Around the world, and particularly in Africa, many people are forced to leave their countries due to conflicts, massive human rights violations, persecution, violence, and discrimination. They migrate in the hope of finding international protection.
Senegal has ratified the:
· 1951 Geneva Convention relating to the Status of Refugees and its 1967 Additional Protocol
· 1969 OAU Convention Governing the Specific Aspects of Refugee Problems in Africa
· It also adopted Decree No. 68-27 of July 24, 1968, amended by Law No. 75-109 of December 20, 1975, establishing the National Commission on Eligibility for Refugee Status, which is the government body that determines asylum in Senegal.
This law was replaced by Law No. 2022-01 of April 14, 2022, on the status of refugees and stateless persons.
The National Commission for the Management of Refugees and Stateless Persons (CNGRA) was created, reporting to the Presidency of the Republic. It is headed by a civil servant at the A level, or equivalent.
The Commission is responsible for ensuring the legal and administrative protection of applicants and beneficiaries of refugee and stateless person status; and for ensuring, in liaison with the competent authorities, compliance with the fundamental guarantees granted by national law and international legal instruments relating to refugees and stateless persons. It is also responsible for assisting refugees, asylum seekers, and stateless persons and for advising on any application for refugee and stateless person status. Senegal has a long tradition of welcoming and welcoming people who, for ethnic, racial, religious, or political reasons, are persecuted in their country of origin or residence. Senegal hosts approximately 17,000 refugees of various origins.
Gaps in the refugee status determination procedure, manifested by:
· Slowness at the Commission level in processing asylum applications. Asylum seekers can wait up to three years without status, resulting in:
· Worsening the asylum seeker’s vulnerability
· The psychological burden
The lack of reasons for notifications of asylum application rejections, which impacts:
· The asylum seeker’s appeal, in that the applicant would not know which aspect to review or amend.
· The appeal is filed with the same body that rejected the asylum application; it turns out that the Senegalese asylum system does not provide for a second-instance appeal body. It is the members of the Commission who examine asylum applications at first instance and appeals. And during this entire waiting period, the asylum seeker generally receives no assistance. They are left to their own devices.
· This leads to a second rejection since the applicant does not know where to rely to prepare their appeal.
After obtaining refugee status:
· Delays in obtaining refugee identity cards and travel documents, which impact:
· The refugee’s free movement, as well as other rights related to these documents (bank account, employment, etc.)
· After obtaining these documents, the refugee faces:
Non-recognition of these documents (refugee identity card, passport) by certain public and private organizations. In southern Senegal, an armed conflict has pitted the government against the rebels of the Democratic Movement of Casamance (MFDC) since 1982. This armed conflict has resulted in massive population displacement, estimated at 60,000 internally displaced persons, not to mention thousands of refugees who have fled their home villages to settle in neighboring countries such as Gambia and Guinea-Bissau.
Recommendations:
· Pay even more attention to the situation of refugees and asylum seekers living in Senegal;
· Create reception centers or shelters for vulnerable asylum seekers (women, children, and the disabled);
· Create a social assistance commission for refugees;
· Reduce the processing time for asylum applications (between 3 and 6 months) by the Commission, as is the case in South Africa and Togo;
· Promptly issue refugee identity cards and travel documents to all persons with refugee status;
· Adopt an implementing law for the National Commission for the Management of Refugees and Stateless Persons (CNGRA) by the President of the Republic;
· Conduct awareness-raising campaigns to ensure that all institutions recognize and accept refugee identity documents;
· Promote the three durable solutions: local integration, voluntary return, and resettlement in a third country;
· Ratify the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Specific Aspects of the Right to a Nationality and the Eradication of Statelessness in Africa;
· Ratify the African Union Convention for the Protection and Assistance of Internally Displaced Persons in Africa (Kampala Convention).
Done in Dakar, June 20, 2024
The General Secretariat