Jaivet Ealom

I think that most people will have heard of the disgraceful way that Myanmar/Burma has treated its Muslim minority, the Rohingya. Nearly a million people are now living in Bangladesh after the military cracked down on them in 2017. It was the most recent instance of discrimination against these people. As the author tells us, when he was born it had been ten years since the ruling junta stripped all Rohingya of their human rights. Although he was smart and as well educated as he could manage in the circumstances, he could see that there was no future for him in Burma.

For Jaivet, the only choice was to go elsewhere and claim refugee status. He first went to Jakarta in Indonesia where there was a UNHCR office but he could see that there would be not much hope of establishing himself there. Through discussions with friends he learned of smugglers who would take people to Australia. He managed to get enough money to pay the fare but his first attempt ended in failure when the boat hit a reef. He was returned to Jakarta where he learned that other smugglers were taking people to Christmas Island, a territory of Australia that was much closer. Again he obtained the required money and his boat made it to Christmas Island. Unfortunately, Australia was cracking down on refugees and they refused to let any enter Australia. Jaivet and the other single men from his group were sent to Manus Prison in Papua New Guinea. The prison was funded and maintained by Australia but the government said that no one would be accepted in Australia. Conditions were appalling probably to encourage prisoners to agree to return to their homelands but for Jaivet and many others that was not a possibility. A number of men committed suicide and Jaivet even tried it himself but was unsuccessful. He made friends with some workers in the prison and used other contacts to get out of PNG and eventually onto a flight from Hong Kong to Canada. He is the only person who managed to escape Manus Prison.

Jaivet started his refugee quest in May 2013 and arrived in Toronto on Christmas Eve 2017. I am so proud of my country for offering this man a safe refuge. He has been living here ever since, working and going to school. For him it is a happy resolution but he does worry about his family, friends and the rest of the prisoners as well as other citizens of the world living under threat. It is astounding to me that a first world country like Australia could treat people so inhumanely. Jaivet calculated that the costs to operate Manus was $7.618 billion dollars or about $2.44 million for each prisoner. Considering that the people who made it to their shores are probably the brightest and best from their own countries, wouldn't it make more sense to have them become contributing members of society instead of spending millions of dollars to keep them out of the country?… (altro)