The national service/Warsai-Yikealo Development Campaign and forced migration in post-independence Eritrea

Abstract

When the Eritrean war of independence (1961–1991) that forced hundreds of thousands of people to flee in search of international protection came to a victorious end in May 1991, the general expectation was that this would decisively eliminate the factors that prompt people to flee in search of international protection. Paradoxically, the achievement of independence has failed to stem the flow. Since 2002, hundreds of thousands of young men and women have been fleeing the country to seek asylum first in Sudan and Ethiopia and subsequently in the rest of the world. The data on which the study is based is gathered using snowball sampling, focus group interviews and key informants in Sudan, Ethiopia, the UK, Switzerland, Norway, South Africa, Kenya and Sweden, and supplemented by United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and other secondary sources. Although it is acknowledged that forced migration is the result of inextricably entwined multiple factors, the question addressed in the article is the extent to which the large-scale displacement that has been taking place in the post-independence period is the consequence of the detrimental effects of the universal, compulsory and indefinite national service (NS) and its concomitant, the Warsai-Yikealo Development Campaign (WYDC) on the agelglot (servers) and their families. It is argued that the most important drivers of forced migration in post-independence Eritrea have been the harmful effects of the universal and the indefinite NS and the WYDC on the livelihoods and well being of servers and their families.

Keywords:

• National service
• Warsai-Yikealo Development Campaign
• forced migration

Acknowledgements

A debt of gratitude is due to the editors of the JEAS and the two anonymous reviewers. I am grateful to Hannah Pool's insightful and constructive comments.

Notes

1. According to UNHCR sources, in 2011, 85 out of 193 countries in the world were hosting Eritrean asylum-seekers and refugees.

2. The WYDC is a multi-faceted national social and economic programme which require all conscripts to serve the government and the country indefinitely.

3. Human Rights Watch (HRW), “Eritrea Service for Life.”

4. Humphris, Refugees and the Rashaida; Ringuette, “Ruthless Smugglers Prey on Unaccompanied Minors.”

5. Tilburg University and Europe External Policy Advisors, “Human Trafficking in the Sinai.”

6. Human Rights Watch (HRW), “Libya: Stemming the Flow.”

7. Human Rights Watch (HRW), “Egypt: Don't Deport Eritreans.”

8. MacNeish, “Eritrean Refugees Tortured.”

9. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), “Statistical Online Population Database.”

10. An Arabic translation was abandoned because all NS participants were fluent in Tigrinya or English.

11. Commissioner's Office for Refugees, Sudan.

12. Biermarcki and Waldorf, “Snowball Sampling”; Bryman, Social Research Methods.

13. Bryman, Dynization.

14. Bryman, Social Research Methods, 185.

15. This will be presented in a forthcoming book on the effects of the national service on Eritrean economy and society.

16. Bryman, Social Research Methods, 185.

17. For an excellent discussion of the difficulties mobile populations, including settled groups, pose on effective sampling, see Vigneswaran, “Lost in Space.”

18. Bloch, “Methodological Challenges,” 233. Vigneswaran, “Residential Sampling.”

19. Jacobsen and Landau, “Dual Imperative in Refugee Research.”

20. Twenty-five filled questionnaires from the Sudan arrived late and were not processed; part of the data in the open questions are used in the discussion.

21. Welch, “Military and Social Integration in Ethiopia.”

22. Kaplan, “Tale of Two Colonies.”

23. Eritrea Profile, “Isaias Afwerki.”

24. Ephrem, “Precedence to National Sovereignty.”

25. Ephrem, “Precedence to National Sovereignty.” (emphasis added).

26. ERI TV, “Interview with President Isaias Afwerki.”

27. Article 8, Proc. No. 82/1995.

28. Article 8, Proc. No. 82/1995., Art. 12.

29. Article 8, Proc. No. 82/1995., Art. 14 (5).

30. Ghide, Teateq.

31. HRW, “Eritrea Service for Life”; Kibreab, “Forced Labour in Eritrea”; Bozzini, “National Service and State Structures.”

32. Kale Meteyik (Interview with President Isaias Afwerki).

33. Kale Meteyik (Interview with President Isaias Afwerki).

34. International Monetary Fund (IMF), Country Report.

35. Gray, “Eritrea/Ethiopia Claims Commission.”

36. Human Rights Watch (HRW), World Report 2013, 111.

37. Human Rights Watch (HRW), World Report 2013, 111.

38. UNHCR, referred in Norwegian Refugee Council, Ethiopia Fact Sheet.

39. UNHCR, referred in Norwegian Refugee Council, Ethiopia Fact Sheet.

40. Referred in Norwegian Refugee Council, Ethiopia Fact Sheet.

41. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), “Ethiopia.”

42. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), “UNHCR Country Operations Profile – Ethiopia.”

43. Sudan's Commissioner for Refugees, quoted in IRIN, “Eritrea–Sudan: Refugees Battling.”

44. Beals, “Gebre's Story.”

45. Beals, “Fear of Compulsory Recruitment.”

46. Cited in ibid.

47. The attitude of some refugees might have changed in response to the change of policy adopted by the Ethiopian government in August 2010 in which the restriction on the movement those Eritrean refugees who can sustain themselves financially or have a close or distant relative or friend in Ethiopia who commits to supporting them are allowed to live outside of the camps in the country.

48. Ringuette, “Ruthless Smugglers Prey on Unaccompanied Minors.”

49. Beals, “Gebre's Story.”

50. Quoted in ibid.

51. Nessel, “Externalised Borders and the Invisible Refugee,” 62–99.

52. Gedab News, “Italy-bound, 15 Eritreans Die in the Mediterranean.”

53. Pleitgen and Fahmy, “Refugees Face Organ Theft.”

54. Humphris, Refugees and the Rashaida.

55. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), “Mediterranean Crossings to Italy and Malta.”

56. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), “UN Refugee Agency Condemns.”

57. IRIN, “Eritrea–Sudan: Refugees Battling.”

58. Quoted in ibid. (emphasis added).

59. IRIN, “Eritrea–Sudan: Refugees Battling.”

60. Gunaratna, Inside al Qaeda.

61. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), “UNHCR Country Operations Profile – Sudan.”

62. IRIN, “Eritrea–Sudan: Refugees Battling.”

63. One respondent was too young when she left; one draft-evader; six demobilized mainly for health reasons; and one did not specify.

64. Central Committee of the Community, Eritrean Refugees in Mai Aini, Statistics.

65. Of the total, 822 were 0–5 years of age, 377 were 6–10 years, 486 were 11–17 years, and 115 were over 50 years.

66. Kibreab, Refugees and Development in Africa.

67. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), “Young Eritreans in Ethiopia.”

68. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), “Young Eritreans in Ethiopia.” (emphasis added).

69. United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), “Young Eritreans in Ethiopia.”.

70. Quoted in IRIN, “Eritrea–Ethiopia: ‘Silent Crisis.’”

71. However, none of the respondents is over 45 years of age. Under the second wave of the large-scale militarization programme introduced two years ago, all men up to the age of 70 years are required to serve in the hizbawi serawit (popular armed forces), and over time this may change the demographic structure of the refugee population in Ethiopia and Sudan.

72. These are dealt with in great detail in the on-going wider research project by the author.

73. There are very interesting reasons why some think the NS is bad or good for participants, but these cannot be presented here for lack of space.

74. Kibreab, “Forced Labour in Eritrea,” 41–72.