London (Alshahid) – The Somali Community in the United Kingdom held a successful Consultative Meeting in London on 19th June at 10.00, at the Head Office of the Initiative for Change for the Somali community in Britain following an invitation from the Somali Initiative for Dialogue and Democracy (SIDD).

 The purpose of the gathering was to discuss and exchange views on major issues affecting the Somali Community, such as unemployment, discrimination, crime, underachievement, marginalisation, crime, exclusion and poverty among other things.

Mr. Osman Jama who chaired the meeting and delivered the keynote speech, is the Chairman of the SIDD and was deputized by Mr.Mohamed Sharif Mohamud vice chairman of the same organization.

Others who made the meeting successful were Zahra Hassan who was a presenter and a rapporteur, and Mr. Don de Silva from the management team of the IFC who briefed the audience on the vision of the IFC and encouraged those present to work hard towards achieving their goals.

Around 40 participants representing a broad spectrum of the Somali communities took part in the discussion.

The idea was warmly welcomed, and a decision was taken to establish a consultative group for the Somali community.

The following document was adopted by the meeting.

Consultative Meeting on the State of the Somali Community in Britain

The Somali community in Britain is one of the biggest and longest established. It is also the biggest in the Diaspora, yet they have the lowest employment rate of all immigrants and the levels of education are also low; with 50 percent having no qualifications and only 3 percent possessing higher education qualifications. Unemployment affects the community across the board, including men and women, young people and adults, highly skilled professionals and trade people, as well as unskilled individuals.

The vast majority holds British nationality, yet they do not benefit from their rights and privileges they are entitled to by virtue of their citizenship, because of lack of awareness, marginalisation and other causes. They are embroiled in a web of entanglements such as crime, unemployment, discrimination, exclusion, underachievement in schools and neglect by local authorities, not to mention non engagement with the central government, just to cite some examples of their plight.

Unemployment is considered to be one key factor contributing to Somalis being caught in a cycle of depression, mental health, isolation and poverty and ultimately turning to crime.

Somali civil society organisations are much localised and are not networked into wider partnership; therefore their influences do not extend beyond their local area. One reason for this is that the Somali communities are scattered all over the U.K and there is no strong voice for the Somali communities across the country.

To sort out these problems, collective efforts and mobilisation of resources are needed. Therefore, they are called upon to join forces towards working for the common good in advancement, assertion of their solidarity, promotion of their common interests in all imaginable fields; organised action is indispensable for the progress of the whole community.

What the Somali community needs most is a sense of purpose, direction, leadership, political maturity and organisation that unites them and speaks on their behalf.

A concerted action of organised work is needed to achieve among other things the following:

1.     To engage with the Somali community to raise their awareness of their rights and obligations as citizens, to help them to integrate, to sustain their cohesion and to benefit from all opportunities offered by the system and to participate in public life.

2.     To combat crime and unemployment among the community and to help them by all means possible to eradicate the root-cause of the problems and to provide them with the assistance needed to lead a decent life.

3.     To help the community in solving the problems inherent in under-achievement and to encourage them to pursue higher, postgraduate and highly specialised education besides helping them to join higher echelons of employment.

4.     To assist the Somali business community to engage in more sophisticated economic activities by pooling together their resources and to benefit from financial services and big businesses offered by economic institutions available in the market.

5.     To constitute a lobby to promote their common interests and to raise their voice to the higher representative bodies and to the central government.

6.     To maintain the Somali identity, culture and language and to promote the creation of institutions that aim to realise this objective

7.     To cooperate with other organisations of relevant communities.

To achieve these goals among others, that aspire to enhance the welfare, interests, progress, visibility, solidarity and assertiveness of the Somali community, a decision must be taken to establish a consultative group for the Somali community.

Source: http://english.alshahid.net/