British Home Secretary, Theresa May (Ken Jack/Demotix)With the prevalence of reports in the media documenting the horrendous conditions faced by individuals within Eritrea, and several thousand leaving the country per month, a pertinent question is who remains in the country and why?
Conversations with colleagues and friends in Eritrea last year, in the context of wider research in Asmara on Eritrea’s historical relationship with its refugees in Sudan, often turned towards people discussing why they had not left the country and claimed asylum elsewhere. For many, their rationale was simple: because somebody they knew already had. Those that had already left now constituted the “lungs” whose remittances kept those within the country alive.
It was not uncommon for individuals to fully attribute their survival to the periodic transfers of money from those “outside”. And what would happen if that flow dried up? All of their dependents – whether brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers, friends and wider relatives – would have to rethink the feasibility of remaining in Eritrea. Many reasoned that the only solution would be to themselves cross the border and leave their country.
