A Sierra Leonean mother’s refugee story - ‘I just sit and hope’
Saffiatu Mansaray is a pregnant woman who is relying on her journey to Europe, leaving behind two children.
Saffiatu Mansaray is standing in the drizzle outside the International Organization for Migration's Tunis office, gazing down at her bulging stomach. Her husband is working with other undocumented individuals across the alley, constructing a wooden shelter coated in plastic for migrants who are stuck in Tunisia with no end in sight.
The pair traveled from Sierra Leone to Tunisia with the intention of traveling to Europe.
Still, the longer they are detained here, the more worried 32-year-old Saffiatu becomes about her pregnancy. With one palm protectively resting on her stomach, she declares, "I am seven months gone."
"I arrived here in February." She left her two children in the care of an aunt in Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone, before setting out on a potentially fatal voyage. She can still clearly recall the incident.
In Tunisia, Saffiatu and her spouse have encountered further challenges. Before the police arrived to take them into custody a few months ago, they were residing in the port city of Sfax.
She is unsure of the precise time of that. She claims, "The police apprehend us and transport us to the desert." "They're coming back." Saffiatu had crossed from Sierra Leone, which she and her husband had left in November, to find herself on the Algerian border for the second time.
This time, she claims that groups of "bad boys" that hang out in the forest close to Tunisia's northern border with Algeria left her, her husband, and the other people they were forced onto a bus by Tunisian security services in Sfax alone and exposed.
These gangs prey on migrants, refugees, and asylum seekers, taking whatever precious or cash they may have with them, including phones. "We [returned from the Algerian border] on foot." There are fatalities. She shrugs passively and continues.
"Some people get sick. She explains how the police eventually stopped the group as they were traveling and took them back to the border. "I became ill," she says. "Everywhere, including under my tummy, hurt. That was three weeks ago. It was chilly''.
0 Comments