IRIN Web Special on Separated Somali Children

Adapting traditions

Somalis are ready to take the risk of sending unaccompanied children away partly because it is "not an entirely alien concept", one Somali aid worker explained to IRIN. Traditionally, Somali society is nomadic, with families depending on the clan network as they move around geographically - often covering great distances and moving across national borders and ethnic boundaries. Before the collapse of the Somali state, it was normal to send young children away to stay for long periods with grandparents and close relatives. However, with the collapse of the state and the resulting exodus, this tradition has been distorted: young children are being sent away to alien cultures for indefinite periods without the support of close relatives.

Initially, more boys were sent abroad than girls. According to figures from immigration sources in Europe, more Somali boys were arriving in Europe in the early to mid 1990s. Families sent them away in the early stage of the war, fearing they would get caught up with the "morians" - young armed militia - either as fighters, or as targeted victims of the clan-based war. This was coupled with the fact that tradition favoured education privileges going to the older male siblings. However, by the late 1990s, there was a demonstrable change in the trend, with an increasing number of unaccompanied girls being sent abroad. In Sweden, immigration figures show of 461 unaccompanied children arriving in 2001, 48 are Somali, of whom 29 are girls. Somalis were the second largest group after Iraqi Kurds - 186 of whom only 20 were girls.

Investing in girls

Research by IRIN in Somali territories showed that girls were now often considered a better investment. Somalis said they had learnt that girls were "more trusted" and "more productive" overseas, while boys were more likely to slip into criminal behaviour and fail to send money home. This is likely to be related to the particular difficulties many Somali boys and men have when in the Western culture they lose their traditional role and authority, exacerbated by unemployment. Women, on the other hand, say they find their role is elevated in countries - like Britain - where the female head of household claims and collects state benefits. In Somaliland - a highly conservative society - this shift towards girls is a recognized social phenomenon. Recent plays and poems have reflected the relative merits of sending girls abroad, and the problems the young boys and men face in the West.

But the breakdown of traditional family structures has exposed these young separated Somali girls to particular vulnerabilities. Formerly there were strict rules governing the identities of the relatives who could be trusted to look after a daughter. One mother explained how it used to work: "I would trust my sister with my child, but not my brother, because he would be married to another woman, who would be looking after the children. My husband's sister I can trust, but not my husband's brother. But if my brother or my husband's brother is a bachelor, I can trust him." Under the present social emergency, Somali families have become willing to send children away to very distant relatives. Moreover, relatives who might be traditionally entrusted with the care of children may prove to be highly unsuitable as guardians in a Western environment. "Parents here don't realize that an uncle has changed dramatically in the Western environment, and now drinks, and is jobless, and has no one to look after the house, and can barely afford to look after himself," one "returnee" from Britain said to IRIN.

Yet Somali families remaining in the home country are unwilling to acknowledge how difficult it is for relatives abroad to look after unaccompanied children; the perspective is that anything abroad must be better than home. "We are willing to take more risks, because we believe that anyone living abroad must be living in luxury," said one mother. Because of the strong oral tradition of Somali culture, the extent of communication - particularly through telephone and Internet - maintained between relatives abroad and at home is unusual, compared with other diaspora and refugee groups. It has had the effect of encouraging families to send young children overseas, in the sometimes misguided belief that the clan network continues to work as effectively abroad.

As a result, some adamantly refuse to believe that a child can end up living a lonely existence in a hostel. "I don't believe our children are ever alone, because every child has their lineage they can always find a relative - maybe they get called 'unaccompanied' because the relatives are afraid to come forward to the authorities," stated one Somali. Few realize just how enormous the gap is between the dream and the reality.

[ENDS]

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