I have just come back from a short visit to Cox’s Bazar, where I visited some of the Rohingya refugee camps. 1987 was the first time I visited Cox’s Bazar and then, in the aftermath of the devastating cyclone of 1991, I was involved with relief and rehabilitation activities.
I last visited Cox’s Bazar in late 2017 as part of a national enquiry commission during which we interviewed some of the refugee families who had fled genocidal violence in the Rakhine state of Myanmar. I remember, clearly, that one elderly woman had told me then that it was the fourth time she had come as a refugee from Myanmar and, “Definitely this time I am not going back!”
At that time, in contrast, a male refugee introduced himself as a timber merchant from Rakhine who, on enquiry, said he owned land in Rakhine and was carrying his original land records. He had carried a small solar panel from Myanmar, not so much for providing light, but to power his mobile phone so that he could keep in touch with relations and friends.
He said that he would definitely return to Rakhine if his citizenship was guaranteed. Two contrasting views!
2017 vs now
The Rohingya camps of 2017 were muddy, very unhygienic, and disorganized. On this recent visit, I saw a transformation. A lot of the internal roads are herringbone brick roads, a lot of the slopes have been stabilized, and trees planted, and the water supply and sanitation have been improved beyond recognition.
In 2017/18, I had been told that there were over 2,000 foreigners working in Cox’s Bazar. I could never understand this high number, and accompanying very high cost, as I recalled that when I worked in the Bangladesh Refugee Relief Program in India in 1971, supported by Oxfam, we cared for 600,000 Bangladeshis with a big staff of Indians and Bangladeshis and only three expatriates. I was told that now there are only about 150 foreigners in Cox’s Bazar.
On my visit to the refugee camps in Cox’s Bazar, I was able to learn and see that aid organizations are now considering the needs of the “host” communities, which is sensible, as their lives and livelihoods have been turned upside down. It was so very good to see that the land even inside the camps, although belonging to local people, was being used by the Rohingya to grow a wide range of vegetables on a share-cropping basis with the landowners.
At the beginning of the Covid pandemic last year, many feared that the virus would sweep through urban slums and the refugee camps, but this has not come to pass. As one person told me: “Sir, this is a disease of the rich, fat people who live in cities and do not eat sensibly.” “We eat simply and have much resistance to viruses.”
As far as Covid protocol was concerned, I found that all the offices of the government, UN, and NGOs connected to the Rohingya strictly carried out temperature checking, hand-washing, and physical distancing. Equally strict were the hotels I visited in Cox’s Bazar. However, the organization at the domestic terminal at Dhaka airport is both chaotic and dangerous, and I was not even asked for my ID. It is frightening to realize that such carelessness is present at Dhaka’s prestigious airport.
One concern that I hope the authorities look into is that while it is understandable that the government has built security fences to keep the Rohingya refugee families inside the camps, the fencing that has been built along either side of the main roads has coiled barbed wire at ground level. When traffic veers off the side of the road, the pedestrians, often small children from both the local communities and refugee families, are forced against the dangerous barbed wire. This manmade danger should be looked into on an urgent basis.
One subject that was often raised in discussions was that of Bhashan Char. Some of the feedback coming from there is positive in terms of good accommodation, sanitation, and income generation possibilities. While the donor community has raised concerns of “freedom of movement,” none of the donor countries are willing to accept any of the Rohingya refugees in their own countries, so is it fair to criticise the Bhashan Char idea? UN and donor country representatives have visited the refugee camps many times. It is high time they visited Bhashan Char to see for themselves and make an assessment of the facilities that exist on the island. l
Julian Francis has been associated with relief and development activities of Bangladesh since the War of Liberation. In 2012, the government of Bangladesh awarded him the ‘Friends of Liberation War Honour’ in recognition of his work among the refugees in India in 1971 and in 2018 honoured him with full Bangladesh citizenship.