The largest single group of refugees to be resettled in the United States in recent years is the Somali Bantus. These Bantu refugees began arriving a year ago, and by the end of 2005 more than 12,000 will have begun a new life in communities throughout the United States. Today on New American Voices you?ll meet Abdullahi Abdullahi, himself a Somali Bantu, who helps newcomers from his native land deal with the initial strains of resettlement in America.
The Somali Bantus, brought to Somalia from Tanzania and Mozambique as slaves two hundred years ago, remained a persecuted minority there long after slavery was officially outlawed. They were barred from schools, relegated to farming or menial jobs, and subjected to all kinds of mistreatment. Abdullahi Abdullahi, a gentle, dark-skinned man in his late thirties, is atypical of the Somali Bantus in that he managed to get both an education and a prized white-collar job.
Mr. Abdullahi went on to study conflict management at the university level, learned English, and found work with the United Nations mission in Somalia. When conditions in the country forced the mission to close in 1996, its workers, including Mr. Abdullahi, were offered asylum in the United States.
Now, after seven years in the United States, Abdullahi Abdullahi is halfway to completing a masters? degree in his original field of conflict resolution. He is also the executive director of the Somali Bantu Community, an organization set up to help Somali Bantu newcomers adjust to life in America.
In Somalia, the vast majority of Bantus were farmers, or held jobs as servants, porters, or mechanics. Most were illiterate. Before coming to the United States, they spent years in drab, dusty, overcrowded refugee camps in Kenya, where they faced further privation and mistreatment.
Mr. Abdullahi, who lives in Atlanta, Georgia with his wife and eight children, often meets arriving Somali Bantu refugees at the airport, or visits them at their new homes. He says they are both surprised and thrilled to hear a well-dressed black man speaking their language.
Mr. Abdullahi says, the first question many Somali Bantus ask him is ?When can I start working In fact, he says, it is their capacity for hard work, and the eagerness with which they take advantage of any educational opportunities, that smooths their transition to life in a society that is for them totally new and strange. Most have never come in contact with electric lights, automobiles, ovens or flushing toilets. But, Mr. Abdullahi says, it is not the gadgets of modernity that impress his countrymen most.
This American egalitarianism is something that Mr. Abdullahi himself appreciates most about America.