The South Sudanese Refugee Influx to Ethiopia and Its Impact on Host Communities: The Case of Gambella Regional State
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Date
2019-06
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Addis Ababa University
Abstract
One of the most eminent outcomes of civil war is the influx of the refuges to their neighboring
countries. Specifically, the recent civil war in the Republic of South Sudan that has resulted
into the displacement of thousands of people entered into Ethiopia. The study was, therefore,
undertaken with the aim of investigating the overall socio-economic and political impact of
the refugee flow in the Gambella Peoples’ Regional State of Ethiopia, particularly the
Gambella town and Itang Special woreda. The research employed a qualitative method with
a Non-probability technique to acquire relevant data. Primary and secondary data was
collected through, in-depth interviews or KII, FGD and Observation, and from books, journal
articles, and national and international agencies’ reports. Data was collected using in-depth
interviews and FGDs participants. The qualitative data was analyzed using thematic
analysis. Research findings indicated that the host community-refugee relationships were
characterized by the competition over scarce resources. This was the fact that, refugee
settlements on host communities have economic, social, political, and environmental impacts
in which, resources shared communally such as water, food, housing, and medical services
were of contentious values. Social and environmental impacts such as crimes and unlawful
movement, deforestation are additional threats to the surrounding communities. However,
evidence show that hosting refugee resulted in both negative and positive as refugee bring
together with development aspects including skill transfer. It is thus suggested that both the
federal and regional government should play important role to properly implement towards
ensuring support for social benefits among local and refugee communities. In addition, the
Ethiopian government and UN agencies should expand the capacity for social services such
as health, education and water supplies so that both sides benefits from key public services.
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Keywords
Refugees, Host community, Impact, Resource competitions