Challenges continue for Mayo’s migrants

FACILITATING INTEGRATION Natalya Pestova, co-ordinator at Mayo Intercultural Action (on left) pictured with Professor Jane Freedman, University of Paris and Kany Kanyeba Kazadi at a seminar on migration in the Museum of Country Life, Turlough Park last June. Pic: Ken Wright

Áine Ryan

IT is 15 years since Russian native Natalya Pestova moved to County Mayo with her husband and their young daughter. The couple also had a son since, in the interim, who is now aged 13 and at secondary school in the county town.
Like many of the other Russian men who applied for work permits, her hsband worked manual jobs in Ballyhaunis, where the family lived for four years, before relocating to Casltebar. Kirov-born, Natayla’s husband was a medical doctor. However, he could earn much more working manually in Ireland than as a qualified doctor in Russia.  
While the couple ‘naturally connected with the migrant community’, in the east Mayo town, ‘a lot of them moved on from Ballyhaunis, progressing their careers in Canada and Australia or elsewhere here in Ireland’.
“As a spouse of an economic migrant who had a work permit from Russia, I was only allowed come in as a dependent wife. While raising my children I did a Masters and Phd in Human Rights in NUI Galway, which addressed the international responsibilities of Local Government regarding access rights to clean water,” she  explains.
A lawyer and university lecturer, the young emigrant had worked for about ten years in her native city before leaving for a new life in Ireland.
“Back at home I worked for about 60 hours a week and when I finally got a casual job in a fast-food café in Mayo, I was paid over one weekend the same as I would have earned over a month as a professional in Russia,” she recalls.

MIA forges its future
MAYO Intercultural Action (MIA) has been located in a HSE building, Hillhouse, on Mountain View, in Castlebar for a number of years. Its history of patchy funding has left it teetering on the edge of closure on more than one occasion but it has always managed to survive.
The fact that the State doesn’t support migrant organisations with core funding is the biggest reason why so many organisations like MIA don’t survive, says Natalya Pestova.
As Coordinator, Ms Pestova is the only paid employee of MIA, with two other members of the team working on projects through Community Employment schemes. One of them, Ella Gizicka facilitates a women’s integration group in Castlebar, which has proven to be very successful. The women – who are members of the Karen community, as well as from New Zealand, the Congo, Nigeria, Poland, Zimbabwe, Venezuela, South Africa – enjoy international singing, volleyball games, crafts and drumming.  On the other hand, Brian Kyne is MIA’s administrator, and provides English language and other supports to migrants and asylum seekers.

But what are the fundamental challenges?
“For asylum seekers, despite the fact that there has been a reform process implemented by the Government, following the McMahon report, there has been little effect on the ground. They are still not allowed to work while in Direct Provision and still come out traumatised and demoralised as the system really breaks them. It is like a prison,” she tells The Mayo News.
“Then, when they eventually leave Direct Provision there are no supports for their transition into independent living,” she continues.
While the experiences of economic migrants may not be quite as difficult, they suffer often because they don’t know how to access the supports that are out there for them.    
Founded by Sinn Féin councillor, Thérèse Ruane who stills acts in an advisory role, MIA was established as a charity in 2004. However, last year it was subsumed under the mantle of South West Mayo Development Company (SWMDC), which has been a very positive development.
“Around this time last year, we had a crisis about our future , so following successful negotiations with their board, it was agreed to take MIA under its governance,” says Natalya.
She added that last week’s announcement of Asylum Migration Integration Funding of €260,000 over three years gives the organisation security of its sustainability.