On a latest Friday, members of Chicago’s American Rohingya group handed indicators promoting citizenship courses, English courses and a soccer crew as they entered a social companies middle within the West Ridge neighborhood. It was time to vote.
Many of the roughly 15 adults of assorted ages who entered the Rohingya Cultural Center on West Devon Avenue solely just lately turned U.S. residents and had by no means voted, in keeping with middle employees.
“If we do not exit to vote, we lose a voice,” mentioned Emran Yakub, 37, a Rohingya who fled Myanmar in 1999 and arrived in Chicago in 2013. Yakub turned a U.S. citizen about 5 years after his arrival, taking part in elections on Tuesday. the second time he voted for president.
Yakub mentioned he believes the United States shall be “higher for everybody” if extra voices are heard. So Yakub, who works on the cultural middle, is raring to assist Rohingya Americans, who arrived within the United States extra just lately, vote.
The Rohingya are a part of a predominantly Muslim and Burmese ethnic group who, because the Eighties, have been denied authorized standing in Myanmar, the Southeast Asian nation often known as Burma till 1989. As of 2012, roughly 800 Rohingya households they got here to Chicago searching for fundamental rights similar to the flexibility to vote.
It is troublesome for brand new American Rohingya residents – who don’t converse English very properly and have issue with duties similar to making use of for social companies, getting round cities, and receiving medical care – to be taught in regards to the US authorities and elections, particularly as a result of they don’t they do. “I do not know what it means to be a citizen of any nation,” Yakub mentioned.
“We be taught quite a bit in regards to the authorities from the information, after which we share it with our personal folks as a result of our folks again house, have by no means, ever attended faculty, learn or written,” Yakub mentioned.
Understanding points such because the distinction between political events will be troublesome, Yakub mentioned. “Both events look comparable,” he mentioned.
When different members of his group come to Yakub with questions on who they need to vote for on this election, Yakub asks his fellow Rohingya Americans whether or not they need a person or a girl to be president.
“It’s straightforward to clarify to folks,” Yakub mentioned.
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Yakub, his dad and mom and siblings went to Thailand for 2 years after fleeing Myanmar. They then spent a dozen years in Malaysia, the place his father died.
“We by no means had this feature at house,” Yakub mentioned of the vote. “We have seen in different international locations like Malaysia and Thailand that they’re very proud residents. We weren’t residents (of) Thailand, Malaysia. We had been so offended.
Staff members on the cultural middle despatched a message to the group on WhatsApp saying they would offer transportation to the Northtown department of the Chicago Public Library, a location for individuals who wished to vote early.
Six days earlier, an identical occasion to get Rohingya Americans to vote noticed 110 new Rohingya American residents vote, in keeping with the Muslim Civic Coalition. The Rohingya Cultural Center is a companion of the civic coalition.
Deena Habbal, communications director for the Muslim Civic Coalition, attended the primary voting occasion. Habbal mentioned the Rohingya Americans who voted in Chicago ought to encourage different Americans to train their proper to vote.
“We take it with no consideration that now we have all these rights,” Habbal mentioned. “We ought to be registered. We ought to make our voices heard as a result of nobody will defend us if we do not defend ourselves.”
