| dc.description.abstract | The growing burden of the refugee question facing Uganda is enormous; Uganda today has a
refugee population of over 1.4 million refugees making Uganda the number one refugee hosting
country in Africa and second in the world behind Turkey which hosts 3.5 million refugees
(UNHCR 2018). The causes of the refugee crisis in great lakes region are diverse and interlinked
in nature. Once these refugee populations are in the country of asylum, they do not live in
isolation but live side by side with the indigenous people. The Ugandan government has been
praised by the international community for having a progressive refugee policy which allows
refugees to socially integrate within the host community, but credit should be given to the host
communities who provide hospitable environment to these refugees. Refugees in Uganda live in
both settlements and urban centers. Those who choose to live in settlement are cared for by
Ugandan government and UNHCR with support from other partners, but for those who choose to
live in urban centers are self-settled. With the UNHCR urban refugee policy 2009 of self settlement, there is a knowledge gap about how these refugees socially integrate in urban centers
where both the government and refugee service organizations have put less emphasis in. As a
response to the apparent knowledge and research gap regarding social integration of urban
refugees in Katwe, Kampala Uganda, I conducted a qualitative study involving Congolese
refugees who have lived in Uganda for over five years. Using purposive and convenience
sampling techniques I selected Congolese refugees and organization like Refugee Law Project
and HIAS which work with urban refugees within Kampala respectively. The study explored the
processes and experiences of social integration of refugees into the host communities in Katwe,
putting in context, the nexus of refugee and host community coexistence, housing patterns,
language and coping mechanisms as precursors to social integration. I analyzed the data
collected in the fieldwork using classification and tabulation of data, the raw data was arranged
into groups or classes on the basis of common characteristic and then editing and content
analysis was done by identifying the common themes that emerged from the descriptions given
by the respondents in answering the questions. Results from this study is presented in verbatim
manner and it indicated that learning the local language Luganda is important in social
integration process, this is because refugees do not live in isolation but live together with the
nationals of which the Baganda are the majority. The study also found out that language alone is
not enough for successful integration; refugees need to engage in business to be able to support
their families, because there is little support for urban refugees when it comes to livelihood
support and hence staying next to the city center which comes with both opportunity and
challenges is viable to most of the refugees. The study indicates that dealing with the past
experiences which forced refugees to flee their country of origin is also important in the social
integration process. Effects of forced migration are both physical and psychological in nature and
one cannot successfully integrate if she or he is still struggling with the past, seeking of God’s
guidance through prayer is one way of dealing with the past but counseling and medical
assistance to deal with both the medical and psychological wounds is another way of dealing
with the past. One cannot fully socially integrate when he or she is still disturbed by the past. The
results of this study therefore allude to the fact that social integration in urban areas is a process
not an event, the government of Uganda and other partners dealing with the refugee question
should put as much effort in social integration as they are putting with self-reliance project in the
settlements. They should come up with a holistic refugee management policy which handles both
the host community and the refugees because these two communities live side by in urban
centers. | en_US |
