Chapter 4 Encampment: the maintenance of a camp-based reception in Zambia
Zambia has maintained refugee settlements as the dominant mode of receiving refugees since the 1970s, irrespective of various exhortations by UNHCR and public commitments by present and previous presidents to relax this approach. The overarching aim of this chapter is to investigate the reasoning behind this continued stance. To achieve this, the chapter utilises the book’s conceptual framework to appraise key factors found at state and international levels that are influencing, contesting and ultimately maintaining Zambia’s national reception policy.
In particular, the case study seeks to move the analysis of camp-based reception policies beyond generalised discussions on ‘security’ factors and state sovereignty. Indeed, via an examination of the causal mechanisms that are maintaining the national camp policy, the chapter clarifies how complex relationships emerge between the refugee camp and other reception sites in the interior (notably the urban space). Furthermore, the analysis shows how a focus on maintaining stability (or avoiding instability) through controlling and monitoring access to urban spaces (rather than stopping all movement) is driving refugee policy within Zambia, including the maintenance of the overall encampment reception policy. This emphasis on controlling or managing movement has unexpected repercussions. Firstly, it helps challenge regional and global trends that frame all refugee movement through a security lens. Secondly, these complex associations between two geographical sites (the refugee camp and the urban space) play a key (if paradoxical) role in the settling of some refugees outside the camp space in Zambia.
The chapter concentrates on the initial arrival of refugees in Zambia. It starts with an examination of the processes and procedures surrounding registration in Zambia. In so doing, it draws out core themes related to conceptualising refugee reception in Southern Africa, such as the conditionality of reception and the position of refugees as long-term guests in the territory. The section also provides context for the second half of the chapter, which analyses the key factors at the different levels of the state (including variations in approaches in border areas) that are ultimately maintaining the encampment approach in Zambia.
The registration of refugees in Zambia
According to national law and policy, the initial welcome and registration of refugees in Zambia involves them being granted a form of legal recognition by the state and then made to reside in a refugee settlement. In many ways, this approach to registration follows the dominant conceptualisation of refugee camps as popularised by academics in the 1990s or 2000s. Indeed, at this initial stage of reception, the emphasis is on the removal of refugees to contained spaces away from citizens and the political life of the state. Yet, in reality the empirical data shows that the maintenance of refugee camps as a national response to new arrivals is far more complex.1
Legal framework and registration procedures in Zambia
Zambia has been associated with the global refugee regime for over forty years. In the 1960s, Zambia permitted UNHCR to enter its territory and it acceded to the 1969 OAU Refugee Convention. Zambia is also party to the 1951 Refugee Convention and 1967 Protocol, although it has entered reservations on several key rights and norms contained within the 1951 Refugee Convention, such as freedom of movement and specific employment rights. Moreover, Zambia as a dualist state never incorporated either international treaty into national legislation.2
Until 2017, refugee reception and the treatment of refugees in Zambia were governed by the restrictive 1970 Refugee (Control) Act (‘the 1970 Refugee Act’). This act required that refugees remain in camps. The purpose of the national legal framework until 2017 was controlling refugee movement via encampment. This means that the procedure adopted to register refugees in Zambia is based entirely on administrative processes designed by governmental departments, with assistance from UNHCR. This legal-administrative ‘gap’ is a constant theme in relation to refugee policy in Zambia, which in turn contributes to variations in the treatment and initial welcome received by refugees during registration and beyond. The Refugees Act No.1 of 2017 (‘the 2017 Refugee Act’) replaced the 1970 Refugee Act. As explained below, it contains several progressive elements, but still grants the state the authority to restrict freedom of movement and demand that refugees remain in refugee settlements.
In terms of registration procedures, refugees are expected to make themselves known to immigration officers and request asylum at official border crossings. In practice there are several different scenarios that can occur. As observed by a UNHCR official, if a refugee has a passport, it is possible for them to travel unimpeded to urban areas such as Lusaka before making themselves known to the authorities.3 This may also happen if they are not detected at the border (for example when they cross the border informally) and then decide to claim asylum when they reach an urban space. Nevertheless, for the vast majority who enter through a border point:
they present themselves to immigration or are intercepted by immigration at the entry point and then when they apply for asylum, the application is screened, and they get interviewed.4
In all these scenarios, after the request for asylum has been made, applications are screened and refugees are interviewed either by: (1) the National Eligibility Committee (NEC) in Lusaka or (2) the Provincial or District Joint Operations Committees (PJOC and DJOC) in the provinces and by the border.5 Note that the coming into force of the 2017 Refugee Act changed the semantics of the procedures but not the substance. The provincial system (pre and post 2017) involves the PJOC and DJOC determining refugee claims based on the broader 1969 OAU Refugee Convention definition of a refugee, with recognition being on a prima facie basis. In comparison, refugees seeking to make an individualised claim (using the individual limbs in the 1951 Refugee Convention) have their claim ultimately referred to Lusaka and the NEC (both pre- and post-2017).
The NEC in Lusaka encompasses the Commission for Refugees (COR), Department of Immigration, Department of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Labour and Social Services, Security and Intelligence personnel from the Office of the President and the police and UNHCR.6 Due to the composition and mandates of the governmental departments involved in the NEC, there is an emphasis on national security within the committee. Decisions are based in part on country-of-origin information and eligibility assessments, with refugees appraised to see if they are combatants and/or a risk to the state.7 The government ultimately makes the final refugee status determination (RSD) decision. In contrast, officers at the PJOC and DJOC can grant asylum-seekers prima facie status based solely on one-to-one interviews. The difference in the attention given to national security concerns between the two decision bodies is therefore salient.
Academics, particularly legal scholars, tend to agree that in principle refugee status granted on a prima facie basis is no different from, and carries the same rights as, status based on an individualised claim (Sharpe, 2018). However, in Zambia, refugees’ ability to gain access to urban spaces post registration partly depends on the procedure they went through. Refugees in both groups (that is, those granted refugee status from the NEC and those granted status by the PJOC and DJOC) are expected to reside in refugee settlements after their registration has been completed. Yet refugees with individualised status granted by the NEC have an advantage when applying for urban permits post registration. The inference is that refugees granted status by the NEC have already passed rigorous checks as part of this RSD process. Thus, they are not deemed to present the same risk to the urban space as refugees whose status is gained via the provincial procedure.8
Initial reception during the registration period
Once refugees have been through either of the registration procedures and the accompanying administrative processes, they are normally moved to one of the two main settlements in Zambia: Mayukwayukwa or Meheba.9 The Mayukwayukwa Settlement is situated in the Western Province. It was established in 1966, making it one of the oldest refugee settlements in Africa (UNHCR, 2017a). As at 2022 the current population of the settlement stands at over 20,875 refugees, with refugees from Angola, DRC, Rwanda, Burundi and Uganda (UNHCR, 2022). The Meheba settlement was established in 1971 to accommodate refugees fleeing the Angolan War of Independence and the Great Lake War (Stein and Clark, 1990). Located around 75 kilometres from Solwezi, in the North-Western province, it is roughly the size of Singapore, and hosts approximately 34,360 refugees (Thorsen, 2016; UNHCR, 2022). The majority originate from Angola, DRC, Burundi and Rwanda (Thorsen, 2016). Both camps are served by extremely poor infrastructure and, despite their age and large population sizes, have remained underdeveloped remote rural spaces. The state chose to locate the camps far away from urban areas in order to exclude refugees from the political and social aspects of the host state (Bakewell, 2002). Refugees, therefore, need permission to leave the settlements, even for short amounts of time.
Since the 1990s, host states and aid agencies in Africa have traditionally treated and supported refugees as temporary guests for the duration of their stay (Maple, 2016). As Hayden (2006) points out, national legal and policy frameworks are usually based on the premise that refugees want, and will be able, to return to their country of origin as soon as possible. Thus, refugee camps are usually intended as a temporary solution and are designed as such. Their distinct social and geographical set-up is aimed at preventing, rather than creating, opportunities to integrate with the local community (Kibreab, 1989). Yet in reality, despite being treated as temporary guests, refugees often have little choice but to stay in camps long term.
Zambia’s approach to encampment differs in certain respects from that used by other countries. For instance, there is an acknowledgement at the national level that refugees are likely to remain in the territory, at least in the short to medium term. This means that there is recognition that the national government must conduct long-term planning to provide for refugees. Indeed, the two main settlements were designed with the intention of becoming self-sustaining, with refugees granted individual plots of land to use for agriculture.10 Self-reliance, however, has never been fully realised, particularly in the case of Meheba. Instead, as pointed out by an official at the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), most refugees in both settlements remain dependent on assistance from the state and UNHCR.11
The initial granting of land attests to the longer-term planning aspects of the Zambian state’s approach and indicates its recognition of the likely longevity of the refugee population’s stay. It also signifies, at one level of an analysis, a generous form of reception. For example, refugees in Zambia have generally been spared the repeated threats of refoulement or forced return as seen across the continent. Nonetheless, forms of reception offered by states to refugees are rarely unqualified. State sovereignty, democratic pressures and key material, ideational and institutional concerns that come with these concepts mean that any form of reception will usually trigger conditional rights and obligations on the visitor.
At the initial registration stage in Zambia, this conditional and often precarious welcome manifests itself in two ways: firstly, through the distinct geographical restrictions inherent to confinement inside the settlements and secondly, through the fact that refugees remain guests, even if their stay is likely to be long term. With little chance of gaining a form of citizenship, refugees in the settlements continue to be treated as visitors or outsiders in the territory. Indeed, political rights such as the ability to vote remain inaccessible, meaning that refugees’ access to the political space of the state is limited.
It is important to note that not all refugees experience this kind of initial reception stage in Zambia. Instead, many refugees bypass this reception policy altogether and stay with local communities or go into hiding after a negative RSD decision. They may settle informally (in border or urban areas) finding forms of de facto acceptance and hospitality within the local communities and/or local government structures.12 Large numbers of others chose to settle in border areas, often entirely outside the reach of the national government and official reception policies.13
The encampment approach in Zambia
Based on previously examined literature, the question of why a state like Zambia maintains an encampment reception approach to refugees, may appear to have a straightforward answer. Indeed, in many respects, Zambia fits within traditional understandings of why refugee camps have remained popular amongst host states on the continent. These include material and ideational factors such as capacity and state security and with them a perceived need to separate refugees from the political life of the state. Yet it is evident that the on-the-ground reality is far more nuanced.
Ideational factor: the historical legacy of the national legal framework
Both the 1970 Refugee Act and the replacement 2017 Refugee Act allow for the creation of refugee camps. For this reason, and from a purely legal perspective, the persistence of refugee settlements in Zambia today can be explained by legal obligations based on compliance and implementation. Nevertheless, the state’s motivation for adopting and maintaining this restrictive reception policy is more complex than simply wanting to fulfil its legal commitments. Indeed, the empirical evidence highlights how conflicting ideational and institutional factors (present in different key national institutions) play a prominent role in how the old and the new legal frameworks influence the national-level reception approach in contrasting ways.
In terms of national bodies that respond to refugee arrivals, the COR is primarily responsible for implementing refugee policy for the government of Zambia.14 COR is situated within the Department of Home Affairs. Other subdivisions of Home Affairs with differing mandates, such as the Department of Immigration, also interact with refugees daily. Numerous other governmental departments and agencies have regular, but varying contact with refugees. For example, the Office of the Vice President supports the settlement of former refugees from Rwanda and Angola and the Ministry of Community Development and Social Services (MCDSS) provides assistance in the two main settlements.15
COR, with its specific refugee mandate, faces distinct institutional and ideational pressures and responsibilities that can conflict sharply with those of other government departments. For example, COR retains less of a security focus than the Department of Immigration or the police, who are more concerned with matters of national security surrounding refugee and migrant affairs.16 For these reasons interpretation and implementation of national refugee policy can vary enormously between different state actors.
Forms of conceptual and ideational contestation between key national entities that engage with refugee issues in Zambia largely stem from the 1970 Refugee Act. The old Act is principally interested in one aspect of refugee reception: refugee movement.17 The emphasis is on the stopping of movement and hosting refugees in camps (UNHCR, 2017a). In essence, as observed by a refugee leader in Lusaka, the Act conceptualises refugees as guests who should reside in camps where they can be cared for by the international community.18 This is also the view taken by UNHCR officials, with one noting:
There is a belief that humanitarian needs [are] to be covered by the international community – it’s not something that Zambia has to cover – that is very clear.19
The old legal framework therefore set out an understanding of refugee encampment reminiscent of the work that has adopted Agamben’s (2005) concept of ‘states of exception’. The goal of the legal framework was principally to isolate refugees and keep them away from key political and social space(s). In doing so, the intention was in effect to create distinct reception sites on the territory but not of the territory.
The old legal framework continues to shape many Zambian national officials’ understanding of who refugees are and where they should be hosted. Indeed, as confirmed by a former senior COR officer, understanding and knowledge of refugees in many departments within Home Affairs comes entirely from a strict reading of the 1970 Refugee Act:
For [the Department of] Immigration and Home Affairs – remember, the knowledge they get about refugees is from the [old] refugee Act.20
As a result, many in the national government understand refugees solely within the geographical context of settlements. By extension, this framing means that any movement outside of a settlement is immediately constructed as illicit. This ‘illicit’ movement has a two-fold effect. Firstly (as examined in the next chapter), it effectively reframes refugees residing outside the settlements in Zambia as illegal migrants. Secondly, it creates a feedback-loop within these government departments whereby the ‘illicit’ nature of the movement reinforces the perceived need for control and encampment reception policies. For these reasons, compliance with the restrictive reception policy within the national government has now taken on a robust ideational power beyond the simple need to implement ‘the law’.
This construction of refugees in Zambia sits in stark contrast to COR’s approach to the previous legal framework. COR, in part due to its close partnership with UNHCR, has historically interpreted national refugee law more broadly and progressively than other government departments. Its characteristic approach can be seen in the way UN agency officials discuss their day-to-day interactions with COR. For example, a UNHCR official noted:
we have a good working relationship with them – whenever they make a decision, they do it … in consultation with us. You see in other countries the government just makes a decision without consulting the UN agency but here it is different – they have [been] very collaborative.21
The progressive approach of COR can be appreciated in practical terms through the way it focuses on regulating and managing movement into urban areas, rather than attempting to stop all movement or ensuring every refugee resides in a refugee camp. For example, COR has allowed groups of refugees to remain in cities and permitted them to leave the camps for differing periods of time. It has done this either officially or by employing ‘a blind eye approach’.22 Another refugee leader confirmed that this approach was particularly evident during the 1980s and early 1990s, before renewed pressure emanating from other sections of the national government saw refugees returned to the settlements in the late 1990s.23
By interpreting the old Act broadly (namely by seeing it as regulating movement via the encampment policy rather than stopping all movement per se), COR stretched its mandate beyond the confines of the old Act. For example, COR has created numerous ad hoc administrative procedures to allow greater movement and access to urban spaces. This includes the granting of gate passes and urban residency permits (URPs).24 As observed by an ex-manager at COR, these practices were often not even recorded officially:
even the criteria for deciding whether someone should be inside the camp or outside was not written down or contained in any policy. It was just an agreement agreed by appointment.25
In 2017, after years of negotiations with UNHCR and numerous draft bills, the government passed the 2017 Refugee Act. The new Act formalises COR’s mandate to deal with refugee matters in Zambia. It also incorporates both the 1951 Refugee Convention refugee definition and the wider 1969 OAU Refugee Convention definition. Importantly, it also explicitly includes, for the first time, several of the fundamental rights contained within these international refugee treaties.26 The new Act nevertheless falls some way short of incorporating all core global refugee norms into Zambian national legislation. Key to this was the state’s refusal to remove the historical restrictions on freedom of movement. Consequently, the responsible minister retains the ability to designate spaces in Zambia for refugee settlements.27 Thus, COR is still responsible for implementing and enforcing the overall encampment policy.
A manager at an INGO noted that the continued restrictions on freedom of movement and the ability to create specific sites of reception was a disappointment for non-state actors working on refugee protection, noting ‘especially I remember for UNHCR’.28 Indeed, it was particularly frustrating for the UN agency following their years of negotiating for the removal of the restriction. As examined further below, opening up new reception sites for refugees has been the key point on which UNHCR and the state have disagreed, behind the scenes. One official noted, ‘the only thing that we are battling with the government of Zambia is freedom of movement’.29
Nevertheless, when speaking to UNHCR officials and civil society representatives, it is evident that they ultimately saw the new Act as a progressive step, if not necessarily the ideal outcome. In addition, similarly to previous approaches (set out above), COR is interpreting and implementing the new Act in ways that allow refugees some access to urban spaces. For instance, COR has begun interpreting specific articles relating to self-employment in such a manner that there is the potential for far greater access to urban spaces in the future than has previously been observed.
This more progressive Act has not altered other government departments’ approaches, however. UNHCR officials contend that many government officials still take their conceptions of refugees and the spatial dimensions of refugee reception from the old Act. One official noted, ‘they are still using the old legal framework of encampment where refugees are put in a certain perimeter of area and they cannot go out, without permission’.30 By extension, immigration and police officers continue to regularly view all refugees outside of the camp space as illegal immigrants/foreigners.
These opposing constructions of refugees and acceptable reception spaces, through the differing interpretations of the legal framework, produce and sustain institutional confusion and contestation. Consequently, wide variation in the treatment of refugees outside of the settlements was reported. Indeed, refugees in urban spaces still harbour serious concerns about being detained or having bribes extorted from them by law enforcement officers, regardless of reassurances by COR that their stay in these spaces is permitted.
The recent positive developments (in terms of implementation of regime norms) have not helped resolve the ongoing contestation between government departments. This is partly because the new Act only goes so far in relation to the inclusion of global refugee regime norms. Freedom of movement continues to be restricted, and spatial limitations to refugee reception are maintained. This means that convincing other government departments to re-imagine refugees and their movement outside camp spaces is likely to continue to be a difficult endeavour for UNHCR and COR. The old Act has held sway over state bodies’ understanding and approach to refugees since the 1970s and remains deeply entrenched within bureaucratic structures and mind-sets. Moreover, recent attempts by COR and UNHCR to facilitate further access to the urban space is based on a liberal interpretation of one clause in the new Act. This means that the more open approach to refugee movement outside the dominant reception space is not established in any official government-wide refugee policy document.
Thus, these recent developments related to the new legislation can be viewed as a positive step in improving Zambia’s implementation of the global refugee regime. Yet, unless the historical ideational power of the former Act within all relevant branches of the national government is properly addressed, the treatment offered to refugees outside the settlements is likely to remain inconsistent. Indeed, there is a risk that without training to promote the new official guidelines and policy, any additional numbers of refugees in urban spaces may trigger the opposite reaction to that intended by COR and UNHCR. For instance, increased movement into spaces such as Lusaka may create a feedback-loop within government departments, whereby the movement reinforces the perceived need for the overall encampment approach.
Material factor: the capacity to receive and host refugees
The chapter now moves to analysing a key material factor that is influencing the maintenance of Zambia’s encampment policy, namely capacity concerns. In the existing literature on refugee camps, material concerns regarding capacity are discussed in the context of two interlinked issues: (1) keeping refugees away from local populations to avoid strain on local infrastructures; and (2) creating sufficient visibility for continued international support. These two issues are studied in the context of Zambia using a multi-scalar lens and illustrate how capacity concerns around the movement of refugees on the territory are highly localised.
The separation of refugees from local populations: capacity concerns in urban spaces
Zambia is a middle-income country, which struggles with high levels of poverty amongst its own nationals. Thus, its ability to absorb and respond to forced migrants, particularly in major urban areas, is a factor that requires consideration. Interestingly, the movement of refugees in small numbers outside of the camp space has always been permitted in Zambia. Many refugees and other migrants stay in border areas before returning to their home countries once the prevailing situation improves. Also, government officials frequently permit (or turn a blind eye to) small refugee communities in urban and peri-urban areas. Yet, the size of the refugee population in urban areas has always been more closely monitored compared to self-settlements in border areas (which will be discussed further below). Indeed, the government’s reservations about its capacity to manage large numbers of refugees in urban areas have been a key reason why Zambia has maintained a camp-based reception policy for the last sixty years.
The distinction in terms of capacity concerns in these two different reception sites (urban centres and border areas) is evidenced by the varying degree to which the encampment policy has been implemented over time. Refugee leaders in Lusaka noted that in the 1970s and 1980s, during which time Zambia experienced large economic growth, COR adopted a relaxed approach to the encampment policy.31 As a result, even though most refugees remained in settlements, many found their way to urban areas, where COR and other government departments would turn a blind eye to their presence.
By the early 1990s, due to increases in refugees and internal migrants in urban areas combined with a downturn in economic growth (which started during the 1980s and continued into the 1990s), the national government started to become concerned about instability in the cities. This unease was based on the strain that increased numbers were putting on urban social services and the tension this was creating between host communities and refugees (UNHCR, 1994). These kinds of concerns created negative democratic feedback loops, through which government departments became worried about the number of refugees in large cities and the destabilising effect this might have on the space (due to extra demands on urban services and infrastructure) and on the voting public (due to tensions over scarce resources).
According to a refugee leader in Lusaka, it was these concerns that led the state to attempt to reassert a stricter interpretation of the national legal framework by the end of the 1990s. It did this by removing urban refugees to the refugee settlements and effectively ending urban livelihood programmes.32 As confirmed by another refugee leader:
all refugees – [were] told to leave on 21st January [2000] … [if] trading in the city markets … told to leave the market. I had to sell my shop.33
This was also the view of a senior legal officer at COR, who noted that, ‘once the social and economic impact was felt, the government had the will to implement the law and enforce its measures’.34
Ultimately, this shift in policy led to the creation of the Sub-Committee on Urban Residency in 2000, which began deciding all requests from refugees in camps for urban residency. The new sub-committee made the process of leaving the settlements extremely difficult. Indeed, the refugee leader cited above suggested that by the early 2000s:
to be in town, refugee must be employed by Zambian employer. And they have to pay [for] a work permit … Imagine this in a country like Zambia?35
The inference in this quote being that for a country like Zambia, with its reliance on the informal economy, this shift in approach by the state was essentially ‘a way of blocking us from being in town’.36
Since the early 1990s, the Zambian economy has marginally recovered, yet the broad historical pattern of a renewed relaxation in camp policy in times of increased prosperity has not been entirely replicated. Similar to the dual economy and wealth disparity seen in countries such as Nigeria and South Africa, the market recovery in Zambia is not being translated into socio-economic improvements for residents in urban spaces (UNHCR, 2017a:1). As a result, the informal economy accounted for around 84 per cent of the labour force in 2014, with most refugees in urban areas working in this sector (UNHCR, 2017a). This remains broadly the case today, with a UNHCR official suggesting, ‘it’s a known fact … the vast majority of refugees are engaged in self-employment in the informal sector’.37 This issue is regularly raised as a major concern by the national government in discussions with UNHCR regarding the removal of freedom of movement restrictions.
Taxation and host capacity are often overlooked by academics when research has promoted the benefits refugees can bring to local economies in Africa (Betts et al., 2017). Yet, the ability to increase revenue for public services via taxation emerges as an important issue when advocates of refugee rights canvass for greater freedom of movement for refugees (IFC, 2018). As observed by refugee networks in Lusaka, with most urban refugees working in the informal sector the number of refugees paying tax is consequently very low. Another refugee leader went further:
To me it’s an issue we are not paying tax … I can’t at the moment, as I will get taken back to camp. We discussed this with Home Affairs … [we could be] an asset.38
Regardless of this inability to contribute via taxes, all refugees in urban areas, irrespective of their exact status, in theory at least, have access to free health services and primary and secondary education.39 Any government struggles to maintain social protection systems if portions of the population are unable to pay into them. The current state of the taxation system in Zambia also faces challenges due to issues such as corruption and social and political barriers impeding nationals from contributing tax (Martini, 2014). This means that the additional strain on social services resulting from increased numbers of refugees in urban areas could have serious ramifications for the local population and ruling political settlement.
The separation of refugees from local populations: capacity concerns in border areas
Zambia’s borders are notoriously porous, with many refugees and other migrants regularly disregarding the designated entry points. Yet, in contrast to the capacity concerns seen in large urban areas, refugee movement within border areas (including subsequent self-settlement among the local population) is not seen as a pressing issue at the national level. Indeed, most refugees in these areas are simply ignored by national and local government bodies. As a result, transnational historical patterns and customs endure in many border areas, and refugees find alternative forms of reception within communities at the sub-local level, along ethnic and cultural lines. Technically, the national government still considers these self-settled refugees to be breaching reception policy. However, it lacks the capacity or the political inclination to try and uphold the reception policy in these remote areas far from urban centres. Consequently, to many refugees, this behaviour is read as a form of tacit acceptance of their presence in border areas.40 In reality, as observed by a UNHCR official, there is ‘minimal state presence in these areas’.41 Thus, this lack of ‘state’ presence is as relevant to the citizens in these spaces as it is to the refugees.
Some capacity concerns were raised by the state in response to the influx of refugees from the DRC into these geographical areas between 2017 and 2019, with aid agencies unsure of the true number of ‘new’ arrivals.42 As discussed below, these concerns were connected to security issues brought on by a specific moment of mass influx due to civil unrest. Yet even during these heightened times, many fleeing the violence simply crossed the border and stayed with family or members of their extended social networks and tribes, with whom they already shared similar languages and customs. Indeed, as noted by a UNHCR official, for many refugees, these can be circular movements they have performed many times before, ‘particularly [for] the Congolese – they just go to Zambia to wait for the wave to pass’.43
With the state absent, local and sub-local actors regulate the reception of refugees and decide on whether refugees have permission to remain. As observed by an INGO officer, the local community or tribal chiefs often give this ‘permission’:
Most of the refugees who are here are from DRC or from countries that are culturally similar to Zambians and are connected to them – tribal, cousins or related or you know … the way that the borders are drawn … they are welcomed. It’s not a big deal.44
These alternative forms of reception, coupled with the lack of a state presence in border areas, emphasises how capacity concerns connected to refugee movement varies within Zambia depending on the geographical space. In addition, the reality in border areas raises questions about the relevance of the host state and the global refugee regime to the many refugees in these areas. Certainly, these entities can appear like abstract concepts to refugees attempting to locate a welcome and find economic opportunities in border areas.
The separation of refugees from local populations: creating visibility for continued international support
The involvement of international organisations and donors and their willingness to fund the reception of refugees affects states’ behaviour towards refugees. Scholars generally argue that international donors have traditionally preferred to support refugee camps over facilitating urban settlement because camps remain visible, with a spatially confined population that is easy to register, monitor and control (Jamal, 2003; Crisp, 2003; FitzGerald, 2019). As a result, host states view refugee camps as a gateway to continued international attention and funding (Stevens, 2006). Zambia appears to contradict these assumptions. It has a reception policy that stipulates that all refugees should be hosted in settlements, yet it receives very little international funding. Indeed, the Zambian case study challenges this ‘funding-visibility-sedentariness’ nexus as a way of understanding camp-based reception.
Firstly, refugee camps are never completely visible. Indeed, they are normally located in ‘out-the-way locations’ and permission is needed to access them (Kaiser, 2008; Agier, 2011). Zambia is no exception, with the state establishing the refugee settlements in very remote, underdeveloped areas of the country. In turn, the intention was originally for these sites to become self-sustaining and, thus, not dependent on state or international funding.45 From their inception, refugees in these settlements were expected to use plots of land for subsistence farming and trade. In reality, subsistence farming has never been fully achieved in the Mayukwayukwa and Meheba settlements. Growing enough food to be self-sufficient has become increasingly difficult over time. As one refugee leader commented, with extreme over-use of the land and a lack of proper fertiliser for the last fifty years, ‘what hope have you got now of growing crops?’46 Due to this inability to become self-sufficient, both settlements require national and international funds to support and sustain their populations. Despite this, Mayukwayukwa and Meheba remain heavily underfunded.
Secondly, a lack of visibility in terms of Zambia as an international actor plays a key role in this dearth of funding. A UNHCR official observed that Zambia is regularly ignored on the international humanitarian and political stage because of being perceived as a peaceful, stable and relatively democratic state. In essence, it is just not very ‘interesting’ to the international community or donors:
People have no idea where it is or how to get there … very often there’s this assumption that it’s not a place that people talk about.47
As Cheeseman (2017) notes, it is neither the ‘clear democratic success story like Ghana or South Africa, nor a case of extreme authoritarian abuse, as in Cote d’Ivoire and Zimbabwe’. Consequently, international priorities lie elsewhere.
The refugee settlements – and the refugee populations within them – are examples of this near invisibility. As explained by an in-country UN official working on refugee issues, ‘Zambia is not a priority country for international donors’.48 Seen as a landlocked and transit country for migrants by regional bodies like the EU, it does not receive the same attention as states such as South Africa, which is viewed as a departure point for migrants travelling to the minority world. In addition, because Zambia has lower numbers of refugees and persons of concern than neighbouring states in East Africa, development and humanitarian actors tend to focus their attention further north.49 As a result, obtaining international support and funding for the permanent settlements has proven immensely challenging.
To conclude, capacity concerns continue to emerge when UNHCR broaches the topic of improving refugees’ access to the interior with the government. These issues have geographical dimensions, with the national government acutely focused on regulating the movement of refugees (and other cross-border migrants) into urban spaces, but less concerned with the movement of refugees in border areas. In essence, managing the number of refugees in urban spaces counter-balances capacity concerns and any resulting political ramifications arising from instability.
Material and ideational factors: security
This section investigates the role of security in the maintenance of the encampment reception policy in Zambia. The discussion is structured using Milner’s (2009) distinction between: (1) direct security concerns; (2) indirect security concerns; and (3) securitisation. As highlighted above, during registration security concerns emerge as a factor in how the state receives refugees and the form of immediate welcome offered to them. Yet as examined below, by unpacking security into these three components, a more intricate and context-specific understanding of the relationship between security and the reception of refugees materialises – one that has historical roots and frequently involves concerns around instability.
Direct security concerns
The colonial and post-colonial history of Africa demonstrates that there are genuine direct security concerns in relation to the arrival of refugees. This is particularly pertinent during periods of mass influx, the nature of which can legitimise a state such as Zambia taking security precautions, for instance, by keeping refugees separate from the local population until security checks and registration processes have identified and removed any harmful individuals. At the time the 1970 Refugee Act was enacted, several of Zambia’s neighbours were still fighting for their own liberation. As pointed out by a former officer at COR:
Thirty-four years after we had obtained independence, most of our neighbouring countries were still fighting for their own liberation. So, some at that time were freedom fighters – guerrilla warfare etc. – so there was that security concern. The primary objective of the Control Act was to control refugee movements in order to monitor the refugees.50
In the 1970s and 1980s, large numbers of freedom fighters and refugee warriors from countries such as South Africa, Zimbabwe and Mozambique sought refuge in Zambia (Veroff, 2010a).51 Consequently, there was a need for the Zambian government to monitor and control who was entering the territory and specifically, who was gaining access to the interior and urban spaces. The same former COR officer noted that the 1970 Refugee Act was the mechanism used to achieve this, namely, to contain refugees and keep them away from densely populated areas in order to keep the local population safe.
Over the last sixty years, Zambia’s geographical position in the middle of Southern Africa has also placed the country close to some of the world’s largest and longest ongoing refugee situations (Brosché and Nilsson, 2005). The memory of horrific events, such as the civil war in Rwanda in 1990s, remains ever present among many Zambians. In fact, the freedom granted to armed militants from Rwanda in neighbouring countries during the 1980s is regularly seen by civil society and refugee leaders as a key reason Zambia maintains a commitment to camp-based reception policy.
Although the make-up and pattern of refugee movements into Zambia has altered radically over the last sixty years, the overriding reception policy has remained the same. In general, the state no longer receives large movements of refugees fleeing civil war nor faces the risk of armed combatants infiltrating those movements that often accompany them. As a result, some members of civil society (and even some officials in the Department of Home Affairs) consider the nationally run encampment policy to be an historical relic based on past security concerns. A former COR officer illustrated this when they observed that, with the passage of time, the policy and the supporting archaic legal framework ‘became the yoke that bound the government’.52 Legal frameworks and policies were set in place to deal with a specific and genuine security concern and over time there has been little motivation for the state to radically move away from this policy. Levi (1997:252) describes this as path dependency: the ‘entrenchment of certain institutional arrangements obstructs an easy reversal of the initial choice’. Indeed, as observed previously, eventually the legal framework has acquired its own ideational authority within core sections of the national government.
Interviews with officials at UNHCR and INGOs at the sub-regional and regional level suggest that in stable times, direct security concerns remain less of a priority to the Zambian government than in neighbouring states in SADC.53 When state officials and UN agencies brought up security, it tended to be in reference to the movement of refugees within urban areas or to gaining access to urban areas. Yet direct security concerns frequently merged with other indirect security concerns and broader fears over instability in the urban space.
Similar to its limited capacity to regulate the settlement of refugees in border communities, the Zambian government is also less able to respond to any perceived security concerns linked to the regular movement of refugees and migrants within those same areas. As noted above, large numbers of refugees and migrants gain permission at the sub-local level to freely move within border areas without raising security concerns. Yet, it would be disingenuous to suggest that security concerns do not exist at all at the border. The identity of those crossing the border (either via formal checkpoints or through more illicit means) remains a concern for the government. This presents the almost paradoxical situation whereby border areas can be the space where the state is most present and least present (Hovil, 2016).
As with all nation states, direct security concerns exist in relation to cross-border refugee movement in Zambia. However, these direct concerns remain less of a priority in Zambia than is witnessed in neighbouring states and more broadly on the continent. These findings also go some way to explain how refugee movement in Zambia is not subject to the same intense securitisation seen elsewhere in the region and globally. This observation will be developed further next.
Indirect security concerns
The second material factor influencing states such as Zambia towards maintaining camp-based reception, relates to indirect security concerns. These concerns focus on the potential increases in levels of insecurity and instability within the areas in which refugees settle. These may often manifest as locals’ grievances against the refugee population due to a perceived deterioration in local structures (such as social services, crime levels, healthcare and education) seen as a result of the refugee presence (Milner, 2009). In turn, this can inflame tensions within communities, giving rise to increases in xenophobia and ultimately negative repercussions for the ruling political settlement. For these reasons, the settling of refugees and other forced migrants in urban spaces is habitually understood by host states in terms of risk (Loescher, 2003). To alleviate these concerns, refugees are confined to camps, thereby nullifying the threat that this form of ‘non-rooted’ movement creates for national security and the overall stability of the nation.
These kinds of national-level concerns surrounding capacity, insecurity and stability in urban areas regularly emerge in Zambia. Indeed, they are given as an overriding reason for the continual push back by the state when UNHCR requests Zambia to lift the restrictions on freedom of movement. As stated previously, during the 1990s, when the state became uneasy about the number of refugees in urban areas, it started insisting that refugees move back to the settlements. It cited the limitations of urban social services and the tensions that an increased refugee population might create between local communities and the refugees. State officials viewed these concerns as vindicated by the small pockets of friction that surfaced between local communities and refugees after large numbers of Rwandan and Burundian refugees arrived in the 1990s (UNHCR, 1994).
Little empirical work has been carried out to examine the validity of the claimed causal link between refugee and other migrant movement in and around urban spaces and the increased insecurity and instability of a nation. Research does point to several major risk factors confronting Africa, such as the sheer speed of urbanisation on the continent (including internal and cross-border migration into cities) and the increasingly high proportion of young people with relatively low job prospects (Muggah and Kilcullen, 2016). Yet, with weak data in this area, it is difficult to know exactly whether and how African cities are destabilised by refugee and other forms of migrant mobility. For example, only a few cities report homicide rates (most are in Nigeria, Kenya and South Africa) (Muggah and Kilcullen, 2016). Nevertheless, what is evident from the empirical data highlighted in this section is that concern around the tension caused by competition for scarce resources and jobs, colours the official mind-set in Zambia and the view of refugees in urban spaces.
The construction of refugees as security risks
Security is a factor that interacts with refugee reception on an ideational level, as well as on a material level. While states express legitimate concerns when refugees cross borders, they also regularly label refugees as security concerns to further political agendas. Instead of being discussed in terms of repairing a rupture between an individual and their political, social or economic rights, the movement of refugees is instead ‘framed in the language of existential and urgent threat’ (Hammerstad, 2012:5).
The construction of the refugee as a security risk helps to explain the continued popularity of refugee camps as a reception policy in Africa. Remote camps provide a way of removing, or containing, the perceived threat. However, the trade-off for protecting the local host population in this way is that key global refugee regime norms (such as freedom of movement and the right to employment) are curtailed for the refugee. This sets up a separation between the movement of ‘rooted’ people or citizens (seen as a fundamental freedom and entitlement) and the movement of ‘non-rooted’ guests (seen in terms of risk or instability).
Remarkably, Zambia appears to be bucking regional and global trends by not securitising the cross-border movement of refugees and other African migrants into its territory. It is not engaging in the kinds of securitisation activities commonly seen elsewhere, such as erecting border fences, manning expensive border checkpoints, externalising (outsourcing) and internalising (insourcing) its border controls. It is also not using the language of security when refugees are discussed by state officials. Equally, xenophobic or anti-refugee sentiments were not used by political parties in their 2021 election campaigns (UNHCR, 2021a). The empirical evidence identifies two key explanations for this pattern: the maintenance of a broad, if not strict, encampment policy (particularly at this initial stage of reception), and the size of the refugee population in Zambia.
Regarding the first point, in neighbouring states in Southern and East Africa, the securitisation of outsiders is observed specifically in large urban spaces, with vast differences seen at other scales of the state (Wanjiku Kihato and Landau, 2019; van Noorloos and Kloosterboer, 2018). In contrast, in Zambia security concerns surrounding migration and refugees have not filtered down below the top levels of the line ministries. When discussing the global trend of securitising refugees, a UNHCR official observed, ‘if you see an immigration officer [you] won’t hear the issue of security as we see in the West’.54
The lack of visibility of refugees in urban centres plays an important role in this observed behaviour at all levels of the state. Most refugees remain in the settlements, away from local populations and cities. As such, they are generally not perceived as a threat to local communities, the state or the current government’s political power. As a result, beyond the direct and indirect security concerns discussed above, refugee stakeholders (such as UNHCR, implementing partners and refugee community groups) are not witnessing security-framed arguments from state officials, local government departments or bureaucrats. Some refugees are allowed a degree of movement (see Chapter 5), but spaces such as Lusaka have not witnessed the influx of African cross-border migration at the level seen in other cities, such as Johannesburg. The contention is that as the number of refugees and other forced migrants coming into urban spaces is regulated and managed (although not stopped) via the overarching encampment reception policy, there has been little need or desire by the national government to securitise refugee movement.
Regarding the second point, the size of the refugee population plays a role in the lack of securitisation of refugees and refugee movement. The refugee population in Zambia is significantly smaller than in other neighbouring states, such as South Africa.55 In addition, Zambia has a comparatively low population density when compared both regionally and globally. Its sizeable land mass and relatively small overall population means that Zambia has large areas of sparsely populated and unpopulated land.56 Due to the remote location of most refugees (in the settlements) and the relatively small size of the population, the ‘refugee issue’ is not seen as a pressing one in urban areas, even in the capital. Indeed, interviewees noted that the influx of refugees in 2017 (as a consequence of the civil unrest in neighbouring DRC) caused little concern within government departments nor local communities, beyond the line ministries affected. This was corroborated anecdotally by the field notes taken from informal interviews with certain academics, policymakers and civil society members in Lusaka who knew very little about the contemporary and large-scale movement of refugees in the border areas between Zambia and the DRC.
For these reasons, the continued monitoring and management of refugee movement into urban spaces has meant that the state and local communities have not felt sufficiently threatened by refugees (or the idea of refugees) to seek greater securitisation measures.57 In turn, the presence of some refugees and forced migrants in urban spaces (either via official pathways or via more illicit movement that places them outside conventional state reception policies) is not currently perceived as large enough to be a cause for concern for the local communities or the state. In this regard, Zambia starkly deviates from its neighbours in the region, where it is increasingly popular for ruling political and local officials to scapegoat forced migrants (Van Hear, 1998; Bakewell and Jónsson, 2011). In this way, the current relationship between refugee camp and urban spaces is, almost counter-intuitively, allowing geographical and political space for some movement and by extension, for some forms of reception in the urban space.
Securitisation of the ‘opposition’ in Zambia
The historical variability in national refugee policy in Zambia is an important factor to consider when examining the securitisation of refugees. Policy and practice relevant to hosting refugees have been prone to sudden changes over the past few decades, at all levels of the government system. For example, this was seen in the 1990s with the pushback of many urban refugees to the settlements. This volatile characteristic is relevant to these discussions because of recent shifts seen in the approach of the governing political settlement in Zambia to numerous forms of ‘political opposition’. With refugee policy outside of the settlements entirely based on administrative practices and policy, the national government’s attitude to refugees and their movement has the potential to be able to shift quickly. This in turn means that the current dynamics and relationship between the two reception spaces remain precarious.
During Zambia’s well-documented slide towards a more autocratic rule between 2016 and 2021, securitisation was employed as a tactic against perceived threats to the government. It was deployed against civil society, the national press and opposition political parties (Frontline Defenders, 2018; Siachiwena, 2021a). For example, the former president, Edgar Lungu, pronounced that fires in the Lusaka City market in 2017 were ‘acts of sabotage’ by opposition leaders, even though no official investigation was conducted. He used this to justify him invoking ‘State of Public Threatened Emergency’ procedures for three months (Civicus, 2017).58
The securitisation of civil society by the Patriotic Front was another attempt by the then ruling party, since the late 1990s, to severely restrict the space available for NGOs. The head of an international aid agency set out the landscape for NGOs in Zambia:
It’s been ongoing, this shrinking space for a decade or so but it has picked up speed … it has picked up since elections. So what might happen is if, if they speak up they get arrested.59
According to a leader of a refugee women’s organisation, the result of the shrinking space has been that assistance provided by NGOs to vulnerable and marginalised groups (in the form of aid or advocacy) is now minimal.60 With a new government coming into power in 2021, there has been some optimism from civil society and the media that these tactics will be reversed (Siachiwena, 2021b). Yet, at least in the short term, it appears as if the new regime is following similar strategies, with reports of the government increasing censorship on civil society watchdogs and other publications (USDS, 2023).
Given that most refugees stay separated from large urban spaces, it remains unlikely that the state will securitise refugees in the near future. However, these broader political patterns highlight the dangers inherent in relying on the goodwill of ruling parties who continue to suppress democratic ideals. Indeed, time will tell if the election of the UPND will see a realigning of the political settlement in Zambia towards a more democratic one.61
Both UNHCR and COR continue to use recent national and global developments in their attempts to improve reception policies for refugees. By deploying a broad interpretation of the new 2017 Refugee Act and building on the international commitments made by the former and current president, these entities are actively pushing for increased access to urban spaces for more refugees. These actions are commendable from the standpoint of a normative and global refugee regime. Nevertheless, with limited political space available for civil society on the ground, the UN and other relevant parties within the international community need to monitor the situation closely. This is especially pertinent if the numbers of refugees in urban areas rise to levels that become perceived as a threat to the security and stability of the state, or if they become such a real concern to the voting public. In these scenarios, the state and Zambians might start viewing refugees in urban and other areas as part of the ‘problem’.
The initial stage of reception in Zambia: a case of ongoing negotiations between encampment and urban spaces
Zambia has adopted and maintained an encampment policy to receive refugees for the last sixty years. This chapter has drawn out and appraised the key material, institutional and ideational factors, at the international, national and local levels that continue to influence, contest but ultimately reinforce this policy. In doing so, the analysis offers key observations in relation to the initial stage of reception in Zambia and the two reception sites examined in this book.
Firstly, the national legal framework holds a prominent position in relation to reception policies in Zambia. On one level of analysis, this is a straightforward conclusion, with both the 1970 Refugee Act and the new 2017 Refugee Act permitting the creation of refugee settlements and allowing the state to house refugees in these spaces. Nevertheless, the chapter demonstrates how the influence of the national framework goes far beyond a simple obligation of the state to implement the law. Importantly, this legal framework also shapes the way in which government officials understand refugees and the appropriate policies for managing refugee populations. The old 1970 Refugee Act still retains a great deal of ideational power within key departments of the national government. Even after the new 2017 Refugee Act came into effect and finally incorporated some core global refugee regime norms, government departments (including the Department of Immigration) continue to derive their understanding of refugees and their reception from the old 1970 Refugee Act. As commented on by a former officer in COR, in several ways the archaic legal framework still provides the glue that binds the government’s approach. Thus, for many at the national level, refugees are solely understood within the confines of the settlements. This inevitably creates institutional contestation as COR continues to permit refugees to travel between the settlements and urban spaces, and even to settle in cities such as Lusaka. In addition, this has ramifications for urban refugees who see their status continually confused with economic or illegal migrants by state officials.
In contrast, the influence of the global refugee regime (that is, international conventions and UNHCR) on reception in Zambia at the point of registration is less evident. This is not to say that UNHCR is not working behind the scenes. The agency has had some success in adopting a support role to COR over the last few decades; for instance, it was involved in discussions and lobbying around the introduction of the new 2017 Refugee Act. As will be examined in the next chapter, UNHCR has a more prominent role in the settlements, post registration. Yet, with Zambia generally being ignored by international donors, combined with key departments adhering to national law that overlooks regime norms, the influence of the ‘global’ (at least at this initial stage of reception) appears relatively minor.
The underlying tension between the ideational power of the former Act within key state departments versus the institutional approach of COR (and UNHCR) demonstrates how contestation between different causal mechanisms embedded within state (and international actors’) behaviour causes ongoing negotiations (and renegotiations) between key actors and, ultimately, unique outcomes in terms of reception policy. At the initial stage of reception, this results in a precarious situation, whereby while the overall camp-based reception approach is upheld, COR frequently permits some movement and access to urban spaces. This approach, and the additional movement that comes with it, inevitably clashes with broader institutional understandings of what a ‘refugee’ is and where they should be housed. Eventually this results in the opposite intended effect: namely, confirmation within other government departments of a need for the encampment policy.
Secondly, the chapter proposes that the use of the refugee camp as a reception modality is, remarkably, helping to prevent the emergence of top-down and bottom-up securitisation of refugees in Zambia. This is not to say that the government dismisses security issues arising from the arrival of refugees. Indeed, legitimate security concerns do play a role at this initial stage of reception. Nonetheless, it is apparent that there is not the overriding preoccupation with security that is prevalent in other states in Africa (and more globally). By managing the movement of ‘non-rooted’ persons into urban spaces, the settlements can be understood as a key reason why refugees and their movement are not currently securitised by either state bodies or local populations.
This finding leads to the contention that a complex association between the camp and urban reception spaces transpires during the initial reception of refugees in Zambia. These spaces are intrinsically linked due to the state’s approach to receiving refugees and their initial movement. Indeed, a theme that emerges is the focus on the management of movement into urban space, with movement in the interior being regulated and controlled via the camp policy. The aim of the refugee camp in Zambia appears not to be about stopping all movement of refugees, but rather to filter and manage the numbers of refugees in urban spaces. This supports contemporary academic literature from a ground-level perspective that has pushed back against the idea that the camp and urban space are diametrically opposed to each other. In Zambia, the empirical research suggests that the relationship between the two reception spaces is symbiotic, with the actions in one regularly affecting policy and practice in the other. As examined further in the next chapter, this complex association between the two geographical spaces plays a key, if paradoxical, role in the settling of some refugees outside the refugee camp in Zambia. During post-registration, greater movement is permitted between each site by elements of the national government. Thus, as the analysis moves to focus on this second stage of reception, the relationship between the two reception sites can be seen to become even more complex.
Notes
1. Chapters 4, 5, 6 and 7 are drawn from analysis of the empirical data and supplemented by secondary sources. Due to publication requirements, reference to interviews and other quasi-ethnographic methods has been minimalised to key quotes or specific examples.
2. In a dualist state, a piece of domestic law is required to incorporate international law into national law.
3. Zambia INGOs Interviewee 10.
4. Zambia INGOs Interviewee 10.
5. In 1993, UNHCR handed over running of RSD procedures to COR.
6. UNHCR officials, as observers in these committees, share expertise and advice.
7. See also Chitupila (2010); Brosché and Nilsson (2005).
8. Applicants have a right to appeal if their claim is rejected under both RSD procedures (Chitupila, 2010).
9. See Chapter 5 for a discussion of the third settlement – the Mantapala settlement – which was opened in 2018 during the main period of data collection.
10. See also Bakewell (2007).
11. Zambia INGOs Interviewee 14.
12. See also Hansen (1979, 1982, 1990) and Bakewell (2000, 2007).
13. Exact figures involved in self-settlement in Zambia are unknown.
14. The 2017 Refugee Act officially gave COR a mandate to deal with all refugee matters. Prior to 2017, the departments’ responsibilities were agreed purely at an administrative level.
15. A ‘strategic framework for the local integration of former refugees’ from Angola in Zambia was set up in 2014 (UNHCR, 2014b). The aim was to integrate former Angolan refugees with Zambians around the existing refugee settlements by giving them land (Kambela, 2016; Osmers, 2015).
16. COR is part of a larger hierarchical structure and reports to Home Affairs, with its mandate for maintaining internal security.
17. See also Rutinwa (2002).
18. Zambia Civil Society and Refugee Groups Interviewee 12.
19. Zambia INGOs Interviewee 10.
20. Zambia State Entities Interviewee 01.
21. Zambia INGOs Interviewee 06.
22. See also Bakewell (2002).
23. Zambia Civil Society and Refugee Groups Interviewee 13. See also Frischkorn (2015).
24. Official avenues run by COR that allow access to the urban area do have de jure and de facto restrictions attached to them.
25. Zambia State Entities Interviewee 02.
26. See Part IV of the Act.
27. See Article 10 of the Act.
28. Zambia Civil Society and Refugee Groups Interviewee 05.
29. Zambia INGOs Interviewee 13.
30. Zambia INGOs Interviewee 13.
31. See UNHCR (2017a).
32. Zambia Civil Society and Refugee Groups Interviewee 13. See also Frischkorn (2015).
33. Zambia Civil Society and Refugee Groups Interviewee 10.
34. Zambia State Entities Interviewee 02.
35. Zambia Civil Society and Refugee Groups Interviewee 13.
36. Zambia Civil Society and Refugee Groups Interviewee 13.
37. Zambia INGOs Interviewee 02.
38. Zambia Civil Society and Refugee Groups Interviewee 10.
39. However, refugees face systemic barriers in accessing these services (Donger et al., 2017).
40. See also Bakewell (2000, 2007) and Hansen (1990).
41. Zambia INGOs Interviewee 11.
42. UNHCR estimate that between 2017 and 2020, around 23,000 Congolese arrived in Zambia after renewed waves of conflict (UNHCR, 2021b).
43. Zambia INGOs Interviewee 02.
44. Zambia Civil Society and Refugee Groups Interviewee 05.
45. See also Bakewell (2002).
46. Zambia Civil Society and Refugee Groups Interviewee 10.
47. Zambia INGOs Interviewee 10.
48. Zambia INGOs Interviewee 09.
49. UNHCR’s budget for Zambia was USD 20 million in 2015. In 2017, it was 12 million (UNHCR, 2019a).
50. Zambia State Entities Interviewee 02.
51. See also Zolberg et al. (1989).
52. Zolberg et al. (1989).
53. See the security strategies targeting refugees in South Africa (Misago, 2016) and Tanzania (Landau, 2001).
54. Zambia INGOs Interviewee 02.
55. Zambia has 76,027 persons of concern. By contrast, South Africa has 275,377, Tanzania 337,000, and Kenya 490,000 (UNHCR, 2019c).
56. The population of Zambia is around 17 million, with a large landmass of 752,000 sq. km (WorldAtlas, 2019). This is roughly three times the size of the UK, which itself has a population of 66 million.
57. This is with the exception of one incident in 2016. See Chapter 5.
58. These powers further limited political space for other political parties and civil society (Civicus, 2017).
59. Zambia INGOs Interviewee 11.
60. Zambia Civil Society and Refugee Groups Interviewee 02. Non-state assistance comes from international organisations (and their implementing partners), faith-based organisations and refugee networks.
61. See Siachiwena (2021b).