Refugees and Forced Migrants in Africa
and the EU
Comparative
and Multidisciplinary Perspectives on Challenges and Solutions
Editors
Elisabeth Wacker
Technical University of Munich
Max Planck Institute for Social Law and Social Policy Munich, Germany
Ulrich Becker
Max Planck Institute for Social Law and Social Policy Munich, Germany
Katharina Crepaz
Max Planck Institute for Social Law and Social Policy
Technical University of Munich Munich, Germany
ISBN 978-3-658-24537-5
ISBN 978-3-658-24538-2 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-24538-2
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1. Introduction – WorkingTogetherto SeeFurther: Europeanand AfricanPerspectivesonRefugeesandForcedMigrantsCompared ........... 1
Katharina Crepaz & Elisabeth Wacker
2. HistoricalandLegalPerspectives:MigrationandSocialRightsina GlobalizedSociety
TheDevelopmentofRefugee ProtectioninAfrica:FromCooperationto NationalisticPrisms .........................................................................................
Dulo Nyaoro
EU ‘Asylum System’– Elements,Failureand ReformProspects ....................
Ulrich Becker
AfricaandtheRefugee Crisis: ASocio-LegalInquiry
Letlhokwa George Mpedi
3. PoliticalPerspectives:MigrationGovernancebetweenTreating SymptomsandCombatingCauses
HowtoMake Europe’s Immigration Policies MoreEfficient andMore Humane ............................................................................................................
Ruud Koopmans
EmergingDebatesonExperiencesandChallengesofRefugee Protection inAfricaandEurope
Susan Waiyego Mwangi
4. CulturalPerspectives:Dealing withDifferencein UrbanEnvironments ‘Ethnic Neighborhoods’ and/orCosmopolitanism:TheArtofLiving
Tabea Scharrer RefugeesandForcedMigrationfromEritreaandEthiopiatoSudan ............
Hassan Ali Mudawi
5. ChallengingtheDeficitPerspective: BenefitsandPitfallsof Diversification
ExperiencesandPerceptionsofRefugeesandForcedMigrantsintheEU, AimingtoCrossanInternal SchengenBorder
Monika Weissensteiner
LifeinRefugeeCamps:The ChallengesofRefugees withDisabilityin Kenya .............................................................................................................
Halimu Shauri & Obeka M. Bonventure
Introduction – Working Together to See Further: European and African Perspectives on Refugees and Forced Migrants Compared
Katharina Crepaz & Elisabeth Wacker
© Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature 2019 E. Wacker et al. (Eds.), Refugees and Forced Migrants in Africa and the EU, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-24538-2_1
According to the UNHCR (2018), there are currently 65.6 million forcibly displaced people worldwide; 28,300 people a dayare forced toflee their homesbecauseofconflict andpersecution(UNHCR2018) – thehighestnumbersincethe end of World War II. These figures show that while arrivals at European shores may be in decline, forced migration continues to be one of the most pressing issuesofourtime.Conflictsinvolvingnon-stateactorsnotboundbyinternational law,naturalcatastrophesandexploitationoftheenvironment,andpersecutionon the grounds of political, ethnic, religious or other affiliation are just some of the reasonswhypeoplehaveto fleetheirhomelands.
WhileAfricahasbeendealingwithlargermigratoryandrefugeemovements for decades, a large-scale influx of refugees from outside is a relatively recent phenomenon for Europe. The continent’s most defining experiences with forced migrationdatebacktothe end ofWorldWarII,whendisplacedpersonsandrefugees fleeing from the Soviet sphere that was to be constituted made their way towards the Western European countries. Over 11.5 million Germans were expelledfromtheEasternEuropeancountriesthathad formerlybeenpart ofHitler’s Reich; many Jewish Holocaust survivors sought safety by leaving their former homelands behind, and citizens of the newly established Communist regimes moved westwards in fear of repression (Wasserstein 2017). The developments during and after World War II led to the installment of international instruments fortheprotectionofrefugees,namelytheUniversalDeclarationofHumanRights in 1948 and the UN Refugee Convention of 1951, with the UNHCR as its ‘guardian’. Article 14 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states that “everyone has the right to seek and to enjoy in other countries asylum frompersecution” (UN2015).TheRefugeeConventionestablishestheapplicabilityofthe term‘refugee’ in article 1: “[to any person who] as a result of events occurring before 1January 1951 and owing to well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons ofrace, religion, nationality, membership ofa particular social group or political opinion, isoutside the countryofhisnationalityand isunable, or, owingto such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country; or who, not havinganationalityandbeingoutsidethecountryofhisformerhabitualresidence as a result of such events, is unable or, owing to such fear, is unwilling to return to it” (UNHCR 2010: 14). Article 33 outlines the Convention’s central idea, the principleofnon-refoulement, alsoreferredtoastheprohibitionofexpulsionand return: “No Contracting State shall expel or return (‘refouler’) a refugee in any
manner whatsoevertothe frontiersofterritories where hislifeorfreedomwould be threatened on account of his race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion” (UNHCR 2010: 30). The principle’s applicationcanbelimitediftherefugeehasbeenconvictedbya finaljudgement ofaparticularlyseriouscrime oriftheyrepresentadangerto publicsecurity.
WhiletheUNConventionremainsthemostimportantdocumentforrefugee issues to this day, it is a product of its time and therefore falls short on dealing withmorerecentdevelopments(e.g.itfocusesonnationstatesasoppressorsand neglects non-state actors such as terrorist groups; it focuses on persecution and neglects armed conflict as a cause of flight; and it also does not include approaches to large-scale forced migratory movements). As the BAMF’s (BundesamtfürMigrationundFlüchtlinge;theGermanFederalOfficeforMigrationand Refugees)asylumdatashows, there werenofurthersizeable refugee movements inEuropefromthe 1950suntilthe early1990s, whenthe BalkanWarsforcedan estimated4millionpeopletoleavetheirhomelands.AsylumapplicationsinGermany reached a peak in 1992 with 438,191 people applying; the numbers then declined, but rose again in2015 (476,694 applications) and sawthe highest-ever registered number of applications in 2016 (745,545) (BAMF 2018: 3). The socalled ‘refugee crisis’ had begun, representing the largest forced migratory movementtoimpactEuropesinceWorldWarII,andconstitutingoneofthemostheatedlydebatedtopicsinGermanyandEuropesince2015. MigrationfromAfricanandMaghrebcountrieshadalreadyincreasedinthe aftermath of the Arab Spring, affecting mainly countries like Italy and Greece, located on the Mediterranean Sea and serving as ports of entryto Europe. However,itwasnotuntillargenumbersofSyriansfleeingthecivilwarintheirhomeland arrived at European shores that forced migration and refugees became an issue of interest for Germany and for the whole EU. German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s open-border policy was at first greeted by many as an innovative and humane approach, with people welcoming refugees at train stations, generating the impressionthat Germany’s long-fought internal battle withitsstatusas a migration destination had been replaced bya more open “welcome culture” embracingsocietaldiversity.However,theinitialeuphoriadidnotlast,andthepractical struggles of integration policies (financial support, labor market access, cultural differencesaspotentialcausesofconflict)soondominatedpublicdiscourse.Refugeesand migrants wereincreasinglyframedasa securitythreat,andright-wing
parties profited from the lack of a common European approach: anti-migration partieswereabletogainvotesinalmostallEuropeancountriesthatwereaffected by the ‘crisis’. Efforts in other geopolitical areas and lessons learnt in handling forced migration were largely overlooked in Europe. Many African countries have long-standing experience in applying different approaches and solutions to refugee issues, from legal questions to housing, the labor market and living in ethnicallydiversesocieties.However,aninternationaldialogueonforcedmigrationand refugee topics with the possibilityto communicate acrossscientific disciplinesandshareproblemsaswellasbestpracticesisstillmissing;thisbookand ourconference serieshopetoplayapartinfillingthisgap.
The 1st South-East African Conference on Refugees and Forced Migrants: SocialRights – Care – Mutual Benefits?, whichtookplaceinKilifi,Kenya from August2–3,2016,andthepresentedited volumeaimtoaddressthese shortcomings, and to provide a starting point for an international scientific collaboration onrefugeeissues.Thegoaloftheconferenceandtheeditionisthereforetwofold: to moveawayfromthelargelyEurocentricdiscourseonrefugeesandforced migrationbysupplyingitwithanAfricanperspective,andtoserveasaplatformfor interdisciplinaryand transnational exchange on a varietyof aspects. The conference’s second edition, with a special focus on diversity and health, will be held in March2019,inordertoestablishalong-termEuropean-Africancollaborationon refugeeand forcedmigrationissues.
Oureditedvolumesetsouttoexplorethevarietyofdisciplinesdealingwith refugee and forced migration issues; it is structured along different scientific fields(history, law, political science, anthropology) and provides an Africanand a European author’s perspective for each discipline. We chose this structure as it allows for both interdisciplinaryas well as international dialogue on a variety of topicsrelatedtorefugeesandforcedmigration.As we’vetackledthedevelopment of refugee protection instruments and the different migratory movements reaching Europe in this introduction, the first contribution will supply our European withanAfricanhistoricalperspective.DuloNyaoroanalyzesthedevelopmentof refugee protection in Africa, denoting a recent rise in nationalism and a subsequentshiftfromcollaborationtorestriction.Heoutlinesthethreedifferentstages of nationalism in Africa from 1950 to 2010, and examines refugee protection in democratically fragile African regions. Nyaoro also looks at the implementation of the UN Refugee Convention in Africa, which he sees as “grossly inadequate”
for the African case, due to its focus on persecution as the cause of flight and its individualistic approach. In response, the Organization of African Unity (OAU) drafted its own Refugee Convention in 1969; Nyaoro discusses the definition of refugees in the OAU Convention and its fit with African political necessities; he then illustrates the different ways of refugee settlement in African countries. Finally,Nyaorodiscussestheinfluenceofneoliberalpoliciesonrefugeeissuesin Africa, which has limited collaboration and fostered a demand for “burden-sharing” also from the international community.
After Dulo Nyaoro’s introduction to the history of refugee protection in Africa and its most recent developments, Ulrich Becker and Letlhokwa Mpedi provide Europeanand African perspectives onlegal issues. Becker discusses the EUasylumsystemandpossiblereformprojects,whileMpedipositsasocio-legal inquiry about the ‘refugee crisis’ in Africa. Becker argues that the refugee situationposes questionsabout the normative basisof the EuropeanUnion, and challenges the notion that the member-states share the same fundamental values. He outlinestheCommonEuropeanAsylumSystem(CEAS),andanalyzesnormative and procedural reasons for its failure. Becker then looks at legislative proposals forreformingtheCEAS,e.g.regardingrelocationcriteriaandfinancialresources. He concludes that the EU must not only react to emergency situations but also proactivelydefineitsglobalresponsibilityforrefugees.
While Ulrich Becker focuses on the EU, Letlhokwa Mpedi posits a sociolegal inquiry about the ‘refugee crisis’ in Africa. He begins with a description of thefactsandfiguresregardingrefugeesandasyluminAfrica,andthencompares the UN Refugee Convention to the OAU Convention. Mpedi also highlights the current challenges that the ‘refugee crisis’ posits to African states: there is no equal distribution of refugees between the different countries and no “burdensharing” mechanisms have been installed. He notes that there is disagreement about the preferable formofrefugee settlement (campsor local communityintegration),thatthereareunduedelaysinthefinalizationofasylumapplicationsand thatpoliticalactorsmakeuseofrefugeeissuestofosterintoleranceandxenophobia. Similarly to Europe, African populations fear being ‘overwhelmed’ byrefugees and have security concerns regarding terrorism. Mpedi argues that these problems could be counteracted bybetter information about the causes of flight, byapositivefocusontheskillsandexpertisethatrefugeesbringtothehostcountry, and by empowering refugees through education and training. He concludes
that most of the factors forcing people to flee in Africa are man-made, e.g. civil wars, and could be prevented by good political leadership, economic controls, respectforhumanrightsandup-to-daterefugeeprotectionlegislation.
RuudKoopmansalsoaddressesnormativequestionsinthenextcontribution, the first article dealing with political perspectives on refugees and forced migration. He proposes possible ways to make Europe’s immigrationpoliciesmoreefficientandmorehumane.KoopmansarguesthatEuropeneedstofocusonattracting high-skilled workers who can help counteract demographic change and who are likely to pay more into the European welfare state system than they receive out of it. However, Europe has so far been unsuccessful in attracting the highskilled professionals needed e.g. in the IT sector, and instead become a popular destinationforlow-skilledworkerswithconservativereligiousvalues.Koopmans criticizes this development, noting that immigration has become a morally chargedissueusedtodiscreditpoliticalopponents,andthatthisdevelopmenthas opened spaces to populist actors on the right. Moral issues should indeed play a role when dealing with asylum and refugee issues; however, Koopmans argues that the Left’s logic is flawed: the people who make it to Europe usually come fromprivilegedlayersofsocietythatcanaffordtopaysmugglers,theytendtobe healthy, young, single and male – in contrast, the most vulnerable groups do not havethechancetoflee.Tocounteractthisproblem,Koopmanssuggestsasystem of application in the countries of origin, where preferential granting of asylum would be given to those most endangered (e.g. minorities), and in which being affluent,young,maleandhealthywouldnolongerequalbetterchancesforarrivinginEurope.
Susan Mwangi Waiyego’s paper focuses on the situation of refugees in Africa and argues that the causes of flight should be dealt with instead of only combatting the symptoms, e.g. trying to block refugees from fleeing to Europe. About 30% of refugees worldwide are located in sub-Saharan Africa, compared to 14% in Europe: Waiyigo therefore proposes a stronger focus on helping refugeesinAfrica.Sheproceedstoanalyzethemainreasonsforrefugeemovements, citing political instability, corruption, and the rise of violent non-state actors; tackling these issues can be seen as the primarystrategy for preventing a further riseinrefugeenumbers.
Tabea Scharrer, the first author dealing with cultural perspectives, talks aboutthe “artoflivingtogether”,namelyco-habitationin‘ethnic neighborhoods’,
as many migrants settle down in the same area when they are moving to a new place. She starts out with the historical example of the Huguenots in Germany, who are nowadays presented as exemplary cosmopolitan migrants, but were indeed a highly exclusive group of settlers. Scharrer then talks about ‘ghettos’ of African-American settlers in American inner cities, and about Somali neighborhoodsinKenyaasexamplesofdifferentviewsonlivingtogetherandofco-ethnic neighborhoods as facilitators or hindrances for inclusion. She concludes that a positive or negative overall verdict cannot be given, and that the experiences madeinthese neighborhoodsmaydiffersignificantly.
Hassan Mudawi’s contributiononcultural aspects focuses onforced migration fromEritrea and Ethiopia to Sudan. Sudan represents an especiallyinterestingcase,asitisbothacountryoforiginandahostcountryforrefugees. Mudawi mentions a recent increase in refugees from Eritrea fleeing mandatory military service;however,thedemographicstructureofthosearrivingischanging,dueto ahighernumberofwomenandchildren.Cross-bordertribesfacilitatetherelocationofEthiopianandEritreanrefugeestoSudan; Mudawiproposesaninvestigationofthesetribalstructuresandoftherelationshipbetweenrefugeecommunities andtheirhostcountriesasissuestobefurtherinvestigated.
The book’s final section is concerned with challenging the dominant deficit perspective on refugees, and with looking at how societal diversity might result in mutual benefits for both new arrivals and host communities. Monika Weissensteinerdescribestheexperiencesandperceptionsofforcedmigrantstryingtocrossaninner-Europeanborder.Shearguesthatsecurityshouldbeviewed as a concept beyond physical safety, and that social rights contribute greatly to people feeling safe or indeed unsafe in a particular place. She analyzes the legal and political framework that refugees are faced with upon their arrival in Italy; after initial housing in reception centers, many refugees become homeless, regardlessoftheirlegalstatus.Althoughtheyareallowedtowork,itisverydifficult forasylumseekerstofindjobsinItaly,andthereisnomutualrecognitionofwork permits with other EU member states. Weissensteiner denotes that forced migrants may first become mobile against their desire (through forced migration), and then again involuntarily immobile when being stuck in a European country that is not their final destination, where they do not have family ties or support structures. In her conclusion, Weissensteiner calls for a more social rights-based approachto migrationgovernance, for obligatoryinclusion services, for the pos-
sibility for refugees to work and settle in other EU member states, and for better collaboration withthe countries oforigininorder toprovide legal and safe pathwaysofmigrationtoEurope.
While Weissensteiner talks about the experiences of migrants in Europe, HalimuShauri and Obeka M. Bonventure offer a lookinto the challenges ofrefugeeswithdisabilityinKenya.Theybeginbyoutliningthedefinitionofdisability givenbytheWHO,andintroducetheframingofdisabilityasahumanrightsissue intheaftermathoftheUNConventionontheRightsofPersonswithDisabilities (CRPD).KenyahoststwoofthelargestrefugeecampsintheWorld, Dadaaband Kakuma; the alreadydifficult living conditionsare even worse for refugees with disabilities, and further compound their exclusion from society. Refugees with disabilities are victims of stereotyping and discrimination, and the violence exerted against this particularly vulnerable group denies them the possibility to voicetheirconcerns.ShauriandObekanotethatthereisagenerallackofvisibility for refugees with disability, and that the camp personnel have no experience indealingwithdisability.Thereisalsoalackofdataonrefugeeswithdisabilities, whichrendersitdifficulttoplanforandcatertotheirrespectiveneeds.Asapossible remedy, Shauri and Obeka suggest custom-made livelihood strategies for refugeesasopposedtoaone-size-fits-allapproach,e.g.incorporatingthespecial needsof children withdisabilitiesinschools. Additionally, camp staffshould be trainedondisabilityandaccesstoassistivedevicesshouldbefostered.
This volume offers a collection of African and European perspectives on refugee and forced migration issues, bridging a variety of scientific disciplines and aiming for an international dialogue on a highly international topic. It providescontributionslookingatframeworkconditions,atmigrationandsocialpolicies, but also at cultural developmentsinsocietiesand at individual experiences telling the story of shared problems. The comparative perspective reveals that while Africa and Europe may be very different cases, they both struggle with similar challenges and tasks related to refugees and forced migrants. CollaboratingmorestronglyandlookingatinternationalinsteadofsolelyEuropeanperspectives could therefore prove to be verybeneficial inaddressingone ofthe biggest currentglobalchallenges.
Bibliography
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UNHCR(2010). Convention and Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees (last accessed 09/May/2018).http://www.unhcr.org/3b66c2aa10
UN(2015). The Universal Declaration of Human Rights. (last accessed 09/May/2018) http://www.un.org/en/udhrbook/pdf/udhr_booklet_en_web.pdf
Wasserstein, Bernard. “European Refugee Movements After World War II” (last accessed 09/May/2018).http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwtwo/refugees_01.shtml
2. Historical and Legal Perspectives: Migration and Social Rights in a Globalized Society
© Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden GmbH, part of Springer Nature 2019 E. Wacker et al. (Eds.), Refugees and Forced Migrants in Africa and the EU, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-24538-2_2
Introduction
ThispiecepositsthatrefugeeprotectioninAfricahasdevelopedconcurrentlyand has been influenced by transformation of the concept of nationalism in Africa. Deploying the concept of nationalism to construct a coherent understanding of refugee protection is useful and relevant because the ‘nation-state’ project is largely accountable for most conflict-induced displacement in many if not all parts of the world (Davenport and Moore 2003). Africa is no exception. The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimates that over 60 million peoplewereeitherrefugeesorasylumseekersin2016,ahighernumberthanafter World War II (UNHCR 2016). Before the eruption of violence in North Africa andSyria,Africahadthehighestnumberofrefugees(FerrisandStark2012).On thecontinent,theprotectionofrefugeessincetheinceptionofthe OAUConvention Governing the Specific Aspects of Refugee Problems has always been definedbycollaboration(McFadyen2012).However,therehasbeenadistinctshift fromcollaborationtorestriction.Refugeesandasylumseekersarefacingunprecedented obstaclesin seekingprotection, includingborder closures, warehousing, discrimination, refoulement and hostile host communities. “Hostility has replaced hospitality,detentionhasreplacedassistance.Therefugeeisaburdenratherthan the individual who is at risk and seeking sanctuary” (McFadyen 2012:1). Some scholars argue that the unprecedentedly high numbers of refugees have created apprehension about open door asylum policies (Hjerm2001; Crush and Ramachandran2010).
This paper argues that evolving nationalism is at the core of this transformation towards refugee protection. From my analysis, nationalism has transformed in three distinct stages in Africa in the last six decades – from 1950 to 2010. The first stage is the development of Pan-Africanism, which successfully employedthesharedhistoryofAfricanpeopletoformulatehowAfricansshould relatetoeachotherand howtheyshouldrelate tothe restofthe world.TheFifth Pan-African Congress, held in Manchester in 1945, was the culmination of this ideology(Hobsjerb2015).Thisperiodisimportantbecauseithelpedtoforgethe struggle for independence and determined how those displaced by the struggle were to be treated. The second stage of nationalist growth revolves around the mergerbetweenethnicnationsandtheterritorialstateinAfrica.Thisnationalism was promoted under the mantra of national unity. Given the threat posed by the ambersofcolonialismand the need to consolidate the state, there was a tacit un-
derstanding that national unity was paramount. Independent leaders used mixed methods to forge unity among many different ethnic nations which the colonial project had put together. The “nation-state project”, as Charles Keeley refers to it,wastherealizationthatalmostallAfricancountriesaremulti-nation-statesand there was need for some supranational identity if these nations were to be governed as one (Keeley 1996). The attempt at forging a homogenous identity in multi nation-states took different trajectories that produced violent conflicts whichinturnproduceddisplacementandrefugeesonalargescale.
The third stage of nationalism is what is called “the second liberation” in Africa.Thisstageisacontinuationofthepreviousstageandfollowedtheendof the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union. The “second liberation” was characterized by civil unrest and a call for political change in various African countries,followedbydemocraticchangeofgovernmentsinsome,butalsoidentity renegotiations based on claims of self-determination (Eghosa 2005). This period also saw the resurgence of neoliberal free market economies which were driven by the so called ‘Washington Consensus’. The spread of neoliberal economicideasandvalueshasprofoundlytransformedhowstatesinAfricaperceive andtreatrefugeesfromfellowAfricancountries.
In analyzing the evolution of nationalism in Africa, I break my arguments into several related subthemes. The first part is the conceptualization which anchorstheargumentonnationalismtheories.Thecentralcontentionisthatnationalismas a source of identityand formof political organization is necessarilyexclusive. The rise of nationalism is directly reflected in the rise of resistance to migration. The second part looks at Pan-Africanism and the concretization of African nationalism withthe establishment ofthe Organizationof AfricanUnity (OAU) Convention Governing the Specific Aspects of Refugee Problems in Africain1969.Asa productofPan-Africanideology,the OAU Convention was a reactionto Africanpolitical realityand is verycollaborative initsarchitecture. ThesecondpartlooksatnationalismaspromotedbyindependentAfricanleaders; while this nationalism entailed forging a homogenous narrative for ethnically diversenations,manyleadersfailedtofundamentallychangetheeconomicstructures that perpetuated poverty and dependency of former imperial powers. Cold War logic allowed either consolidation of the coercive power of the state or its erosion altogether which led to the militarization of African politics. Coups and countercoups produced hundreds of thousands of refugees. Such refugees were
accepted by neighboring states as victims of events outside of their control. The third form of nationalism emerged around what has been described as “second liberation” movements. The collapse of the Soviet Union and the withdrawal of support by the USA from weak African leaderships triggered internal rebellion and demand for more democratic governance. This was compounded by neoliberal economic policies which introduced Structural Adjustment Programmes in many African countries. Violent internal negotiations of belonging and entitlement therefore followed. The fourth part examines refugee protection under the new democratic governments in Africa. I will argue that political competition, which is central to democracy, undermines the asylum facility in a number of ways.
RefugeesinAfrica:AnOverview
By the end of 2015, the UNHCR estimated that there were about 63.91 million people of concern including internally displaced persons, asylum seekers, refugees,statelesspersonsandotherswhosestatuscouldnotbeascertained.Ofthese people of concern, 16.121 million were refugees whose number increased to 21million in 2016 (UNHCR 2016). Compared to 1960, when there were only 1.6millionrefugeesinthe world,itisinevitabletoconcludethatthenation-state projectisfacingaprofoundtransformation.Sub-SaharanAfricahosts26%ofthe world’s refugee population. Of the 63 million forced migrants, 18 million are in Africa (ibid.). It is in these parts of the world where violent conflicts are most frequent, wherenation-statesaremostfragileand wheredemocraticexperiments have yieldedtheleastbenefits.
Mostrefugeesfleefromjustthreeregionsofthecontinent:TheGreaterHorn of Africa, the Great Lakes region and the Central Africa region. In the Greater Horn of Africa, which includes Somalia, Kenya, Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Djibouti, 11.6 million people were displaced in 2016, 3.2 million of whom are refugees. ‘Displaced people’ here refers to different categories of those who have beenforced to flee their habitual placesofresidence. While InternallyDisplaced Persons(IDPs)arethose who aredisplacedbutremainintheircountries, asylum seekersand refugeesare outside their countryoforigin. Currentlythe number of refugees is increasing, partly due to the on-going crises in the Central African Republic, Nigeria, South Sudan and Burundi. Initially localized in the Horn of Africa, refugee camps are now being established in all other sub-regions, espe-
cially in West and Southern Africa (Adepoju 2016). The Horn has experienced bothinter-andintra-stateconflictsintermittently.These includetheEritreanwar of liberation from Ethiopia which lasted until 1993. Ethiopia and Somalia have gone to war two times over the Ogaden triangle while the South Sudanese separationfromtheSudanlastedfrom1959to2005.Almost1millionrefugeescome from the Great Lakes region, including the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda, Burundi and Tanzania, and the area hosts almost the same number (Accord 2015).
TheUNHCRestimatesthatin2015,over3millionpeopleweredisplacedin West Africa. Nigeria was particularlyaffected but so were Mali, Mauritania and theCentralAfricanRepublic.Itisestimatedthatthereare2.5millionIDPsinthe region. Figures indicate that there are about 500,000 refugees in the region, but there could actually be more. All these displacements are symptomatic of the fragility of the nation-state in Africa (Annan 2014). In Nigeria for example, the divide between the North and South is manifest in the Boko Haramterror group which seeks to establish sharia law in the North. As of 2016, the countries with the highest refugee burdens in Africa are: Ethiopia (659,000) Kenya (551,000), Chad (453,000), Uganda (386,000), Cameroon (264,000) and South Sudan (248,000)(UNHCR2016).
Despite this grim picture, refugees face difficult obstacles in search of protection.AUnitedNations official had this to say; “Instead of explaining to people thatrefugeesneedhelp,insteadofmultiplyingeffortstohelppeopleintheircountries or trying to solve conflicts, address poverty, they have […] presented these people as people that come to richcountries, abuse the valuesor steal the wealth or take jobs away.” (Grandi2016)
Engagement with refugees has declined; “hostility has replaced hospitality, detentionhasreplacedassistance.Therefugeeisaburdenratherthananindividual who is at risk and seeking sanctuary” (McFadyen 2012; 1). The protection of refugees is no longer based on preserving the life of individuals at risk but on preservingthenation-statetowhomtherefugeeisarisk.Thisperceptionisdominant in the European and North American countries. Refugees are seeking protectioninhostilecontexts(Fetzer2000;Grandi2016).Whilethisrealityhasbeen widely acknowledged in the North, in Africa, it is muted in many ways. At the coreofthiscontestationisthearticulationofnationalismandthenation-stateproject.Buthowistheconceptofnationalismunderstood?
Nation-StateBuilding andNationalism
According to Anderson, nations are imagined as communities which overtime developorganicallythroughsharedhistory,cultureanddestiny(Anderson1991). Nationalism as a social or political construct is necessarily an exclusive project with strong undertones of belonging, which automatically excludes others (Mavroudi 2010). Nationalism – an ideologybased on the common identityas a nationandlinkedtoapoliticalprogram – emergeswhenthereisapoliticalproject to protect and preserve because of its uniqueness (Smith 1986). Normally, two types of nations exist. The first is the ethnic nation or the primordial, and the secondistheterritorialnation(Smith1986;Keeley1996).Smitharguesthatmost Western European nation-states are territorial nations, which are the result of mergingmanydifferentethnicgroupsintoasingleterritory.Forceddisplacement happenswhennationsareuprootedfromtheirterritories (Malkki1992).Theethnic nation, however, is a community that shares a common descent and may or may not have a territory. However, universal consensus on what constitutes a completenationdoesnotexist becausethereareexceptionstoeveryrule.Keeley argues that the nation-state project, which is the process of forging unity from many different identities into one distinct group, takes many trajectories. These includedomination,federationsandconfederations,andevenseparation(Keeley, 1996). While this is assertion is largely true it does not explain why a state like Somaliashouldhavecrumbledeventhoughitconsistsofoneethnic group.
Becauseofthemanypathwaysandstrategies,thenation-stateprojectcauses violent resistance,due tothe fearoflossofidentityorthedesirebysome groups todominateothers.Throughouthistory,thenation-stateprojecthasbeenresponsible for genocide, forced displacement, population transfers and domination (Keeley1996).ThegenocideofRwandain1994isseenasarevoltagainstmany yearsofTutsidominationofthe majorityHutu (Uvin1999).InAfrica, manynations found themselves under colonial rule, which then gave rise to the current states. It is argued that unlike in Africa, the development of the nation-state in Europewasfiercelycontestedandtookmanycenturies(Mitchell,1998).Indeed, themodernrefugeeprotectionregimewasinstalledbecauseoftheneedtoprotect ethnic nations from persecution and genocide in Europe and Asia (Fellar 2001). Nation-states in Europe were formed for protection against foreign aggression and domination after many wars, while in Africa nation-states were created to serveexternalinterests.Theconflicts,displacementandcontestationwithinmany
statesinAfricaarethereforeaprocessofinternalnegotiationsofthemanynations withinthestate.
BasilDavidsonhasbroachedAfricannationalismfroma historicalperspective (Davidson 1977). While acknowledging the colonial experience and its impact on African political development, he doubts the Eurocentric thinking that African nationalism is merely a reflection of European nationalism. Davidson thinksthatAfricannationalismmaycontainthepotentialforadifferenttrajectory. ThenormativejudgmentofEuropeansaboutpoliticalorganizationsinAfrica,the mergingtogetherofmanyethnicnationsintoonesingleterritoryhasnecessitated the forging of a supranational-identity, which is partly the genesis of huge displacementinthe Africancontinent(Davidson1977).
While refugee protection is not exactly a new phenomenon in the African context, the advent of the conventional nation-state in the 19th centuryhas transformedthephilosophicalunderpinningsandthereforethereasonsforrefugeeprotection (Schmidt 2000). The main objective of this paper is to analyze how the transformationofnationalismhas inturninfluencedrefugee productionandprotectioninAfrica.Analyzedfromtheperspectiveofdifferenttypesofnationalism, it becomes apparent why refugee protection is inherently a political process, yet the UNHCR and other humanitarian agencies are expected to remain apolitical. BelowisanassessmentofthedevelopmentofnationalisminAfrica.
Pan-AfricanismandRefugeeProtection
The development of Pan-Africanism took a while to catch the world’s attention. With its emphasis on historical injustices against African people, including the longhistoryofslavery,colonialism,dominationanddiscrimination,Pan-Africanism became an emancipation ideology (Bujra 2002). This shared cruel past became the unifyingglue amongblackleadersall over the world (Uvin1999).It became a critical asset in the struggle against colonialism in Africa, segregation in North America and minority rule in many parts of the world. Importantly, its romantic prophecyof a shared destiny became a source of strength. For the purpose of this essay, Pan-Africanism helps to illustrate how people displaced by liberation struggles were protected by other African states (ibid.). The struggle againstcolonialisminAfrica,segregationintheUnitedStatesofAmericaandthe emergingapartheidregimeinSouthAfricawereallviewedaschallengestoblack
people in general. Therefore, the struggle required a common front, shared resourcesandacommonstrategywithleaderssharingthe samevision.
The liberation struggle displaced hundreds of thousands of people in the threedecadesafterWorldWarII(Mavroudi2010).The1951Conventionrelating to the status of refugees and the 1967 Protocol proved grossly inadequate in providingprotectionforrefugeesoutsideEurope,particularlyinAfrica(Hofmann 1992).First,itsemphasisonpersecutionasthebasisofseekingandgrantingasylumdidnotcontemplateotherpossiblecausesofflight.Second,theindividualistic approach to refugee status determination was problematic where danger was imminentregardlessofpoliticalviews(Fitzpatrick2005).Furthermore,whilethe right to seek asylum was central to the Convention, there were no concomitant binding responsibilities for states to admit asylum seekers. For these reasons, Africanleadersresolvedtoseekadefinitionthat wouldreflectthecircumstances onthecontinentwhichledtotheOrganizationofAfricanUnityConventionGoverningtheSpecific AspectsofRefugeeproblemsinAfrica (OAU,1969).
TheOAU Convention Governing theSpecificAspectsofRefugeeProblems inAfrica
ThePan-AfricanideologygavebirthtotheOrganizationofAfricanUnity(OAU) whichis credited with formulatingthe OAU Convention Governing the Specific Aspects of Refugee Problems in Africa. Due to the limitations in the 1951 Convention and the 1967 Protocol, the Organization of African Unity established a conventionofitsownin1969 (Chimni 2004; McFadyen2012).Besides respectingthe 1951Conventionandits1967Protocol,the OAUConventionGoverning the Specific Aspects of Refugee Problems in Africa expanded the definition of refugeetoincludeallpeoplefleeing from manmade disasters: “The term refugee shall also apply to every person who owing to external aggression, occupation, foreigndominationoreventsseriouslydisturbingpublicorderineitherpartorthe whole of his country of origin or nationality is compelled to leave his place of habitual residence in order to seek refuge in another place outside his countryof origin or nationality” (Art 1(2),OAU1969).
This definition is important for several reasons: First, it allows individuals or groupsto disengage fundamentally fromabusive national communitiesbyoffering such people international protection. Second, it expands the definition of persecution, which may include denial of formal protection, a campaign of gen-
eralizeddisfranchisement,refusaltoallowself-determinationoractsofdeliberate harm(Arboleda1991:195).Third,itallowsprotectionforindividualsandgroups fromstateswhichhavefailedintheirprimaryresponsibilityofprotectionbecause ofexternalfactors(Fitzpatrick2005).TheConventionalsorecognizesthatabuse mayoccurasaresultoflossofauthoritybecauseofexternalaggression,occupation or foreign domination. Group disfranchisement and legitimacy of flight in circumstancesofgeneraldangerisrecognized.Inthe1951Convention,thecause of harm was ascribed to individual or group characteristics, while in the OAU definitionthecauseofharmcanbeindeterminate;personalstatusandimpending harmdonothavetobelinked.Finally,thisdefinitionleavesroomfor apersonto seekrefugeifpublic orderisinjeopardyeitherinpartofor inthe wholecountry due to issues of proximity, closure of escape routes, or political instability. This convention in many ways reflects the reality and circumstances in Africa at that timeandbeyond.
The collaborative approach is well captured in the OAU Convention which states that “where a Member State finds difficulty in continuing to grant asylum to refugees, such Member State may appeal directlyto other Member States and through the OAU, and such other Member States shall in the spirit of African solidarity and international cooperation take appropriate measures to lighten the burden of the Member State granting asylum” (Article II(4), OAU 1969). This collaborationwaswellcapturedwhenthegovernmentofBurundinegotiatedwith the governments of Tanganyika and Congo to share Rwandese refugees who arrivedinBujumburainthousandsin1961(Goetz2003:5).Toachievethiscollaborative approach, asylum was characterized by self-settlement, local integration andtransitrefugeecamps.Indeed,CrispnotesthatAfricagainedareputationfor hospitalitytowardsrefugees(Crisp2006).Asdiscussedbelow,thiscollaborative approachwastobetestedaftertheendofcolonialism.
Post-IndependenceNationalismandRefugeeProtection
No sooner had the colonial administrationdeparted thana newformofnationalismemerged.NationswhichhadbeenbroughttogethertoresistcolonialgovernancenowhadtonegotiatetheirplaceandspaceinthenewlyindependentAfrican countries(Stein1990).FormostAfricancountries,independencecameabruptly. The leaders did not have time to prepare. There were no specific plans for postindependence economies and administrations. Some departing colonial adminis-
trators had no time to properly prepare their African followers, while others simply had no intention to be of help in the transfer process (Kyle, 1996). The structures left in place were superimposed and had no roots in politics and governance.Theeconomiesofthenewlyindependentstateswerestilldirectlylinked to the European economies. The fundamentals of colonial economies were created for European rather than Africa interests –the profits were for European banks, companies and governments, and such policies undermined the future economies of an independent Africa (Bahamian 2009). Yet, the African people had very high expectations of their leaders. Independence removed the glue that held many ethnic nations together. Discontent and disagreements led to coups, violenceandevencivil wars(Keller1996:156).
TheBiafrawarinNigeria(1967–1970)andtheKatangasecessioninCongo (1960) were the manifestations of protests against unmet expectations and new forms of nationalism compounded by Western economic interests in Africa (Davies 2002). While Pan-Africanism had worked well in uniting Africans against colonialism and racial discrimination, it proved inadequate in addressing this new form of nationalism. Indeed, the divide between the Anglophone and francophone countries became a persistent obstacle in achieving African unity (Legume1975:210).
Fear of disintegration of many African states called for an emphasis on nationalunity,inwhichpoliticaldissentbecametreasonable.Thiswastheperiodof the “African strong man”. The Cold War logic nurtured this form of dictatorship because it allowed the superpowers to have their way without any public discourse (Bratton and van de Walle 1997). Although many people were displaced in Africa, most of them applied for asylum status on the basis of persecution. Fromthe1960supuntilthe1980s,manyAfricancountriesnotonlyallowedlarge numbers of refugees into their territories but also ensured that they enjoyed “reasonably secure living conditions” and both legal and social protection (Crisp 2010:3).
CoupsandCountercoups
The sheer number of military coups the continent has experienced over the last 50yearsepitomizesthenexusbetweenpoorgovernanceanddisplacementinAfrica.Hutchfulestimatesthatfrom1956to1986,there wereatotalof60coupsin Africa(Hutchful1991).By1986,only18outofthe50statesinAfricawereunder
civilian rule (Nyongo 1998). While some coups were peaceful, the majority of themwereviolent,andledto protractedconflictsituationsanddisplacement.NigeriaexperienceditsfirstcoupinJanuary1966,whichledtothedeathsofPrime MinisterTafawaBelewaandSirAhmedBello,theleaderofSokotostate.Nigeria remainedundermilitaryruleuntilabout1999,althoughthere wasashortcivilian government stint from 1979 to 1983. This 30-month-conflict escalated only six yearsafter the countryhad gained independence, and it killed over 500,000people, while an additional 2 million people died as a result of related starvation (Momoh 2000). Ghana experienced a coup almost immediately when Kwame Nkrumah was overthrown and went into exile in 1966 in Guinea. In the spirit of Pan-Africanism, President Sékou Touré of Guinea made Nkrumah joint head of state(Hadjor1988).
Due to dictatorship and the limited possibilitiesfor peaceful change ofgovernment in many African states from the 1960s until the early 1990s, Africa experienced a militarization of politics. Coup d’états became the preferred method of changing governments and transferring political and administrative authority inAfrica(Shivji2003).ShivjiarguesthattheColdWarbetweentheSovietUnion and the United States of America led to “hotwars” in Africa, because it stunted the full negotiationof statehood after independence. However, it isalso true that the coups were sponsored bythe superpowers in order for themto gain foothold in Africa or to install their preferred candidates. The lingering effects of these externalexperiencescanstillbefeltforexampleintheGreatLakesregion,especially in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where the first Prime Minister Patrice Lumumba was brutally assassinated in 1961 through the duplicity of the United States of America (Blum 1986). These coups and generalized violence thereforeframedhowasylumseekerswerereceivedinotherAfricancountries.It wasnot tenabletoinsist that asylumseekersdemonstratepersecutionastheonly reasonforflight.Africathenhadtoinitiateinnovativewaysofmanagingasylum.
Groupand IndividualAsylum
DuetothestronginfluenceofPan-AfricanismandtheOAUConvention,asylum seekers were mostly granted asylum on two bases. The first were the leaders of liberation movements, their supporters and families who were accorded asylum asrevolutionariesfightingforself-determination.Theywereallowedandactively supportedincontinuingtheirpoliticalmobilizationandrevolutionaryactivitiesin
the host countries, often with the tacit approval and assistance of the OAU and thehoststateelites.UndertheUNHCRmandate,asylumseekersandrefugeesare not expected to be armed. Asylum is only granted to civilian and not to armed combatants(UNHCR2001).Thosedisplacedbyconflictsorliberationwarswere receivedonprimafacietermsandweretreatedaccordingly.Suchgroupsorindividuals may not have been directly targeted by persecution. Refugees from the lusophone African countries such as Angola and Mozambique, who gained their independence in the 1970s and descended into civil wars, were mostly accorded thisformoftreatment.
LocalIntegrationandCircularMovements
Adepoju argues that most African independent presidents deliberately downplayed the international borders whichallowed bothrefugeesand other migrants tofreelymovebetweencountries(Adepoju2008:17).Stein(1990)concludesthat local integration and other durable solutions depend on the political will of the hostcountriesandotherparties.Localintegrationisfarmorecomplexthanoften perceived. Political will to support the refugee cause is important – particularly forindependentstruggles,secession,orautonomy.Thesecondproblemwithlocal integrationand self-settlement isthe number ofrefugees. InAfrica, especiallyin the 1990s, the numbers of refugees have been so large that local integration became less attractive. The possibilities of losing ethnic and national identity became real. The third problem is that local integration could act as a pull factor, encouraging more refugees to come. Finally, the ethnic, religious and national identities of refugees may create problems, especially in Africa, where crossbordercommunitiesarecommon.
Self-Settlement
Self-settlement was widely practiced, e.g. among Angolan refugees in Zambia (Bakewell 1999), or Mozambican refugees in Zimbabwe. Local integration was promoted; Ugandans and Ethiopians in Kenya were allowed to work in the civil service, and lived alongside Kenyans (Odiyo et al. 2000). More than 40,000 Rwandeserefugeeswho fledtoBurundibetween1962and1965wereintegrated with the help of the Burundi government and international organizations (Goetz 2003). In Burundi, the government, the UNHCR and the League of Red Cross
Societies experimented with self-settlement that should eventually lead to local integrationforRwandeserefugeesintheEasternpartofthecountry(Mugerasettlement) (Goetz 2003: 4). Although the settlements did not succeed, they displayed the political will that existed regarding the protection of refugees. Due to the displacement of many more Rwandese refugees, the government of Burundi negotiated withthe government ofTanzania to share the refugeesbecause ofthe former country’s limited capacity (Goetz 2003).
NaturalizationofRefugees
During the “golden era of asylum” in Africa, which lasted up to the 1980s, refugeeswereallowedtonaturalizeandbecomecitizens(Crisp2010).AlthoughseveralAfricancountrieshavehadopendoorrefugeepolicies,restrictionswereseen as alternatives. Refugees have been granted citizenship in several countries. Kenya accepted many refugees from Ethiopia, Uganda and Eritrea in the 1980s, who eventually became citizens (Odiyo et al. 2002). In 2008, Tanzania granted citizenship to 150,000 Burundi refugees who had been displaced in 1972. However, because Tanzania does not accept dual citizenship, the refugees were expected to renounce their Burundi citizenship, which became a source of controversyand misunderstanding (CSFM2008).
In the 1960s, the Burundi government viewed refugees as future citizens. Refugee settlements were to be made permanent and not provisional. However, somerefugeesthoughttheirasylum wasonlytemporary.Thesesettlements were not immune to nationalistic sentiments as the refugees from Rwanda were seen as the same people (Stein 1996). In the Burundi experiment, collaboration betweenthehostcommunitiesandrefugeesallowedtheprogramtoachieveacertain degreeofsuccess.
SecondLiberationNationalismandtheNew Wars1
Theendofthe ColdWarandthecollapseoftheSovietUnionin1990 weakened and exposed many African “strongmen”, who abruptly lost the support of the superpowers (Huntington 1991; Shivji 2003). This led to the period referred to as the “second liberation” movements, in which multi-partydemocracy,freeandfair
1 ThistermisattributedtoKaldor,M 1999 New and Old Wars: Organised Violence in a Global Era.1stedition.Cambridge:PolityPress.
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I believe that you’re right, the more I think of it, and in that case I believe our chances of ever getting Hayden and getting out of here are about as good as the old snowball in ⸺ . I’ve got a crazy idea we could take off here.”
Hinkley was not greatly surprized, but Graves was.
“You really think so?” he inquired with the nearest approach to eagerness that the flyers had ever seen him show.
Broughton nodded.
“On account of the slope, only half a load of gas and oil now, and the fact that even if we stall completely getting over those trees that the mountainside is so steep we can nose down and get up speed. What do you think, Larry?”
“Just about fifty-fifty,” was Hinkley’s reply. “Of course I don’t know a great deal about Martin bombers—I’m a pursuit man and Jim here is the big-ship expert. It’ll be a hair-raiser, with everything to lose and pretty nearly everything to gain. Inasmuch as these yeggs are so suspicious, I don’t believe we’d have a Chinaman’s chance to get Hayden and get out of here⸺ ”
“Except by strategy they won’t understand,” Broughton cut in. “You see, Mr Graves, I figure it this way If you tell them we’re going, they’ll lose some of their suspicion. Probably half the reason for killing us would be to prevent our telling anybody about their funny rendezvous up here, plus the plausible reason for our death if anybody gets nosing around. The ship gives them that ”
“And any of them who are afraid of the police through their past reputations could disappear while some unknown tells the army all about the wreck,” Graves suggested.
“Exactly,” agreed Broughton. “They’ll lose their suspicion, and will think that we see nothing unusual in this place. When the motors start they’ll all be out for the take-off. By some hook or crook we ought to be able to get Hayden near enough the ship and a little away from the others so that we can knock him on the head, chuck him in the back cockpit, and give the old ship the gun.”
“If they’re all too near, one of us can get in the back, fiddle with the machine gun, and then suddenly announce that we’ll mow down the crowd unless Hayden gives himself up,” said Hinkley amiably
Graves was almost excited at the hopeful vista suggested by the flyers. His pace was a little faster than usual as he covered a path twenty feet long over and over again. A fresh, unlighted cigar was clamped in the extreme corner of his well-chiseled mouth.
“Of course I am in your hands as far as flying is concerned,” he said as though talking to himself. “I don’t know how many of them will be armed, but the chances are that in the excitement the shooting will not be very accurate.”
Every one was silent for a moment. Then Broughton made another suggestion.
“They will be back of us, sir, and if we can get in the front cockpit fast the bomb compartment, which is as high as our heads, will protect us from shots while we are taking off. They’ll ricochet off the steel runway, I believe, at the angle of fire they’ll shoot at. Besides, they’ll hold their fire at first for fear of hitting Hayden.”
Graves threw his untasted cigar away.
“We’ll do it,” he said calmly. “There are men with field-glasses over on that mountain there keeping watch. If we fail, all hope of getting Hayden alive and without publicity will be gone, but no man up here will get out. All the routes are blocked, if they only knew it. It will mean a lot of men killed capturing this party, and our swoop on Hayden’s gang all over the country will be incomplete, but we’ll have done our best.”
“Let’s get the motor started then, right away,” said Broughton. “It’s getting dark already.”
The western sky was red as fire still, but the sun itself had dipped behind the mountains and the valleys were filling with purple shadow.
The motors were started without trouble. The roar of them brought every one out of the shack. Luck was with the flyers, for only three men came close to the ship—Hayden, Somers, and little Meyer. All the rest of the men stayed near the shack, fifty yards away from the Martin. The machine-gun holdup appeared to be unnecessary. The three men stopped about ten yards away.
Graves walked up to them.
“We have the ship fixed, and have decided to try a take-off,” he said.
The comfort this brought to the three agitators was obvious. Graves looked around and beckoned to Hinkley, who strolled up casually Broughton was idling the motors, now, and preparing to climb out.
Graves went a few steps to meet the flyer.
“Get close to Meyer and disarm him when I give the signal. Tell Broughton to do the same to Somers—knock him on the head if necessary. I’ll get Hayden, and then the three of us can heave him in the back cockpit and get in before that gang up there can get their guns. I don’t believe any of them carry revolvers.”
Hinkley grinned delightedly.
“Fast work, partner,” he breathed.
The three were standing quietly, talking in low tones, when Hinkley and Broughton came up.
“Well, good-by,” said Graves, extending his hand to Hayden. Broughton and Hinkley watched him closely.
His fist shot up like a flash of light, carrying all his weight with it. The big man fell like an ox. At the same time the two flyers leaped in, revolvers in hand, and crashed the butts down on the heads of their respective victims. It was such a complete surprize that the ruse was funny in its effectiveness.
Somers and Meyer were disarmed in a trice. Before the astonished henchmen of Hayden had recovered from their surprize and covered half the distance between the cabin and the ship the three government men had heaved the unconscious Hayden into the rear cockpit and were scrambling forward over the bomb compartment.
Without waiting for belts to be adjusted Broughton jammed on both throttles. Bullets sang close to them; the gang had held their fire at first for fear of hitting Hayden, and now the bomb compartment shielded the flyers completely. Their heads did not show above it.
By the time the marksmen had realized this and had veered to go around the wing the ship was in motion. For a few seconds two men wrenched at the rudders in a mad effort to disable the plane, but the
sturdy controls held. Then the Martin was moving so fast that the men had to let go.
For twenty-five yards Broughton ruddered the ship straight down the slope. It was extremely steep there, and the heavy ship picked up speed amazingly Then Jim swung it slightly to the left, to get the benefit of the extra yards that would give him.
The trees rushed nearer with terrible swiftness. There came a quivering bounce, and then, with a feeling of infinite relief, he felt the ship leave the ground. He pulled the wheel back as far as it would go.
The Martin made it. There was not an inch of margin, for the elevators and rudders swished through the trees and the nose of the ship dropped in a stall. For two hundred feet Broughton had all he could do to keep it from dragging in the trees on that nearly sheer mountain side. Then it picked up speed, and with both Libertys still running wide open turned eastward through the thickening shadow, streams of fire from the exhausts trailing behind like banners of triumph.
VI.
The peak they had left was a trifle higher than any of the others, so it was unnecessary for Broughton to waste time getting altitude. The Martin drove steadily eastward over the murky world below.
Probably no ship is ever so helpless as when flying over country like that at night, but the successful culmination of their adventure was such a tonic to the airmen that the chance of a forced landing seemed only a minor thing, scarcely to be considered.
In a few minutes Graves turned and passed a note back to Hinkley. The tall flyer read it with difficulty in the darkness, and then passed it to Broughton, steadying the wheel to give the pilot an opportunity to read it:
Although the ammunition and guns in the back are packed where I do not believe Hayden can get at them, I believe it would be wise for me to climb back there in order to take no chances with him. He is desperate, and might try to take us all to with him.
It would be an easy matter for Graves to get from his cockpit into the flyer’s compartment, and from there back to the rear cockpit. The roof of the bomb compartment provided a four-foot runway which is not a difficult matter for an experienced airman to negotiate. Nevertheless, climbing around a ship under the best of conditions is no parlor sport.
It was a tribute to Graves’ nerve that Broughton looked at Hinkley and then nodded at Graves. The secret agent promptly unbuckled his belt and crawled beneath the instrument board into their cockpit.
With the aid of wire and struts he inched himself over the flyers’ heads, and started crawling along the runway. Broughton throttled as low as he dared to kill speed. The air was smooth as glass, as it always is at night, which made Graves’ attempt easier.
Finally Hinkley turned to Broughton and nodded with a wide grin. Broughton relaxed from the strain of keeping the ship absolutely level, and looked around. No one could be seen in the rear cockpit. Then Graves’ head appeared, and the firm mouth was smiling beneath the big goggles. He nodded cheerfully. Apparently everything was all right. Hayden’s head had come into contact with something when they had heaved him in, Broughton surmised, and he was probably as unconscious as a sack of meal.
They were now a speck in the starry sky above the mountains. In every direction nothing but the black voids of the valleys and the shadowed sides of towering mountains met the eye. Both flyers had seen awe-inspiring sights in the air, but there were few which could compare with the panorama spread out below them now. There was mystery and greatness there—widely scattered pin points of light from the wilderness, with an occasional far-off cluster that represented a town—all contributing to a grandeur and beauty which was more impressive because less seen than suggested.
Suddenly Hinkley’s long fingers gripped Broughton’s arm. He pointed to the right hand motor. For a moment Broughton could not fathom his meaning. Then his heart sunk as he realized what had happened.
A tiny spray of water was spurting from the radiator Perhaps one of the bullets had hit it and weakened it, or more likely it was only a failure in the material. In any event, it meant that within a few minutes all the water would be gone, and even before that happened the motor would be useless.
The pilot strove to pierce the gloom below to discover any sign of a landing place. There was none. Parachute flares would do no good down there—one can land in the trees blindly with as much chance for life as in the daytime.
While Broughton was still trying to pick up some clearing, which would show lighter than the woods, Hinkley loosened his belt. He leaned over to yell into Broughton’s ear:
“I think I can hold it for a while!”
He threw his leg over the side of the cockpit, leaning far backward to avoid the propeller which was whirling within inches of him. Finally he decided not to risk it, and climbed back. He went back on the bomb compartment and crawled down on the wing from there. Little by little he made his way forward to the leading edge of the wing. Once again even the throwing of an arm for a few inches would mean being mangled by the propeller.
He held to the struts and made his way to the motor. The design of the radiator helped his scheme. On a Martin it is a square contrivance set up above the motor, and well toward the rear of it. On most planes the radiator is in front of the motor, with the propeller turning two inches in front of it.
Hinkley fought the wind viciously while he extracted a half dollar from his pocket and wrapped it in his handkerchief. It took precious time to accomplish it on his perilous perch, and all the while the water was getting lower. Already Broughton had opened the motor shutters wide to hold the temperature down.
Finally Hinkley placed the wrapped coin against the leak. He pressed hard against it with his hand. He could feel the handkerchief
soaking, but he knew that the motor would last many precious minutes more because he had reduced the leak by over half. He set himself as comfortably as he could. One foot was less than an inch from the edge of the wing. His right arm was crooked around a strut. His left held the temporary barrier against the radiator. In this position he fought the propeller blast.
The heat of the water made him change hands frequently. Once he nearly fell into the propeller doing it, for both hands had to be free for a second at one time in order that the coin be always pressed against the leak.
Then he had to change fingers, for his thumbs were both scalded. One by one he used the tip of each finger, and one by one they scalded. His thin lips were set into a line that was like a livid cut in his face, but the makeshift plug was always there. He did not even glance at the ground six thousand feet below. He wondered whether Broughton knew what he was suffering, and would land at the first opportunity.
Broughton did, but for a half hour he could find no place. Then the great ship cleared the last peak. Over beyond the foothills plowed fields gleamed dully in contrast to the black spots of trees.
The left hand motor was eighty-five Centigrade, flying throttled to a thousand revolutions and with the shutters wide open. It was difficult to handle the ship with the right motor turning up so much more. Broughton came to a decision. To take a chance was the only way.
He cut the right hand motor until it “revved” up a thousand, and started a shallow dive. In a moment the Martin was diving through the gloom at a hundred miles an hour. It was only three thousand when they cleared the foothills. The country was still ragged, but it was level.
Broughton pulled his left parachute flare. A sense of ineffable relief filled him as he saw a fiery ball drop earthward. Those flares didn’t work as invariably as they might.
The eyes of the three airmen, stranded there in the darkness, followed that ball of fire with unwinking eyes. Suddenly it burst, and a
brilliant flare swung downward on a small parachute. The earth was lighted up fairly well in a circle of at least a mile’s radius.
Broughton cut his motors still further. He beckoned to Hinkley. Hinkley knew the desperate need for haste—that flare would not last long and the other one, hung to the right hand wing-tip, might not work. He worked his way rapidly back to the cockpit, careless of his raw fingertips as he grasped wires and struts to help him along. The flare was within three hundred feet of the ground, and the Martin a thousand, when he reached the seat and strapped his belt.
There was just one possible field. It was a cornfield, apparently, about seventy-five yards long. There was a fence at both ends. Next to one fence was a road. On the far side of the other was a very small clump of woods.
The flare was growing dim and perilously near the ground as the Martin, with all switches cut, skimmed the fence and settled. The corn was nearly as high as the bottom wing. The bomber no more than hit the ground before darkness came as suddenly as though a light had been turned off in a room.
The ship wavered, and there was a rending crunch from the landing gear. Then a crash as the ship nosed up slowly and the front shell of the observers cockpit folded back until it loosened the instrument board.
“Hooray!”
It was Hinkley shouting.
“Jim, I never was so glad to get on the ground in my life!”
Broughton made a wry face. He was suddenly weak from the strain.
For a moment the two sat there motionless, not even bothering to unloosen their belts. Then Hinkley turned to look at Graves. That gentleman was unloosening his belt.
“We thought you might want to smoke a cigaret, so we landed,” said Hinkley.
Graves held up the frazzled butt of a cigar.
“I chewed it up from the time you got out there on the wing,” he replied. “We came pretty near trading a Martin for a pair of honest-to wings, didn’t we?”
“Or coal-shovels,” grinned Hinkley
“How’s Hayden?”
“Came to once and I put him out again and tied him up,” replied Graves calmly. “Let’s flag this car coming down the road and see where we are. I’d like to get the first train I can get to.”
“We’re not far from either Lexington or Richmond. I saw the lights of a big town a few miles north,” said Broughton as all three men climbed out.
They lifted Hayden out of the back seat. His head was bandaged, and he was still unconscious.
“I bandaged him up—he was bleeding pretty badly,” remarked Graves, lighting a new cigar with a steady hand. “Let’s get over to the road—there’s a regular parade of autos coming.”
A string of headlights extending so far that some were mere points of light were coming down the road. The noise of a Martin, plus the parachute flare, had aroused the whole country.
Broughton lingered behind to use an electric-flashlight on the ship. The ground was soft, and there was a ditch they had hit, besides. That was the reason for the nose-over. It was better so, he reflected. They would have run into the fence and then the trees at the further end of the field, and some one would probably have been hurt.
Within fifteen minutes there were a hundred marveling people around. The flyers hired a guard for the ship, and then accepted the invitation of a man who drove a luxurious touring car to spend the night at his home. Hayden, whose identity was not revealed, spent the night in the town jail of Ellis, Virginia, guarded by the tireless Graves in addition to the regular warden, and accompanied that gentleman to Washington by train early the next moving. He was handcuffed, and rode in a baggage car to avoid publicity
As he was leaving Graves shook hands with the flyers in a matterof-fact way.
“You’ll hear from me,” he stated. “Perhaps I may see you again before long. Good-by.”
Hinkley and Broughton had to wait for a crew to come from Langham Field to dismantle the Martin and ship it home. The day
after their return to the field the newspapers blossomed forth with across-the-page headlines telling of the round-up of a stupendous conspiracy which had been responsible for the series of great robberies that had been astounding the country.
The story of Hayden’s capture was not a part of the press reports, and Hayden himself was not too prominent in them. They saw Graves’ fine hand in that. They could readily realize that any revelation of their identity would be more dangerous than the glory involved would warrant, even were they desirous of nibbling at the fruits of fame.
A few days thereafter there came a letter to each of them. The contents were alike. There were two copies of a letter signed by that same great government official whose name had appeared on Graves’ letter of authority. The letter was addressed to the Secretary of War. As they read those letters Hinkley’s smile was as mocking as ever and Broughton’s face as stoical, but each of them still has his copy, carefully locked up and preserved as though the most precious of possessions. As Hinkley once confided to Broughton while slightly under the influence of the demon rum—
“I don’t think a bit more of that letter than I do my right eye!”
Transcriber’s Note: This story appeared in the December 7, 1923 issue of The Popular Magazine.
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