Nesh Nesh’s Story: Follow the legal way!
Nesh Nesh is a popular social-media personality in the Eritrean refugee community in Europe, known for his poetry and songs. As a spokesperson for the diaspora and a role model for the young, he feels a responsibility to educate his fellow refugees and asylum seekers about the futility of going from country to country hoping for a quick solution to your situation.
Nesh Nesh says you must be patient and follow the legal path. He learned that himself when he arrived in Europe, after a terrible journey through Libya.
When Nesh Nesh fled Eritrea he was 22 years old. He intended to go straight to Europe, passing through Sudan and Libya and crossing the Mediterranean. He knew that the smugglers were brutal, and that people were mistreated along the way, but he thought that was only those who could not pay for the trip.
“You know what I believed? - That those who suffer in Libya are those who couldn’t pay their fee or had no-one to pay for them. I thought that if you pay your fee, you can cross normally, but it isn’t like that. There are people who paid their thousands and are still trapped.”
Entering the Sahara, he was quickly taken out of that illusion. He and the people travelling with him had to go days without food and water and had to hide from Chadian kidnappers. In Libya, they continued the journey by truck, hiding under a load of sheep. When he arrived in Tripoli, he took a boat for Italy, but the engine stopped working. The Libyan Coast Guard captured them and took them to prison. This prison was the worst place he had ever experienced: a place of hopelessness, impossible conditions and routine abuse and violence.
“Two to three thousand people were detained there. They were from all over Africa, not just Eritreans. There are many forgotten people there; people whose smugglers have never contacted them after they were arrested on the beach. These are lost people who have wasted away in there for two or three years in a place where you can barely survive two or three nights.”
After his release, he attempted another crossing and succeeded, though five friends drowned along the way. Having arrived in Europe, he left the refugee reception centre in Italy and tried to enter the UK through France but was repeatedly stopped at the French border. Then he went to Switzerland, where he was arrested and sent back to Italy.
He now decided to follow the legal procedure and await a decision on his asylum application. In 2017, he was granted asylum in Germany through the EU relocation scheme. He notes how many of his friends, too impatient to enter the immigration system, are drifting from country to country without legal permission to settle anywhere.
“Always when you follow the legal procedures, it’s very helpful in life. There are a lot of my brothers who escaped from Italy and absconded from the train. They got here to Germany and still have no legal status. They are still drifting about in reception centres and facing a lot of problems. So, what I got in Italy, the legal procedure that took ten months, has helped me a lo