Syrians in Egypt .. Success stories on the sidelines of asylum

Mohamed Seif El Din - Cairo

Six years ago, Abu Talal left his home country Syria to escape the war that had not stopped for nine years, leaving behind his beautiful memories in the countryside of Damascus, which renewed the hope of returning to it every year.

Two years after his arrival in Egypt, Abu Talal opened a famous restaurant in the 6th of October City in Giza Governorate (west of the Egyptian capital Cairo) with the help of three other Syrians who fled with him, in addition to an Egyptian partner.

The 50-year-old Syrian of Al-Jazeera Net says he preferred to go to Egypt because the immigrants - especially the Syrians - enjoy full integration with the Egyptians. There are no camps or restrictions on living or work, and this is not available in most Arab countries.

Abu Talal's life seems to be soft, but he stressed that Egypt's economic reforms - in reference to the decision to liberalize the local currency against the US dollar of 3 November 2016 - had greatly affected his daily income, which he maintained.

He pointed out to Al Jazeera Net that the increase in prices in Egypt led to a decrease in the number of visitors to the restaurant, because of the low purchasing power of the Egyptian pound, as well as its desire to raise prices after increasing the labor costs of rent shops and salaries of workers and supplies, adding that this is an obstacle to future expansions He was planning it.

Prices have risen in Egypt since the "float" and so far about 300%, and is expected to increase in the coming months, where the dollar will reach the end of this year to about 19.6 pounds, according to the forecasts of the research unit of "HC" Securities.

small projects
Those who could not get out of Syria with their money, as Abu Talal did, sought to open small projects such as al-Qarini Karim al-Basha.

Al-Basha told Al Jazeera Net that he owned a clothing factory in Damascus but closed it in the absence of any solution to the conflict in his country. When he arrived in Egypt, he rented a sewing shop. "I started from scratch, as the Egyptian saying goes," he said.

Despite the bitterness of living outside the country, most Syrians find no alternative but to continue living abroad and not to return for fear of facing death.

Most Syrians prefer Egypt because they can work without permits, a privilege they do not find in many other Arab countries, and do not expose them to legal accountability, punishment or deportation.

And developed with the Pasha and expanded its work, and was able to open a shop selling fabrics and abaya Syrian embroidered, in the area of ​​the markets of the city center of Cairo.

"After saving a sum of money, with my friend's participation, I agreed with my brother, who could not join me, to send me the cloths and then we complete the products here so that the whole product is Syria," he says.

Al-Basha is one of 50 other Syrian shops on the Ghawriya Street, which is the kiss of girls seeking furniture with tastes and colors similar to those we have seen in Syrian and Turkish soap operas.

Success stories
Although Syrian stories are full of success in the fields of work, the UNHCR has warned that 80% of refugees in Egypt live in miserable humanitarian conditions.

"The current refugee programs in Egypt aimed at assisting and protecting a quarter of a million refugees, more than half of them Syrians, as well as others from Sudan, Ethiopia, Eritrea, southern Sudan and Yemen," UNHCR Commissioner Filippo Grandi said in March. % Of funding required ".

After two months of 2019, UNHCR is working on a very small part of its annual budget of $ 104 million to support and protect refugees and asylum seekers in Egypt.

According to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), as of November 2018, some 242,000 refugees (40% of them children, many of whom are unaccompanied and separated from their families) Fold, to form the largest community in Mahrousa.

The Syrians in Egypt go to the UNHCR to be granted residency cards for six months and are registered as refugees. The Egyptian Ministry of Foreign Affairs then addresses the Ministry of the Interior to regularize their situation until they are granted residency.

The Syrians are concentrated in several Egyptian governorates. According to their population density, the city of 6th of October is located in Giza governorate (west) in the foreground, then the city of Obour in Qalioubia governorate (East), 10th of Ramadan in Sharkia governorate and north of Damietta.

As the war continued in Syria, Syrian immigrants were able to penetrate Egypt's economic structure through the opening of a number of commercial projects that focused mainly on popular Syrian food, as well as spinning, weaving and ready-made garments.

High investments
Over the past year, Syrian investments have increased by 30% compared to 2017, worth about seventy million dollars.

The number of companies established by the Syrians during the first nine months of 2018 to 818 companies, which represents a quarter of companies established by foreigners in the same period.

These figures, prompted the economic adviser to US banks Nabil Zaki to criticize the Egyptian youth, and accused of laziness and "dal".

He said during a meeting with one of the private satellite channels that "most of the young Egyptians on the cafes smoking shisha, and young Syrians came to work in Egypt and win .. Young people back to laziness, we want the government to do everything, and support is the reason we have reached" .

But others rejected the economic adviser's remarks and pointed out that Egyptian youth are neither lazy nor helpless, but suffer from a lack of opportunities and weak potential. They have held the government responsible for creating jobs and facilitating the creation of economic projects for young people.