Eliminating xenophobia through education

The Coordinating Body of Refugee and Migrant Communities (CBRMC) is an initiative that began in 1999. It was initially based in Eloff Street and later moved to a number of different locations in the CBD before settling at its current location on 4 Loveday Street.

Darius Kwigomba, an advocacy officer of CBRMC, said they assist asylum seekers, otherwise known as refugees, to become legal migrants.

“We work on the integration of migrants,” he said.

“Most importantly, we do educational campaigns or information sessions where we inform them of their rights and responsibilities in South Africa. The education campaigns aim to raise awareness of the issues that lead to xenophobic attacks, in addition to taking certain measures to prevent them from occurring in the community.”

There are six advocacy officers and each one of them is a migrant from different countries in Africa. It is important to have representatives from each nationality in order to be able to communicate and promote social cohesion.

Allowing migrants to work in harmony with the rest of the country is what the organisation aims to achieve. “One of the current projects we’re working on is the education of undocumented children, who may or may not be from South Africa,” said Kwigomba.

In those cases, the organisation intervenes by contacting the school to work out a way for the undocumented child to continue with the school programme while the parents apply for documentation for the child.

While many people are not aware of this issue in South Africa, it often occurs that people become logged on the system as having two different birth dates, or someone doesn’t even exist on the system.

The organisation campaigns to end xenophobia in the country through education, and aims to make sure that refugees and migrants receive the government’s full range of services in order to live an integrated life.

Details: www.cbrmc.org