Refugees who fled from Burma to escape persecution tell their story.m
Below is an article published by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation:
TRANSCRIPT:
LEIGH SALES, PRESENTER: The Federal Government's under increasing pressure over its asylum seeker policies.
A High Court challenge is preventing it from activating a key initiative - its plan to send boat arrivals to Malaysia.
But at the Malaysian end of that deal, there are already winners; the mostly Burmese refugees who've been stranded in that country, many for years.
Some of them have already arrived in Australia as part of the Federal Government's deal, and Mary Gearin met one of the first families to arrive.
MARY GEARIN, REPORTER: This is the life Biak Zel Kheng Lawt and his wife Ngun Tha were praying for as they tried to make a life as refugees in Malaysia.
BIAK ZEL KHENG LAWT, BURMESE REFUGEE (voiceover translation): It's very nice and the people who come here are well taken care of.
MARY GEARIN: Their journeys began separately back in the turmoil that faces the Chin ethnic minority in Burma. Biak Kheng Lawt is one of nine children, but his family has been torn apart.
BIAK ZEL KHENG LAWT (voiceover translation): My father fled away from home to avoid arrest by the regime, the Army, and we were ordered - the remaining family were ordered by the Army to bring forward my father, otherwise we'd get arrested. So I fled with my younger sister to Malaysia.
MARY GEARIN: Ngun Tha was brought up by her grandmother. Her mother died when she was young and she doesn't know where her father is. She says three years ago she was coerced into working for the Burmese Army.
NGUN THA LEN KHENG LAWT, BURMESE REFUGEE (voiceover translation): I was forced to be a porter, to carry their stuff, and I was told by them that I'll have to follow them permanently to transport their goods and their ammunition. While they were drinking, I fled. While they were drinking and drunk, I fled secretly.
MARY GEARIN: Separately, they made their way to Malaysia, where they met, and soon after came Robert, but it was never going to be a straightforward love story amid the chaos of life as illegal immigrants before gaining refugee status.
BIAK ZEL KHENG LAWT (voiceover translation): The main reason is housing. It's very hard to find a house and it's very expensive, especially with a labourer's income, where you have to work. And for people like us who came into Malaysia illegally without a passport, it's much harder. And from time to time, we get arrested on the street, where the police officers took away all our money.
MARY GEARIN: As the Government's been battling politically and legally to begin the expulsion of boat arrivals under the Malaysia agreement, the deals beneficiaries have been arriving and settling into Australian suburbs.
Over the last few years, Burma's supplied the largest percentage of refugees to Australia. Most of them are settled in Victoria in places like this, Springvale, in Melbourne's south-eastern suburbs. As the intake increases offer the next few years and the new arrivals are attracted to already-established Burmese areas, there'll be more challenges for resettlement support groups. They're already struggling to find affordable housing for the refugees who are here.
PETER DEKKER, URBAN NEIGHBOURS OF HOPE: There's a housing shortage across Melbourne, and, you know, here in Springvale, definitely that's the issue. So housing will be an issue and also getting enough volunteers to help with settlement work. Help them navigate even how to cross a road, how to deal with a ATM machine, how to visit Centrelink - all those sorts of things. The basic navigating life in Australia. I'm worried that there won't be enough people like that around to help out, yeah.
MARY GEARIN: Peter Dekker is part of the Christian-based group Urban Neighbours of Hope that's been helping Burmese refugees in Melbourne for 15 years. Right now, they're hoping to establish a refugee-owned and operated cafe with Mus Mi as its manager. He arrived in Australia four years ago after a decade in a camp on the Thai-Burma border and a childhood spent fleeing from violence.
MUS MI: Sometimes the Government and our people fight, they fought, and they burn, the village is gone. And come back, the building again, the house, and go to school again, and three or four months, run again. Just life, my life, all the like this.
PETER DEKKER: You hear some of the stories that my neighbours are dealing with and how every three months they're having to flee from the military, having family members stolen to become porters and forced to carry goods for the Army, forced to be human shields. So they definitely deserve to be in a country that's safe, in a country that can offer them a future.
MARY GEARIN: Mus Mi welcomes any deal to bring more Burmese into Australia. When it comes to the other side of the deal though, sending boat arrivals to Malaysia for processing, his feelings are mixed about the Government approach.
MUS MI: This is my suggest, they shouldn't come by boat because that's very dangerous, very dangerous. But I don't know their situation there, I don't know what their life there.
PETER DEKKER: I don't like the way that the Government is treating asylum seekers. They're not illegal. And to then snuffle them off to another country is unacceptable. And, I think if anything's illegal, it's that actual action. On the other hand, taking another 4,000 refugees from Malaysia where the situation is pretty grim there, you know, is a fantastic thing. I'd like to think that we could do both.
MARY GEARIN: Like many others, the Kheng Lawt's have been welcomed into the homes of other recently arrived refugees. While they were in what some have labelled the refugee queue, it's never as simple as that. Biak Kheng Lawt did pay people smugglers to get him through Thailand, but then only had to wait 15 months before being swept up in the Malaysia deal. While they don't understand the politics behind their arrival, Ngun Tha Kheng Lawt says she'd like to see all Chin refugees make it to Australia. Biak Kheng Lawt is still anxious about those he's left behind.
BIAK ZEL KHENG LAWT (voiceover translation): All I worry about is my father and my sister who live in Malaysia, and my father is old; he's 63 years old. On the other hand, I worry about my mum and my younger brothers and sister in Burma and hope they could join us here as soon as possible. Then we'd be very happy.
A High Court challenge is preventing it from activating a key initiative - its plan to send boat arrivals to Malaysia.
But at the Malaysian end of that deal, there are already winners; the mostly Burmese refugees who've been stranded in that country, many for years.
Some of them have already arrived in Australia as part of the Federal Government's deal, and Mary Gearin met one of the first families to arrive.
MARY GEARIN, REPORTER: This is the life Biak Zel Kheng Lawt and his wife Ngun Tha were praying for as they tried to make a life as refugees in Malaysia.
BIAK ZEL KHENG LAWT, BURMESE REFUGEE (voiceover translation): It's very nice and the people who come here are well taken care of.
MARY GEARIN: Their journeys began separately back in the turmoil that faces the Chin ethnic minority in Burma. Biak Kheng Lawt is one of nine children, but his family has been torn apart.
BIAK ZEL KHENG LAWT (voiceover translation): My father fled away from home to avoid arrest by the regime, the Army, and we were ordered - the remaining family were ordered by the Army to bring forward my father, otherwise we'd get arrested. So I fled with my younger sister to Malaysia.
MARY GEARIN: Ngun Tha was brought up by her grandmother. Her mother died when she was young and she doesn't know where her father is. She says three years ago she was coerced into working for the Burmese Army.
NGUN THA LEN KHENG LAWT, BURMESE REFUGEE (voiceover translation): I was forced to be a porter, to carry their stuff, and I was told by them that I'll have to follow them permanently to transport their goods and their ammunition. While they were drinking, I fled. While they were drinking and drunk, I fled secretly.
MARY GEARIN: Separately, they made their way to Malaysia, where they met, and soon after came Robert, but it was never going to be a straightforward love story amid the chaos of life as illegal immigrants before gaining refugee status.
BIAK ZEL KHENG LAWT (voiceover translation): The main reason is housing. It's very hard to find a house and it's very expensive, especially with a labourer's income, where you have to work. And for people like us who came into Malaysia illegally without a passport, it's much harder. And from time to time, we get arrested on the street, where the police officers took away all our money.
MARY GEARIN: As the Government's been battling politically and legally to begin the expulsion of boat arrivals under the Malaysia agreement, the deals beneficiaries have been arriving and settling into Australian suburbs.
Over the last few years, Burma's supplied the largest percentage of refugees to Australia. Most of them are settled in Victoria in places like this, Springvale, in Melbourne's south-eastern suburbs. As the intake increases offer the next few years and the new arrivals are attracted to already-established Burmese areas, there'll be more challenges for resettlement support groups. They're already struggling to find affordable housing for the refugees who are here.
PETER DEKKER, URBAN NEIGHBOURS OF HOPE: There's a housing shortage across Melbourne, and, you know, here in Springvale, definitely that's the issue. So housing will be an issue and also getting enough volunteers to help with settlement work. Help them navigate even how to cross a road, how to deal with a ATM machine, how to visit Centrelink - all those sorts of things. The basic navigating life in Australia. I'm worried that there won't be enough people like that around to help out, yeah.
MARY GEARIN: Peter Dekker is part of the Christian-based group Urban Neighbours of Hope that's been helping Burmese refugees in Melbourne for 15 years. Right now, they're hoping to establish a refugee-owned and operated cafe with Mus Mi as its manager. He arrived in Australia four years ago after a decade in a camp on the Thai-Burma border and a childhood spent fleeing from violence.
MUS MI: Sometimes the Government and our people fight, they fought, and they burn, the village is gone. And come back, the building again, the house, and go to school again, and three or four months, run again. Just life, my life, all the like this.
PETER DEKKER: You hear some of the stories that my neighbours are dealing with and how every three months they're having to flee from the military, having family members stolen to become porters and forced to carry goods for the Army, forced to be human shields. So they definitely deserve to be in a country that's safe, in a country that can offer them a future.
MARY GEARIN: Mus Mi welcomes any deal to bring more Burmese into Australia. When it comes to the other side of the deal though, sending boat arrivals to Malaysia for processing, his feelings are mixed about the Government approach.
MUS MI: This is my suggest, they shouldn't come by boat because that's very dangerous, very dangerous. But I don't know their situation there, I don't know what their life there.
PETER DEKKER: I don't like the way that the Government is treating asylum seekers. They're not illegal. And to then snuffle them off to another country is unacceptable. And, I think if anything's illegal, it's that actual action. On the other hand, taking another 4,000 refugees from Malaysia where the situation is pretty grim there, you know, is a fantastic thing. I'd like to think that we could do both.
MARY GEARIN: Like many others, the Kheng Lawt's have been welcomed into the homes of other recently arrived refugees. While they were in what some have labelled the refugee queue, it's never as simple as that. Biak Kheng Lawt did pay people smugglers to get him through Thailand, but then only had to wait 15 months before being swept up in the Malaysia deal. While they don't understand the politics behind their arrival, Ngun Tha Kheng Lawt says she'd like to see all Chin refugees make it to Australia. Biak Kheng Lawt is still anxious about those he's left behind.
BIAK ZEL KHENG LAWT (voiceover translation): All I worry about is my father and my sister who live in Malaysia, and my father is old; he's 63 years old. On the other hand, I worry about my mum and my younger brothers and sister in Burma and hope they could join us here as soon as possible. Then we'd be very happy.
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