Day: April 14, 2013

Australian elderly asked to take-in an asylum seeker!

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

This is not a joke!

The Australian government, completely consumed these days by the arrival of boat people (mostly young Muslim men arriving illegally on Australian shores or being apprehended at sea while approaching Australia) is now asking retired people to take them into their homes as household (or farm) help and as “companions.”

Remember the young Rohingya ‘asylum seeker’ we heard about here the other day.  The 26-year-old had been on the run for 11 years and had managed to “scrape together $12,000” to hire a people smuggler.  Now, imagine him moving in with granny in order to help her run the vacuum and take out the trash!  Companionship? Maybe she could pick up a few words of his particular Bangladeshi dialect.

Australian granny to open her home to a refugee applicant, says she isn’t naive.  Photo: The Sunday Times

Here is the story from The Australian:

ASYLUM seekers will be used as live-in companions for retirees and to “help out” on farms across WA under a new homestay scheme starting next month and backed by the Immigration Department.

Live-Every West Australian with a spare room is being urged to sign up for the Homestay Helping Hand program, with hosts paid $50 a week for each asylum seeker in exchange for providing board and food.

Asylum seekers, in return, are urged to “help out around the home or farm”, “pick up the shopping”, or “provide company for someone who’s lonely”.

The scheme will be run by the Australian Homestay Network, which finds accommodation for asylum seekers after they are processed on Christmas Island and released by the Immigration Department on bridging visas while their refugee claims are assessed.

Executive chairman David Bycroft said placements would start within a month and it was a “chance for Australians to put their hand up and be part of the solution instead of complaining about the problem”.

Give people a chance, says 70-year-old volunteer:

“Some of my friends think I’m quite naive and I guess I have a little bit of trepidation because some people are quite anti-refugees and think that anyone who is sympathetic is a bit naive. I don’t agree with that. We should give people a chance.

Readers, there is a certain logic to this.  Rather than dumping all of the expense on the average Australian taxpayer, let the do-gooders open their homes and wallets.  I’ve advocated a form of this concept in the past myself.

Every “refugee” family coming to the US should be sponsored by a private organization whose job it would be to use charitable (privately-raised) funds to take care of their needs for at least a year and help them assimilate into our culture.  This would eliminate the federal contractor middlemen and brokers.  We would very quickly learn how many of the do-gooder class are really charitable when it comes to their own personal funds being expended for the grand social experiment.

Endnote:  A cool feature at wordpress tells me that hundreds of readers are arriving here at our blog from Australia—thanks for visiting!

If you are on twitter, follow me —  Ann C @refugeewatcher!

Rep. Keith Ellison: It’s a new day in Somalia; send money

~ Ann Corcoran ~ Leave a comment

Update:  Lawlessness and mayhem are back as al-Shabaab attacks the capital—and as our commenters noted earlier.

If it’s a new day and Somalia is on the mend, then WHY ARE WE STILL IMPORTING SOMALI REFUGEES? 

If Somalis from the ‘diaspora’ are traveling back and forth to Somalia to buy real estate and do business, why is the flow of “refugees” still moving Westward?  Should we even be calling them “refugees” anymore?

Rep. Keith Ellison scans the horizon for Somali pirates (just kidding!). Photo: Minneapolis Star Tribune

Editors note:  As of the end of February (5 months into fiscal year 2013) see, here, the US State Department and its contractors have brought 2,814 new Somali “refugees” to the US (read: new Democrat voters and cheap labor)!

In his opinion piece at Insight News, Minnesota Rep. Keith Ellison, the go-to guy for the federal refugee contractors, tells readers how great Somalia is doing and how the US needs to send more money to the country. 

Let’s make a deal—send Somalia more money and let them keep their so-called “refugees.”

Ellison (emphasis mine):

It’s a new day in Somalia. That’s the message I took away from a trip to the capital city of Mogadishu earlier this year. We have our best opportunity in more than two decades to help stabilize Somalia and advance U.S. national security interests — but only if we act quickly.

The improved security situation has filled Mogadishu with new life. Somalis can once again play music and dance, activities banned by terrorist group Al-Shabab, which until recently controlled much of the country. Crowds of people fill the streets, socializing and shopping.

Somali-Americans from my district in Minnesota are starting businesses and buying real estate. And a new generation of Somalis from the global diaspora is returning. One of them started Somalia’s first think tank, the Heritage Institute for Policy Studies. Another woman left her high-paying job on Wall Street to help build up Somalia’s financial sector from scratch.

These positive developments are largely a result of Somalia’s successful political transition last year. After many failed attempts, Somali leaders completed a process that produced the first representative, permanent government since the fall of Siad Barre’s regime in 1991.

Somalia now has a new constitution, parliament and president. In a strong vote of confidence, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton formally recognized the new government when President Hassan Sheik Mohamud visited Washington in January. Mohamud also met with President Obama and more than 20 members of Congress.

Nonetheless, Somalia’s new leaders face challenges that would be difficult even for an experienced, well-resourced government. Ministries are nonexistent or understaffed; there is no public education or established banking system; more than a million people are displaced, and security threats remain serious. However, even the pessimists can no longer say that Somalia is hopeless.

The new government is populated with public servants who want Somalia to succeed. President Mohamud made clear at his meeting on Capitol Hill that security is his top priority. His government must quickly move into areas liberated from Al-Shabab and prove that government can be a force for good, not just a source of corruption and oppression. It can do that by providing basic public services, including trash pickup, transportation, education and a functioning judicial system.

The United States has an opportunity to make an investment in Somalia that could pay huge dividends over time.

There is more.