Felda 2-2 Kelantan posts
Zafar Ahmad Abdul Ghani When we think of ‘refugees’, what normally comes to mind are pictures of poor, homeless, malnourished people who have been chased out of their country either by their government, war, or their warring government. Some of us might even think they Read more ... re dangerous, or adrain to our resources.
And in case if you’re mistaking them for foreign migrant workers, do take a look at this helpful chart to know they’re totally different:

Image courtesy of Cilisos’ very own Jo-Lyn
But sometimes, refugees can go on to achieve great things in their new country as well. Take for example Bakery Jatta, a Gambian refugee who signed for Hamburg SV, a professional German football club. Still, he isn’t the only one with such a great success story though – Malaysia has it’s very own refugee success story too. And it. will. blow. your. MIND.
Introducing….

Mr. Zafar Ahmad Abdul Ghani is aRohingyan refugee who came to Malaysia after enduring years of torture and abuse, and survived it to tell a story that would make Rambo look as tough as a kitten. CILISOS had the incredible opportunity to speak to him at his MERHROM office HQ in Cheras.
Zafar had to run from his country (Myanmar) after being involved in a student’s movement that was demonstrating against the military junta for the unequal and inhumane treatment of the Rohingyans (read more about their story here).
After being caught and tortured by the Burmese Intelligence for two months, he was sentenced to jail for 7 years for refusing to give any information that could be used to find and arrest his fellow demonstrators. That was when Zafar’s story takes a whole new twist, Shawshank Redemption-style.
Zafar’s epic escape plan…

Gif from giphy.com
After being forced to work and watching many of his fellow Rohingyans die of exhaustion and malnutrition, Zafar decided he had to escape. Together with a few inmates, he managed to break a window to the prison and escaped into the night. Free from prison, he knew that he had to get out of the country. But… how?
If you’re thinking “AirAsia”, Zafar had no “air” option, only the “Asia” part.Travelling via fishing boat, Zafar arrived in Bangladesh, before running to India(literally, on foot) because the Bangladeshi government were arresting and deporting Rohingyans back to Myanmar (where they will be imprisoned, or killed).
From India, he forced to take an epic night-trek through the forests of and rivers to Thailand which took almost 2 months (they can only travel at night to avoid capture). For those of you who aren’t sure how epic this journey is, here’s an illustration:

Note: This meant RE-ENTERING two of the countries that were ACTIVELY trying to arrest/torture/murder him. Unedited image from www.nationsonline.org
After being in Thailand for a few months, and again being threatened with deportation back to Myanmar (this will be a very common theme from now on), Zafar finally made his way to Malaysia as a refugee. A trip that would normally take 2 hours and 40 minutes by air took Zafar a total of 11 months. This was not helped by the fact that the Malaysian government isn’t exactly very friendly towards Rohingyan refugees coming to Malaysia to seek asylum.

Image taken from www.bbc.com
In fact, the Malaysian police arrested Zafar for illegal entry, and deported him back to Thailand, where he was arrested…for illegal entry… and sent to jail before being deported back to Myanmar (again). Knowing that he faced death back in Myanmar, he managed to convince the boatman to….send him back to Malaysia instead. After much struggling (including one more arrest, deportation, and prison sentence), he finally made his way to Kuala Lumpur through an agent.
But although he made it to Malaysia, Zafar tells us that he was deported, not once or twice, but…
He was deported from Malaysia for a total of… 12 times!

Edited image by thumbsandammo.blogspot.com
Yes, in the span of 7 years (1996-2003), less time than most of us take to finish primary school, Zafar was arrested, deported, and made it back to Malaysia12 times, an average of 1.7 times a year. Every single time he was deported, he was sent to Thailand, and he made his way back via a human trafficking operation which he had to pay (prices varied from RM1200 – RM2150, depending on the trafficker).
If they had no money? Well…
“If we didn’t have money, they would beat us. In some cases,they even shot to death some of us with a pistol. They would threaten us to pay them all we had, or they would send us back to Myanmar.” – Zafar
In addition to risking his life just to pass the Thailand-Malaysian border, he also had to risk his life travelling from the border to KL, including hiding in the backs of trucks and being stuffed into car boots where he almost suffocated to death. He couldn’t stay in Thailand because it was too close to Myanmar, and Malaysia was his only hope for survival, enough for him to risk his life every single time to make it back into Malaysia.
He asked the UN for help when he was in Malaysia, but wasn’t acknowledged as a refugee
Zafar continued the fight for his fellow Rohingyans by establishing the Myanmar Ethic Rohingya Human Rights Organization Malaysia (MERHROM) in 1998. In the year 2000, Zafar approached the Malaysian chapter of the UNHCR for help and to request for Refugee status.
After listening to his story, UNHCR refused to acknowledge Zafar as a refugeebecause he couldn’t sufficiently prove that he was deserving of refugee status.
To be fair, it’s not that the UNHCR doesn’t like him or anything. There is actually an application to be recognized as a refugee, and Zafar failed the application process the first time because he failed to produce the necessary documents for registration (birth cert, IC, passport, etc). This requirement is especially troublesome for Rohingyans as theMyanmarese government revoked their IDs and documentations. However, after appealing to the UNHCR to review his application, he finally got himself registered as a refugee. But that’s not the end of his problems…

In fact, it’s just the beginning.
Unfortunately, because he’s a refugee, Zafar cannot own any property, business, or vehicle, secure a legal job, and has no access to basic amenities such as government healthcare or schools, even though he legally married a Malaysian wife. (His wife, his father-in-law, and himself had to beg the Registration Department with tears in their eyes multiple times in order to get married, and after being constantly rejected, a kind-hearted Perak mufti finally agreed to legally marry him and his wife under Islamic law, making their marital status legal).
Woah. But why?!
Because Malaysia is NOT a signatory to the UN Convention on Refugees, Zafar is classified as an illegal immigrant by Malaysian law, and can be arrested and prosecuted at any time by the Malaysian authorities. Illegal immigrants also suffer from a lack of rights and legal protection, and are possibly mistreated as well.
Wait….Malaysia ISN’T a signatory to the UN Convention of Refugees?!
No…no we’re not. Which is basically whywe’re terrible at the way we handle refugees, and also why we’ve just been given an ‘F’ grade on our refugee report card. In fact, we’re criticized by parties for having a ‘two-tiered refugee system‘, with refugees from countries likeSyria being invited with open arms and given jobs, housing, and documents, and refugees from countries like Myanmarand Bangladesh being deprived of documentation and told to “go back to your own country”, an issue that has been highlighted by local human rights groups.

In fact, a doctor friend from a local gov hospital told us a heartbreaking story about the plight of refugees in Malaysia who are not part of the “privileged class”:
“I have seen pregnant women who are already in the beginnings of labour being turned away from government hospitals because they couldn’t afford to pay and were not eligible for government facilities when they had no proper documentations.
I’ve overruled the medical staff multiple times and told them to get the OT (operating theatre) ready so I could save the mother and child. As to who was going to pay, that was not my primary concern.”- Anonymous doctor friend
Why don’t we just sign the UN Convention then?
Part of the reason why Malaysia isn’t a signatory to the UN Convention of Refugees is because of a bad experience with Indochinese refugees that Malaysia went through in the 70s and 80s, when thousands of them fled to Malaysia because of the Vietnam war. As a result, the official policy of the Malaysian government is to negotiate with each individual group of refugees rather than just signing the UN Convention and being forced to take all refugees in. Whether this is a wise move or not, we leave that to you to decide la k?
This makes Mr. Zafar’s story all the more amazing. As an unrecognized refugee, he managed to set up MERHROM, have an income through a kedai runcit and gerai makanan (both under his wife’s name), bring attention the ASEAN and UN leaders as to the plight of the refugees,and even managed to help Malaysians when they needed it. (Fun fact: MERHROM raised and donated RM25,000 worth of goods to the Kelantan flood victims of 2015!) His efforts has also been internationally recognized, with organizations from Hong Kong, Korea, UK and the US inviting him over to give him awards, but he is unable to attend and receive such awards (and speaking engagements) because he doesn’t have travel documents.
While his fight for the rights of the Rohingyas is far from over, and he hassuffered immense loss (his parents and younger sister were murdered by the military junta), he continues to struggle for the rights of all refugees (not just Rohingyans), because of his father’s words:
“Don’t ever give up the fight son.Even if they kill me or our family, don’t be afraid and don’t stop fighting for the rights of the oppressed. Allah will be with you.”
The Malaysian refugee issue so far:

Refugees at a detention centre in K.L. Image from http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/
There are more than 154,000 refugees currently in Malaysia, most of whom livewithout basic rights and protection. While most of us think it can lead to increased crime rates, this is actually not true. In fact, the UNHCR actually makes it a point to screen all asylum-seekers before accepting them into the country, and that those who commit crimes are not eligible for refugee status, so there is a huge incentive for refugees to follow the law in Malaysia.
In fact, according to our Deputy Home Minister Datuk Wan Junaidi Tuanku Jaafar, only 1% of all crimes in Malaysia are committed by them, though he did also say that we shouldn’t make the issue worse by hiring them, sheltering them, or renting properties out to them.
Mr. Zafar disagrees however:
“We’re not asking for sympathy or for donations. All we ask if that we be given a legal identity, so that we can find work to provide for ourselves, for our children to go to schools, and for us to build a life.
We have a lot that we want to contribute to Malaysia, and we love Malaysia, because she has provided for us a hope and a life again. I ask that Malaysians and the Malaysian government just give us a chance.“
And let’s face it, there are plenty of jobs that most Malaysians don’t want to do that refugees will gladly take up.
Besides being part of a labour force that our country needs, we must not forget that the greatest ideas and advancements can come from anyone of us if we’re willing to give them a chance, like the U.S. did with a certain Albert Einstein, or the U.K. did with Bob Marley. Who knows? We might just have the next genius currently looking for an opportunity to showcase his/her talent in Malaysia, if only there was a chance. What can we do then?
For a start, we could write to our MPs to bring the matter of Malaysia’s treatment and acceptance of refugees up to Parliament, and lobby our government to formally sign the UN Convention of Refugees. Additionally, you could also donate to organizations focused on helping refugees like the UNHCR orMERHROM (they need money and supplies like rice, toiletries, etc); contact themhere to set up a donation time that is appropriate. If you own a business, perhaps you could consider giving refugees a chance to be fairly employedin your organization as well. Together, we can work to make Malaysia a welcoming second home to those who have unfortunately lost theirs. 
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