Submission from Hengride Permal, Chair,
Chagos Islands Community Association
1. My name is Hengride Permal. I am the
Chair of the Chagos Islands Community Association which represents
some 2,000 Chagossians. Some of them live in Manchester and London,
but the vast majority are living in Crawley. Out of these 2,000,
a very small number of around 50 are babies who were born in the
United Kingdom. Around 200 are elderly residents who were born
in the Chagos Islands. The remainder were born in Mauritius and
came to the UK because they were desperately seeking a better
life and their families were suffering in the slums of Mauritius.
2. We began to arrive in Crawley in May
or June 2002 when we started to receive full British passports.
Once here, most of us spent days sleeping in Gatwick Airport,
then spent a certain amount of time in hostel accommodation in
Horley, then returned to Crawley where we had to seek private
lodgings. The council did not consider that it had the responsibility
to house us and we had to struggle in order to gain access to
council housing.
One of our members was only given a council
house after he fell into the clutches of a private racketeer landlord,
who assaulted him and beat him up and only then did the council
move to provide him with accommodation.
We had a 24-hour demonstration outside Crawley
Council Offices throughout the winter months of 2005-06 to insist
on our right to council housing and to demand access to the Jobseekers
Allowance and to other benefits. These were denied to us, despite
the fact that we had full British passports. To this day, we are
still involved in struggles to gain access to the Jobseekers Alliance
and to the Old Aged Pension, with elderly people who are entitled
to it, still being denied.
We are also suffering from our families being
spilt up, with husbands living in Crawley and wives and children
still in Mauritius and vice versa. Despite the fact that we are
all British subjects, the conditions on which we were given British
passports mean that some family members are admitted and others
aren't. This causes a real trauma. It is possible to get long
stay visas, but these cost nearly a thousand pounds which Chagossians
do not have. Even then, when a family has been temporarily united
through a long-term visa, big problems arise. We have a case currently
where the father and his children, who came to stay with the mother
in Crawley, on a long term visa, has been told that he has failed
a Citizenship English test and is liable to be returned because
of this to Mauritius with his children unless he is able to purchase
a new visa to restart his stay here. There is no other word for
this but torture. The family are distraught and fearful about
what is to happen to them.
In our opinion, this is no way to treat a people
that have already been evicted from their homes and saw their
animals being killed and their actual housing being demolished
as they were removed from Diego Garcia and taken to Mauritius,
never to return, as we were told. This is also not the way that
people from other overseas British territories are being treated,
such as from Monserrat and the Falklands.
The British people are tolerant and have welcomed
us, but there have been a number of instances of racist attacks
on people and people's houses creating an atmosphere of fear,
for which, of course, only a tiny minority are responsible.
We come from a tropical island where you never
get cold, where there is never a lack of food supply, either from
the ocean or from the land, and where there were very few troubles
and stresses. We find it very difficult to live in a completely
urban environment and also in a climate that is cold and damp
and we find difficult, leading to all kinds of illnesses, colds,
chills, general aches and pains, which have blighted our stay
here, especially for the elderly, who spend their days dreaming
about returning home.
Our community does look for work and many of
us are working. But unfortunately it is in the lowest-paid jobs,
with very little prospects. Also, our native language is Creole
French. Many of us do not speak English and they have to be represented
in dealing with problems, such as attempts to gain access to the
Jobseekers Allowance and access to council housing, and problems
with visas.
So it is wrong to accept the picture that is
being made that we are a community that is fully integrated into
Britain, more or less British, and that has no real connection
or desire to return to our homes. We all want to return to our
homes. We all want to return to the Chagos Islands and to the
life that our parents once had and which we all dream about.
3. We do not accept that there is a group
of Chagossians who are more entitled to return to their homes
than the rest of the Chagossian community, which is scattered
in the UK, the Seychelles, Mauritius and other countries. We are
all suffering. We all have the right to return and we all represent
the same generations.
4. We are very disturbed that it seems to
us that we are being by-passed. Nobody has ever informed us of
the establishment of a resettlement team. It was news to us that
a resettlement plan for some Chagossians would be launched in
the House of Lords next month. We have never seen this resettlement
plan. Nobody has consulted us about it. In our opinion we have
the right to return, we have the right to draw up, with the rest
of the Chagossian community, a resettlement plan and be represented
on a negotiating team. This cannot be done for us or without us.
This is why we would like to give face-to-face evidence on these
issues to your Foreign Affairs Committee.
We are very, very appreciative of the legal
work that Richard Gifford from Sheridan's Solicitors has done
to advance the cause of the Chagossian people. However, he cannot
negotiate either on behalf of us or without us. The Chagossian
community must have its own negotiating team. I would like to
repeat that no section of the Chagossian community has a monopoly
of the right to return, we all have it.
The same is the case with the question of which
Islands are to be resettled. We have the right as a community
to decide on this. We do have the right of self-determination
and I think that you will, and the British government will, recognise
this right. It is now agreed that removing us from our homes was
illegal. It follows from this that the establishment of the huge
base on Diego Garcia was illegal. We cannot accept that since
this illegal action is an established fact that we cannot return
to Diego Garcia, from which the vast majority of us came from.
In our opinion the United States of America must be asked to remove
its base.
5. On the question of compensation, in our
opinion the amount of compensation that has been paid up until
now it pitiable. Two and a half thousand pounds is no compensation
for what we have been through.
However, many of us have never received any
compensation and we would like your Foreign Affairs Committee
and the British government to investigate what happened to the
amount of money that was on offer as compensation. As far as we
are concerned, we have the right to return and we have the right
to a proper amount of compensation, to be negotiated, for what
the Chagossian people have suffered.
6. We are prepared to discuss the issue
of a phased return to our homes, but all have the right to return,
not a limited 1,000, and the planning must be for a full return
of the Chagossian people, with all of the different Chagossian
groups represented in the different phases of this return.
We wish to see self-determination for the Chagossian
people. We want to be able to elect a Chagossian administration
to run the Chagos islands so that we will never be tricked out
of our homes again, although of course we are not opposed in any
way to being members of the Commonwealth.
Once again, I would like to thank you being
able to make a written submission to you and we are looking forward
to being able to appear before your committee to discuss the issues
that have arisen.
We would just like to re-emphasise that the
Chagossians must decide who will negotiate for them, that all
the Chagossian communities must draw up the plans for resettlement
(and in this context we would appreciate it if you could see that
we receive a copy of the current resettlement plan), and that
all Chagossians must have the right to return with adequate compensation
for their 40 years of suffering, if the terrible wrong that was
done to us is to be really righted.
12 February 2008
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