‘No point having integration programmes if they lack funding or will’

There is no point in having integration programmes if they do not have funding or the will to go through with them, Foundation for Shelter and Support to Migrants (FSM) director Ahmed Bugre has said.

In the second episode of this season’s Indepth, deputy editor-inchief Neil Camilleri welcomed Dr Ahmed Bugre – founder of the FSM, who is also involved with the Third Country National Network, an umbrella organization representing around 15 different migrant communities and groups.

Throughout the programme, they touched on issues such as integration, hate speech, and the various migrant centres in Malta.

When queried on the issues and methods of integration, Bugre rhetorically asked whether the Maltese people “want African migrants to integrate, or to be included.”

“Look at our national system how many migrants, how many African migrants are involved in it? They are excluded.”

He said that Malta’s national programmes do not include migrants, and that the only place they are included is in the labour force because it is needed.

“You can never fully become a Maltese person in terms of how you integrate, but what is integration?

“Integration is building friendships, embedding yourself in your community and being productive, which comes by learning how people live, but it is not only the migrants who have to do that, but also the Maltese, who have to reach out and understand where the other people are coming from.”

“Integration is a two-way street one cannot integrate unless one is wanted,” Bugre insisted, going on to criticize the local system as one that is built to “make people move on.”

“The question is whether the onus is on the migrant to integrate, or on Maltese society itself to reach out.”