he has started drinking, you know. So I can’t sleep, thinking, how can I manage? I don’t want to borrow more.
• I was Assistant Government Agent [in Sri Lanka]. [Now] I am a book-keeper in a car rental firm… I don’t want this job – but I have to exist, I can’t commit suicide. It wasn’t employment alone, when I was in Sri Lanka; I had a prestigious position there. The people with whom we moved, the status we had in society – we were in a position to help so many people who were in distress!
Did you have any property in Sri Lanka?
Yes – I had a house and some farmland.
Have you been losing much sleep over worry?
Not now, really. I did at the start – in fact I had to take some pills from the doctor for depression… I don’t think I’m much use to my family or anyone else… there are so many things beyond our control. My wife’s state of mind… she was forced to go out to work to pay for the mortgage. She never went out to work earlier.
• [In Sri Lanka I did] electrical and plumbing work. For the last two months I’ve been working in a petrol station at the request of the health officer – he wanted to check whether I could work comfortably, because of my health… He wanted me to do some job, to keep myself occupied instead of idling at home. But I would prefer to be doing some other work.
• I was an assistant teacher… I am now a cashier at a petrol pump. It was better in Sri Lanka! I’m trying to get another job, but I couldn’t get a good job – so many times I was refused, and the main reason was the language problem, because I had all the other qualifications.
• I was working as a teacher… and am now employed as a cashier at a petrol pump. It’s totally different. This is a crazy job!
You haven’t been able to find a better job?
I can’t find it here, because they first ask about residence, and then I can’t get the job. That’s why I’d like to go back… How can I go on doing this job? But I have to!
• I was a farmer in Sri Lanka.
Are you employed now?
No. I applied for so many jobs! But I couldn’t get anything. I’m still applying, I’m going for an interview, but I don’t think I’ll get it – I doubt it very much… If I could get a job, it would be all right; but I’ve tried so many times, and always I’ve been turned down. I have no hope at all, but still I try… When I don’t fulfil my children’s needs, that is a big worry. When you’re unemployed and dependent, you can’t do anything.
• I was (a doctor) running a clinic, until it was destroyed. I’d like to work (here), but the problem is whether the General Medical Council will recognise my degree. I wrote to them, and they sent me a form to fill, and I have sent it; and I have enquired about the exam I have to take.
So you’re living on social security?
Yes. But the money I’m getting is not enough for a man to look after himself. The order is that within six months we shouldn’t try for any job. So the income is not enough, neither can I go for a job – that’s a problem, supporting myself.
The other problem is that I have a family – I have a small kid who is not even three years and my wife – they are suffering in India… Today also I received a letter that the police went and harassed them. So this is a problem for me. Financially I am not in a good position to bring them here, and to get permission also it’s a problem.
• When I came here, I was unemployed, I had to depend on others, and I was always thinking, ‘I am borrowing something from others,’ you see. Because before coming here, I was working for nearly eight years, and earned money of my own. After eight years if you become dependent on somebody, it’s very, very difficult. That was my main problem.
• I was a civil servant. I worked in the office, and I was one of the district secretaries in the union. We worked with the workers and enjoyed ourselves; it was a happy life! But here, we can’t get any decent jobs. Only, if I want to, I can get a job in a petrol station or in Kentucky Chicken! We have certificates, but we can’t get jobs.
Are you getting social security?
No, now I’m working for two days a week. For the moment I’m working part-time as a night cashier in a petrol station. I don’t like it, but there is no other way to live!
• I was a chemical engineer… Actually, I’ve had a lot of difficulty trying to get a job – they only take into account experience from here. I’ve had a lot of experience in Sri Lanka, but they don’t count that.
• I was a turner in a turning workshop. I also know welding and fitting.
Would you like to get a job?
Yes – but I haven’t got a National Insurance number. Friends are supporting me. If the situation in Sri Lanka is peaceful, I would like to return. I can work and earn my living there.
The idea that all these people with a comfortable standard of living in Sri Lanka, and sometimes with prestigious, high-status jobs too, should come to Britain voluntarily in order to be unemployed, or to do unskilled jobs in petrol stations, shops or other workplaces, is grotesque. The media as well as the politicians who repeat this story ad nauseam are either shamefully ignorant (‘shamefully’ because they ought to make sure they are better informed before making statements in public), or even more shamefully dishonest, spreading untruths which they know will be used as a pretext for vicious attacks on helpless people.
This is not to imply that there is anything wrong in coming to Britain in search of employment or economic security. But the fact is that for Sri Lankan refugees, the very opposite is the case: most of them come to Britain leaving employment, property, status and economic security because their lives are at risk; and the allegation that they are economic migrants who have left their country voluntarily must be exposed for the contemptible lie that it is.
Apart from the disabilities they suffer as refugees, there are also the problems shared with many immigrants: racism, loneliness, alienation, homesickness, and nostalgia for their former way of life. One or two of the refugees, who had come to Britain very young, thought they might find it difficult to readjust to life in Sri Lanka, especially after the devastating changes wrought by the war:
What do you feel about settling down in Britain?
• Well, I’m used to things here, and I wouldn’t mind settling down here. I still want to go back, but one thing that’s against that is that it’s not the same as before – all my relatives and everyone, they’ve become refugees, and everyone’s gone all over the place. The rest of my family are here. Nobody has remained in Sri Lanka. Even by the time we were leaving Jaffna and going back to Colombo, by that time half the buildings had gone anyway, and the place was already being transformed. And my uncle, last year, he took some photographs and sent us, and my mum’s house – that’s been sort of blown in.
This is an understandable response, and the number of people in this category can be expected to increase as the conflict drags on and children who came over with their parents grow up in Britain. Unless normality can be restored in Sri Lanka before they adjust completely to life in the host country, the ideal solution for them is to remain.
There is also the possibility that refugees are too traumatised by their experiences in Sri Lanka ever to wish to go back:
Some Tamils have decided to settle down and make their life in Britain: what do you feel about doing this yourself?
• It depends on the individuals, no? People like us can’t settle down. We can stay for a short time, till the children are settled. When we ask our children, they don’t like to go to our country or any other country; they are used to this environment because they were small when they came, they’ve got used to the set-up of this country. So for them, this is their home, we can’t uproot them. Till they are educated and settled, it’s our duty to look after them. But after that, we prefer to go to some other country.
Back to Sri Lanka?
Not to Sri Lanka! I’ll never stay in Sri Lanka – such a disgusting place! Sri Lanka is out from my life! I’ll never, never go back.
For such people, settlement in Britain or a third country is the obvious solution. But the overwhelming majority of those I interviewed – including young people, including some who had suffered horrific experiences – expressed a desire to go back if peace was restored and they had homes and jobs to return to. For some, this desire was related to negative experiences suffered in Britain, but many who had no complaints about their host country still preferred their own.
Would you think of remaining permanently in Britain?
• Till the problem is solved in Sri Lanka. If it’s normal, if it’s all right, I prefer my own country. Nothing like your own country.
Do you feel at home in Britain?
• No. We don’t get any help from others, from people around – we have to find solutions for our own problems. If the situation settles down, it is better to go back; but if it takes five or ten years, then after that it is very difficult for our children to go back and live there. For myself, I’d prefer to go back, but for our children, it’s different.
• If our problem, our minority problem, is settled to the satisfaction of everybody, then I don’t mind going back. It’s not a matter of minding – I would actually prefer to go back. Here you are on your own, you know; you’re not known to your next-door neighbour, and you are by yourself. But that is not the case there – there we have all our contacts and social life, when you walk in the neighbourhood you know everybody. You are lost in this place – you are to yourself.
Do you feel at home in Britain now?
• No, not really.
What prevents you from feeling at home?
Racism; people passing in cars, they call you ‘black bastard’ and ‘Paki’ and all that – I’ve been called that when I walk along the pavement by a crowd of white hooligans. And your neighbours don’t communicate with you in this country.
Would you like to go back to Sri Lanka?
Some time or other I would – if things get better and we are quite convinced that there is no fear of persecution or fear for your life or freedom.
• Economically for me, in my country, I worked for a government department, my wife worked for the department, I had land, I had a profession, and I was maintaining a car there, you know – quite a high standard of living. For my personal field, it is very difficult to find a job in London – it is related to tropical countries like Sri Lanka, you know, nothing to do with countries like Britain. And the environment outside my home, you know – I never get any sort of a feeling that it’s like Sri Lanka. I don’t know who is my neighbour, and also they don’t want me to know who is living next door. Enjoying our social and cultural life – it is very difficult here. I feel I must, I want to die in my country.
• One important factor was that when we shifted to London, my son was mugged. It was a terrible thing I went through! He was very small at that time – about ten years. Children younger than him assaulted him. He had a head injury and had to be taken to hospital. It was terrible, you know – from the frying pan into the fire!
What do you feel about settling down permanently in Britain?
Not me; no way! If the violence ends, I’m back. That is one condition: if there is no violence, I am going. Nobody can stop me!
• It’s very difficult to make close friends in this country – you can make friends, but not close friends – and I have no relatives here, so I feel alone. I’d like to see my grandma, she’s now 80, 85 – I don’t know. My mother died in 1983, so my grandma was looking after me, and she likes me very much. Recently she sent me a photo, and she’s very ill now – actually, she’s going to die.
So she wants to see you before she dies?
Yes. I’m just writing, ‘I’m coming, I’m coming,’ but I can’t go, I know I can’t go. And my elder sister, she’s a widow, and she’s also like my mum, because my mum died in 1983, she came and looked after everything.
So she also would like to see you?
No! She says, ‘Wherever you live, that you’re alive is enough for us; don’t come back.’ But I’d like to see her.
Will you ever go back and live in Sri Lanka?
If the situation is all right, after some time I’ll go. I can get a better job there than I can get here, I can look after our things and live with my own relatives – that’s the greatest thing you can get in the world. But in this country… nothing!
• In Sri Lanka, when we have free time, we can go to neighbours and speak to them; but here we can’t go to neighbours – we don’t even know who they are! … [I feel] lonely because I don’t have relations here either.
• Even today we are facing racial harassment problems in this country; still we are thinking that Sri Lanka is the best country in the world.
What kind of problems?
Even when I walk along the roadside without doing any harm to others, when passing people see me, they call out ‘Paki’ and all those things. When you see an advertisement, when you call over the telephone, immediately they tell you that vacancy is filled. From the accent – because they didn’t ask my qualifications, they didn’t ask my experience, they didn’t ask my age; from the first word, they say that it is filled. But the next day, next week, the advertisement goes on.
The Asians get problems from both sides – from blacks and whites… In Sri Lanka the racial discrimination is created by the politicians. I was born in a Sinhala district, and I lived there; most of the people, they are okay. This is an organised problem in Sri Lanka. But here no one is organising, but in spite of that you can see it in the public.
You think it’s worse here?
Worse here. I think anyway one day the Sri Lanka problem should be settled and we can make it into a paradise.
• If I could [return to Sri Lanka], I would. That’s the only thing I want to do right now – there’s nothing more I want in this life: just to go back, come back to normality, I mean. In spite of the discrimination I’ve faced in that country, Sri Lanka is still my own country.
• I’m not satisfied because of the racial harassment [in Britain], and also because I haven’t got any proper employment. I would like to return back to my country, but not now.
• If there’s no problem, I would like to go back to Sri Lanka. But I don’t like to go there when there’s trouble. When we came, we just wanted to avoid the problems there, so we came here. If there’s peace there, we want to get back. I don’t say that this life here is bad, or the people or the climate or the country is bad. But I prefer my own country. Not that I hate this place, but I prefer my own.
• I still want to go back. I came here because of the security problem, but I have to go back because my parents are alone.
• I feel very small to be in this country. Very often I think, with my first degree and legal qualification, I was something there. Until 1977 when this discrimination came to a height, you know, I could contact any of the ministers over the phone. My dealings were always with ministers, ministries. But having lived such an influential life, remaining a person of consequence, to be nobody here! After my LLM, I passed my solicitor’s examination, and I had faced these few interviews to be chosen as a solicitor in English firms or in the CPS – that is, the Crown Prosecution Service. We are treated as dust! Whereas somebody here – just anybody from any of the universities – is wanted, I am not.
Even when I was practising my profession, I was lecturing in law at universities, polytechnic, law college, Bankers’ Institute, so lecturing had become my field. But after I came here, I applied even for part-time jobs as a law lecturer: not possible. This is disgraceful! It’s dehumanising for me, you know. So many qualified people have worked at petrol sheds. I haven’t. I would choose to reduce my premiums to one rather than working like that.
Of course, there’s also discrimination in Sri Lanka, not only between Sinhalese and Tamils, but also among Sinhalese and among Tamils.
Over there, perhaps because we didn’t belong to the downtrodden, we did not experience the humiliation and we did not know what it was. What I’m trying to say is, what humiliation is, we did not know, or rather I did not know when I was in Sri Lanka, because I was supposed to have been born in a higher caste. But when I came here, and assumed the role of the downtrodden here, I started fuming and fulminating. But if you ask me to compare, I am sorry, I am not able to compare it because I never experienced it there. But I am experiencing it here!
You mean you feel that you are treated like a lower caste person over here?
Right. That’s right. Exactly… There, maybe I deserved 70%, but I was given 60%; here I may deserve 50%, but I am not given even 15%! So in Sri Lanka I was given at least something that I deserved. Here I am given nothing.
• Because of my political and social involvement, I don’t see much difficulty in settling in. It’s okay for the time being. But I’m not thinking of settling here for ever… I want to go and settle there in my country. That’s my country; no racial harassment, nothing will be there if we settle the matter. Because it is true that Sri Lanka is a paradise!
• I think in Britain, because a large number of Asians are here, everything is provided according to our likes – I think so. One thing we don’t like: the structure of British life is different from the structure of our Asian life. The community life is very different. Here you don’t know what is happening in the next house. You are isolated. We like to mix with neighbours, but that is not a part of life in Britain.
• When I stepped in here, I never asked for asylum. Those days, it was not a problem: had I told my whole story, they would definitely have given me asylum, and had I brought my family, they would also have got asylum. But I didn’t want to be a political refugee, so I applied for leave, six months’ leave, and on the leave I came, thinking that after six months I could go back; and I really wanted to go back. But I found that I couldn’t.
My major problem is actually that my children find it difficult to adapt to being here. My elder son got educated in the Tamil medium; now he is sitting for the GCSE, and it gives me pain to see the difficulties he is undergoing, in switching from the Tamil to the English medium. My wife doesn’t know much English; after her cultural background over there, she finds it very uncomfortable to be here. More than anything else, I couldn’t get suitable employment here!
What do you feel about settling down in Britain?
I’d prefer it if we could go back to Sri Lanka, if the situation and the climate there are more convenient for us, if it is suitable for us to go back – I mean, not coming back to normal, but at least coming back to near normal… My problem is, I may be singled out… I could easily be identified.
• I feel terribly homesick, because I have never gone back since I came to this country. We are not used to this type of living, you see, we are used to the set-up in our country.
Are there any specific aspects of life there which you miss?
Mainly maybe the social set-up. Because we were holding good posts there, so people came to see us and discuss matters. [We are] more isolated here, yes… Even if I had any amount of money, I wouldn’t like to stay here.
• Actually, in Sri Lanka I was a housewife, and here I have to work outside; I get tired, but I have to do it. I don’t want to take even one day’s leave, because it is less money in the bank – they pay by the day… I am a cashier in a supermarket. I need the money, otherwise we can’t live. My husband doesn’t earn enough, so I must work – I must work. My children are still young – they are not working yet. I prefer to be a housewife, but in this country, I can’t afford to stay at home.
• Because of the weather and the comfort, everything in Sri Lanka is better. I don’t like this country, actually. This is not a happy life; it’s a working life, a ‘machine life’. Sometimes I think, there’s no point in living. Every day is just the same. But it can’t be helped… Here, there’s no time at all – no time. If I finish at work, then I have work at home, and then I feel tired.
We’d like to go back. If everything is okay, we’d like to go back. I thought that our country has a lot of problems; but after I came here, I realised there are more problems here!
• I wouldn’t like to settle in Britain, because I like my country, The political problem is the main thing for me. Here the way of living is different, because they don’t get together. In Sri Lanka, suppose if something happens to the next-door people, we will go. And they will say ‘Hello,’ and get together at least. But here it’s entirely different. They will live on their own, everything is through the telephone… We can’t leave the children on their own at home. I don’t like it. So if the children’s education is finished, we can go back, if the political problem is solved.
• It’s not my home! It’s quite a different environment… maybe the weather… And the treatment we get from these people also is very different from the treatment we get from our people; in your country, the respect that you get is quite different from the respect that you get here. Here, you are just a doctor in the ward, and when you come out, you are nowhere, There, even out in society you are a doctor.
Settle in Britain? I won’t do that. I’ll be going back if the situation in Sri Lanka is all right. At work you experience (racism) day to day, you know, you realise that you are looked at differently.
You mean, the way they talk to you and treat you?
That’s right. Not everybody, but there are people like that… We feel more uncomfortable over here. Over there, even though there is discrimination, we feel it is our home, you know.
• Here we’re not actually living, we’re only existing. Every day we get up, go to work, get back home, cooking, washing… There, in our place, we were really enjoying life – we had time to enjoy life!
• I’m used to living in my own country, the country of my birth, and I don’t feel that this is my home country. It’s very different here – the culture and everything. I am connected with my country and with my people. And the climate, weather – the climate also is so different.
Are you planning to make a visit home?
Only when all the problems are solved. Otherwise I can’t: if I go, they will arrest me. Actually, I want to see my mum, my mum and sisters. I have two nephews and five or six nieces, so sometimes I miss them, I want to see them. But I can’t go now because I’m afraid for my life… I don’t think I can go for some years. But after that, I’ll go back.
• For work, it’s okay, but my mind is not happy, it’s really not happy. How can I feel happy? My parents, my brother and sister are all struggling in that place. I can’t feel at home in this country.
Did you come with the intention of staying in Britain?
No – I just wanted to save my life… But I’m not happy here; I’d like to go back, if all the problems are solved.
• I have experienced racism from some of the people at work – not all of them, but some… We are better in Sri Lanka. Because it is our motherland, our own country. We were living a peaceful life there, before all these problems… At the moment, we can’t go back to Sri Lanka – not that we don’t like to. That is the reason we don’t want to go back there now.
• The main problem was my children’s studies – that was the first thing, the language… There is the money problem… Everything’s a problem in this country, no? … My God, I miss Sri Lanka! Here I have to work so hard. Before, in Sri Lanka, I was not employed – there was no need for it. But here I have to go out to work, look after the children, do the cooking and everything. There’s too much work! I go to the factory at 7.30 in the morning. I come back at 4.30. After I come back, I have to do the cooking and everything. Sometimes I get fed up! Sometimes I fight with the children because I’m so tired.
How long did you think you would stay in Britain?
First and foremost, I wanted to look after my children. If I stayed in Sri Lanka, my children could have problems – they might even die, no? Sometimes the bombs came through the roof into somebody’s house. I wanted to save my children’s lives, so I came here. But when their studies finish, I go back.
Even if they want to stay, will you go back?
The children may stay here, but I won’t stay here! I want to go back even if the children stay… If everything is good, it’s better to go back, no? I don’t like this hard life.
• I don’t like this life! … All the work we have to do, all the work; even when I’m not well, there’s no one to help me – I still have to do all the work all the time. When I’m pregnant like this I feel very homesick, I feel my home is much better.
I go to work early in the morning, I start from here at 7 o’clock taking my baby, I drop the baby at another house, then I take two buses, then I’m at work till 3 o’clock, then I wait for buses again, get back at 4 o’clock, get the baby, do the shopping, cooking… it’s very difficult. I don’t like to settle down here. When the problem in our country is solved, when a peaceful time comes, then we’ll go back.
What if your children grow up here and don’t want to go back?
I’m teaching them from now, that this is not our country, we come from a different country. I show my baby photos of his grandmother, grandfather, uncle, aunty – because he knows nothing, only mother and father!
• Everywhere – in school, on the road, in the house, shops – we get racial harassment, breaking into the house, thefts, all the time – and my wife is sick continuously. My children have a lot of harassment even at school. My eldest son was threatened at knife-point thrice, coming home from school, and my third son was robbed just in front of the house: both of us were sick, he went shopping, and at the bus stop he was robbed…
We’re living in a black area, so it’s mostly blacks here. Then I sent my eldest son to school in a white area, and there it’s even worse! So the situation is very bad… In Sri Lanka the discrimination was formed by the politicians, not by the community… If everything is settled in Sri Lanka, I will take the first flight back. Even my daughter always pleads with me to send her back to Sri Lanka; all the time she insists ‘I want to go back.’
What are the main factors that prevent you from feeling at home?
No stay, racial harassment, healthwise everybody’s suffering, then we’re suffering mentally, the children are not free to do anything – they are not free in school, on outings, shopping – they are like caged birds! Wherever you live, you must have peace in life, that is important. But we don’t get any at all. Only we have got government accommodation and money – we must be grateful for that, at least we are getting something. But when your mind is not at peace, everything seems wrong. We are alive, anyway; there are so many people struggling to save their lives in one way or another.
• Whenever I go home, my wife immediately starts, ‘Why can’t we go, at least to India?’… Mainly we miss our friends and relatives. If you’re in Sri Lanka, you know that in the evenings you can simply walk out and go into any other house without telling anybody beforehand. Or evenings you can go for films, you can go to the temple – there are so many things! Those are the things we miss – social activities, contact with other people. When you work here, you really have to work! You have no time for social activities – there is nothing called leisure. You have to do the cooking and all those things. My wife goes out to work in the evenings, and also works at weekends, Saturdays and Sundays, so I have learned to cook after coming here – that is one good thing, at least!
• I’m missing my parents – that’s the main factor. And it’s a different environment… If Sri Lanka comes back to normal, and everything is the same as it was before 1977 – because 1958 I can’t remember, only my parents can remember, but before 1977, Colombo and Jaffna were quite all right, we were quite settled. If it goes back to being like that, we would like to go back – one day, I would like to go back and settle, I’ll be very happy to go back and settle if the country is normal.
You’d prefer to go back to Sri Lanka?
• Yes, of course. But not in the climate at the moment… If the conditions are better, if there’s peace – and I’m talking about the days which we had before.
What I always wanted is to contribute to that place, but not at the moment. Because I always thought that we have a duty to try to contribute something; that is one reason. And our roots are there, our people are there. My feeling is, if the climate is good, I always want to go back and do something as a way of contributing. I can’t contribute by violence or in a violent climate. But if things are all right, then I can do something.
• I have got two little daughters, I would like to go back if there is peace. If there is no peace, if there is no luck, we have to stay here. But if there is peace in Sri Lanka, we have to go because it is better for our children there. I would prefer not to stay here because of the cultural difference.
• I had a problem when I came here in 1986, when I stayed with my sister – she’s also a refugee – her two children, a girl and a boy, and my mother; they came in 1985, in the open visa time. First they stayed in a bed-and-breakfast hotel, after that they got a four-bedroom flat in a lovely block of flats, but they had a lot of racial harassment. Children used to come and bang on the door, they threw dirty nappies and dog-shit through the letter box. They called us ‘Paki’ and ‘you bloody bitch’, and asked my mother to ‘get out, you old bitch.’ They would draw dirty pictures – vulgar – and throw them through the letter box. When we went out, they would splash water on us, they spat on us and threw beer cans. And for a Christmas gift they would put dirty things in a sack and leave it in front of the door.
My children were frightened, so I thought I couldn’t stay there, and I went to the housing association and told them about it. They asked, ‘Do you think you would like to stay in temporary accommodation?’ I thought it doesn’t matter, it’s better than living with racial harassment, with the children being depressed all the time. So I came to temporary accommodation.
But my sister thought, ‘If I stay here, at least they will get me a home,’ but they didn’t, and for three years she had racial harassment. Every time the CID and the police officer used to come and ask, ‘Do you know who the people are, giving you trouble?’ And my mother said, ‘No, we don’t know.’ But the policemen, they know who the people are, giving trouble to them. At last my mother said to them, ‘If you don’t give us good accommodation, we are going to commit suicide, me and my daughter and my grandchildren.’ That is the last word she said. Within two months, they gave them a house.
Racialism is the worst thing in this country… The racial harassment here is worse [than in Sri Lanka], because they say in front of people, ‘We are giving equal opportunities’, but in their mind it’s different.
Perhaps it is difficult for people who have lived all their lives in Britain to understand the intense nostalgia and longing for their homeland felt by people who have been accustomed to a warmer geographical and social climate; to understand that it can be a sad, lonely, frightening experience, which can be turned into an absolutely hellish nightmare by racial harassment. But all human beings have the capacity for exercising some imagination; and it should not be impossible for most people to get at least a vague idea of the predicament of these unhappy exiles, forced out of their homes and living in a country where they are uncomfortable, if not positively miserable.
What makes this effort of imagination impossible is the constant propagation of blatantly distorted images of refugees by racist politicians and the media; propaganda which portrays them as economic migrants coming West to seek their fortunes. The truth, as we have seen, is the opposite: these people have been compelled to come, simply in order to save their own lives or those of their children. And there are many others who feel that exile is literally a fate worse than death. Most refugees had relatives or friends, especially elderly ones, who refused to leave Sri Lanka even when they had the opportunity to do so, for reasons like this:
• Some people, you know, they love their country so much, they don’t like to go to another country.
• They know it’s a dangerous life, but they don’t like to come to other countries and be like me: no permanent residence. They would have to sell their property to come here, and then if they can’t settle down, that is again a difficult situation for them. So they don’t want to come out, they just adjust themselves to stay there.
• One of my cousins is there – he doesn’t like to come out. He knows that his life is at risk, but his parents are there, and he doesn’t want to leave them.
• Some people are devoted to the land, they are attached to the soil. A lot of parents I know, after coming here they complain, they want to go back.
• They don’t like to leave the country because they don’t like western culture. They were brought up in the rural areas, the village, so they only like that culture. And they have some property, so they don’t like to leave it.
• There is a family who had two sons killed by the army, but the parents don’t want to go anywhere. They said, if they die, they will die at home. They don’t want to save their own lives by going to another country, because they are mourning for their sons whom they have lost.
• They think that organising life in other countries is very difficult. And here they’ll have to wear a lot of clothes – coats and caps and gloves and all that. They don’t need that in Sri Lanka.
• So many old people want to live there – they don’t want to come here because they can’t adapt to a different way of life, and they don’t want to leave their property.
• A lot of people, because they were born there, they want to die there. Yes, I have some friends, relations, everybody. They want to live in their country, and even if there’s any problem, they want to die there. They don’t mind about their lives, because they don’t want to die in another country.
• Not because he thinks it’s safe to stay there; but he’s very strongly attached to the country, he just feels that whatever happens, he will live or die in Sri Lanka – it’s his principles. Also, over there he enjoys a certain status: everybody respects him, everybody knows him. He can’t get that anywhere else – now he’s too old to work up to that status.
• They are risking their lives and staying there, to try to find a solution to the problems.
• The risk is there, the danger is there. But I know my mother is one who simply cannot manage here. She would rather starve and die there than come and get humiliated and bored here.
• They want to stay because they really want to liberate the country, solve the problems once and for all, and live there peacefully.
• They don’t understand British culture; they don’t understand English. Once we go to work, they just have to put the TV on and watch it, and even then they can’t understand it. So what they think is, let us die on our own soil. That is what they want. Especially old people. They think that staying here is the same as dying there. For example, my wife’s sister’s mother-in-law: she was here, but she went back and now she’s there. Even with all the risk. Because they want to settle down and die on their own soil.
• I know a lot of people who don’t want to leave Sri Lanka. For example, one of my cousins. All his children are outside Sri Lanka, they are in Canada and other places, but he doesn’t want to go. He says, ‘If all the Tamils die, I may as well die too.’ He is at risk, his house was bombed, but he feels more uncomfortable to change his environment and undergo a different type of hardship.
• I had a close friend who had full refugee status here, but he went back and got killed. He went back because he thought he could serve the Tamil community better from there than from here.
• My mother doesn’t want to live here, she wants to go and settle there. She likes it there, she likes the country and everything. But the problem is she’s alone, she can’t manage. The police, the army, when these violent people come she can’t run, she can’t walk without support – she’s a diabetic patient. But she wants to go there.
• The main reason is, they don’t want to leave their property, and they’re old; some people think, ‘We can’t come and live in this country because it’s cold.’
• Their lives are at risk, but they want to meet the challenge, they don’t want to run away from problems.
• I know two doctors still working in the hospital in Jaffna, even though they have the opportunity to come out; this just shows their determination and courage to help the people.
• One of my uncles didn’t want to leave. He’s dead now – the Tigers killed him. They just came to his home and took him away.
• Often young people leave the country, but older people stay behind. They feel that to settle down in another country is very difficult, that they have to start everything again.
• All my family doesn’t want to leave – they’d rather face the situation there than lose their dignity and status and identity.
• They love their country, they don’t want to leave the country. It was the same with me, but I had to leave.
And so on, and so forth. To most people in Britain, if they have heard of Sri Lanka at all, it is a place producing tea and a tourist spot. But for those of us born and brought up there, it is a homeland where the love and warmth of relatives, neighbours and friends is experienced against a background of breath-taking natural beauty. Exile from such a homeland is understandably a painful experience.
No insult to Britain, but let us be clear that it is not exactly a paradise – not even to the majority of its indigenous population. People forced to come to it due to circumstances beyond their control need the utmost sympathy and support in order to make life tolerable even in the short term. The last thing they need is racist politicians and tabloids scapegoating them for all the economic, political and social shortcomings of the host country (‘Immigration – this threat to our society’ etc.), and implicitly inciting fascist gangs to terrorise, assault or kill them.
The ill-treatment of refugees in countries like Britain, is, of course, an expression of their own social crisis; but it also contributes to a deepening of that crisis by diverting attention from its real causes, proposing illusory solutions (as though harsher asylum laws will do anything to pull Britain out of the recession, create full employment, house the homeless, eliminate poverty, etc, etc!), and accelerating the descent into irrational violence and brutality. Greater understanding of the problems faced by refugees and attempts to provide them with asylum and make them feel at home can enable them to make a creative contribution to the country where they have taken refuge. It would also, of course, make their exile more bearable.
However, for most of them this would still be only a temporary or second-best solution; the longing to return would remain. So a further step, for those concerned about refugees, would be to put pressure on those who are creating the refugee problem – in this case mainly the Sri Lankan government, and to a great extent also the LTTE – to cease their human rights violations, which are forcing people to flee and preventing refugees from returning voluntarily. To the extent that human rights are a legitimate concern of the international community,
It is becoming increasingly clear that the view that refugee movements pose humanitarian problems marginal to the central issues of war and peace, or that they are unique and isolated events, must be superseded by a serious consideration of refugee problems as an integral part of international politics and relations.
(Loescher and Monahan 1990, p. 2)