Assignment: The Gambia - when migrants are forced to go home
The Documentary Podcast
BBC
4.3 • 2.7K Ratings
🗓️ 14 January 2025
⏱️ 27 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Each year young people from the tiny West African nation of The Gambia try to reach Europe through “The Backway” - a costly, perilous journey over land and sea.
Many do not make it. In recent years, the EU has done deals with several North African nations to clamp down on irregular migration. Though human rights groups say the treatment of migrants can be brutal - allegations the authorities deny. But each year thousands of African migrants say they have no choice but to return home.
It can be a struggle to return. Some are traumatised by their experience and face stigma for having failed to reach Europe. Others are already planning to try again.
For Assignment, Alex Last travels to The Gambia to find out what happens to migrants who've risked everything to get to Europe, but end up back home.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to Assignment from the BBC World Service. |
| 0:07.9 | It's late at the Gambia's International Airport. Most here are waiting for the arrival of tourists from Europe |
| 0:15.0 | who flock to this tiny nation in West Africa for its beautiful beaches and winter sun. |
| 0:23.2 | But just after 2 o'clock in the morning, a special group of arrivals appear walking single |
| 0:28.8 | file in silence out of the terminal. |
| 0:31.6 | There are dozens of Gambian migrants who were trying to reach Europe without visas, but |
| 0:36.8 | whose journey came to an end in Tunisia before they could cross the Mediterranean |
| 0:41.0 | and have now been returned home. |
| 0:47.2 | They are all young men. There's 47 of them. |
| 0:51.0 | They're not carrying much. |
| 0:52.6 | There's perhaps just a small hold all. It seems to be all they have left from a journey that probably cost a loss and for which they risk their lives. They are actually being handed a small white cloth bag. I think it contains blanket and some essential items. |
| 1:13.8 | They've been giving them by a team |
| 1:15.2 | from the United Nations. |
| 1:19.5 | Hello, sir. |
| 1:20.5 | Tell us your name. |
| 1:22.4 | My name is La Jai. |
| 1:23.9 | I am 20 years old. |
| 1:25.4 | 20 years old. |
| 1:26.6 | How do you feel about being back home? |
| 1:29.3 | Right now, just thanking God, al-hambardillah, here is our homeland, my homeland. |
| 1:34.3 | Right now, I'm very happy. |
| 1:36.3 | Thanking God to be here right now. |
... |
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