Choose your death: dehydration or drowning or physical assault
Each day 6 people die for trying to reach Europe by sea
At least twice as many migrants die attempting to reach the Mediterranean as those who die attempting to cross the sea, according to the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR).
So in short, at least 18 people die each day for trying to reach Europe
https://migrantsea.com/people/fidele/
In Libya, there are two types of prisons: the state prisons and the Asma Boy prisons. The Asma Boys are a loose network of gangs that imprisons and resells migrants throughout the country – Ali Ghetto being one of their biggest bases of operations. During the Gadhafi era, it was a state prison similar to those here in Italy. But during the civil war, the government abandoned it and the prisoners escaped, which left Ali – the gangster who had taken over most of Sabha at that point – to take possession of it.
Every Wednesday, the guards would force each prisoner to call their friends or family and ask for a 3,500 Libyan dinar ransom for their release. Since I had paid for my journey in full in Algeria, I desperately tried calling my smuggler in Oran; but his number had been disconnected.
I reluctantly called my family next. They were shocked to hear from me after so long, not to mention given the circumstances I found myself in. My mother explained that she was facing deep financial troubles and couldn’t help me, “We’re not doing too well, son. The amount you’re asking for is a lot”. She would look, but it would take some time.
When we first arrived, J. tried to rebel; he’d tell the guards that he had no money and that they wouldn’t get anything from his family. So they beat him terribly before the calls. Initially, his family didn’t believe that he was in prison, so the guards sent them a video where they gagged him, tied his hands and feet, and burned his body with molten plastic. If his mother didn’t pay, they said, the next video would be of her son’s corpse. And so, she sent the money, and he was released a month before me.
J.s in Bologna now. He still has scars all over his body.
Eventually, my calls to Cameroon stopped going through. This angered the guards, and for two months, they abused, tortured and beat me. I didn’t know what to do. I felt beyond helpless.
Fortunately, a Nigerian guard from Akwa Ibom patrolled our section, the state where I lived in Nigeria. One day, as I was following him to the phone, I spoke to him in his dialect. “Shut up. You shouldn’t talk”. But I wouldn’t listen; I told him that I had lived in Akwa Ibom and that I knew the area well, and started naming obscure places known only to locals so he would know that I was telling the truth. I told him that I was Cameroonian and that I had no one to help me. Finally, he broke. “We’ll manage until we figure out how to get you out of here.”
Fortunately, a Nigerian guard from Akwa Ibom patrolled our section, the state where I lived in Nigeria. One day, as I was following him to the phone, I spoke to him in his dialect. “Shut up. You shouldn’t talk”. But I wouldn’t listen; I told him that I had lived in Akwa Ibom and that I knew the area well, and started naming obscure places known only to locals so he would know that I was telling the truth. I told him that I was Cameroonian and that I had no one to help me. Finally, he broke. “We’ll manage until we figure out how to get you out of here.”
From then on, the beatings and ransom calls stopped. On the days when Ali came to log the prisoners’ calls, we would have to line up so that he could speak to us one by one. Since Ali just wanted a broad account of whose ransom to expect and who had yet to pay, he never stayed long enough to reach those at the back of the line – which is exactly where this guard would put me every time.
I tried my best to appeal to the guard’s feelings of pity, so I lied to him, saying that I had no family left and that they’d never obtain a ransom for me, that I no longer wanted to suffer, that all he had to do was get it over with: tell Ali, and kill me. But he cared for me, and one Saturday night, he helped me escape.
A convoy of trucks had arrived from Niger after more than a week and a half in the desert. They had run out of water, and all the passengers were thirsty and exhausted; so, the guards sent two men to the nearby well.
When the door opened, the guard allowed me to slip out: “Now you can go anywhere. Please, just leave the city.” A taxi was waiting for me outside. The guard wished me good luck and handed me 45 dinars. I couldn’t thank him enough. If I had been caught or if Ali had found out that he had helped me escape, he would have been executed. Today, he’s is in prison in Catania, Italy, because the authorities here found out about his past.
The taxi left me in Sabha, where I convinced someone to lend me a phone with which I was able to contact J. on Facebook. A few hours later, I joined him at the Cameroonian Ghetto and we planned our journey to Italy.
We had to reach Sabratha, where the boats depart for Europe.
At first, I hesitated to call my family. I didn’t want to burden my mother any more than I already had, but I realized that I had no choice. I told her: “Mama, I need your help to go to Italy.” Though it was difficult, she gathered 300,000 CFA francs (around USD 500) to pay for my crossing.
We weren’t alone in the ghetto; with us were other migrants we had met on route to Libya or befriended in Ali Ghetto. Other than J., one of my closest friends was an Ivorian boy; we had bonded on the way to Sabha and had quickly become inseparable in Ali Ghetto. He would often tell me about his past, his aspirations, plans and hopes for the future. His elder brother had already crossed, and once reunited, they would build a new life together.
He would die soon.
Typically, the journey from Sabha to Sabratha takes two days; however, the road is highly patrolled, so migrants must resort to smuggling caravans, which prolongs it to about a week.
At some point, we stopped at some kind of bunker to rest and avoid Libyan patrols. As teens do, we’d often joke around, tease and insult each other. After more than 3 hours of waiting, we all stepped out for a meal before continuing to Sabratha. My Ivorian friend jokingly made a rude gesture to someone behind one of the smugglers, but the man believed that he had meant it for him and started shouting.
Gamz! Gamz! Gamz! [Lie down! Lie Down! Lie down!]”. My friend didn’t speak Arabic, so he didn’t understand why the trafficker was yelling and just kneeled down, frightened and confused. Though none of us completely understood either, we quickly realized that he was threatening to shoot him. We begged him for forgiveness, “Asma malish! Malish!”. “KOULA JAMA GAMZ! KOULA JAMA GAMZ!” (“Faces down! Faces down!”). Then we heard a gunshot, and everyone threw themselves to the ground. As everyone pressed their faces into the dust and avoided looking up, I could see my friend’s body nearby, his blood pooling into the sand around him.
It hurt to see him there, dead, in the dirt, for barely any reason at all. I still don’t know what he did to provoke it.
And so, we left him there and moved onto Sabratha.
On the way to Europe, the slightest mistake can mean death. The smugglers have no mercy.
I made my first attempt to reach Europe on December 14, 2016. It was two days after my birthday.
When we arrived on the waterfront, the sea was agitated. J. refused to leave. He thought the winter weather was too dangerous and told me that he preferred to cross in February or March when the waters would be calmer. I decided to try my luck. I boarded an inflatable boat with 137 people, and we left the Libyan coast at around 23:00.
At about 3:00 a.m., our boat capsized. I remembered seeing two large jerrycans of gasoline, so as soon as I fell in the water, my first instinct was to look for those. I managed to find one to cling to. As everyone was struggling to stay afloat, I wanted to help two or three people, but when I saw so many coming towards me, I realized that my can couldn’t hold them all. I would have drowned. So, I swam away.
At around 8:00 a.m., the Libyan police arrived. Some had found planks, and two people caught the other jerrycan, but out of 137 people, only 15 of us survived. The police fished us out and brought us to the state prison in Sabratha.
When we had reached the prison at around 11:00, our helmsman, one of the few survivors, contacted the trafficker who had sent us to sea, a Libyan man named Moustapha. By 20:00 – 20:30, he’d arrived. He convinced the police to release us, and took us back to his safehouse to discuss what had happened.
I was desperate. I had survived, but I couldn’t afford a second trip. The little my mother was able to send me had served no purpose. I couldn’t ask her a second time.
Thank God for J. His crossing had already been paid for, but he called his mother again and somehow convinced her to cover my fee. Three weeks later, on January 12, a new boat was ready to leave for Italy. Again, my friend wanted to wait, this time for the calmer summer waters, but I convinced him otherwise. “In Libya, morning, noon, and night, bullets fly above our heads. Brother, instead of risking death here every day, we should risk it once while trying to reach Italy. Whatever happens, our suffering will be over.” He paused, then answered, “Till the end, brother.” I’ll never forget those words.
And so, for the second time, I took to the sea. The waters were awful, even more turbulent than before, and I was still traumatized by the shipwreck, constantly terrified that the boat could capsize at any moment.
But this time, we had an excellent helmsman. He told us, “Either we all die, or we arrive in Italy, so everybody calm down and let me handle this. I promise we’re going to make it.” Some cried and begged him to head back, but he refused. “Do you want to go back and die by the gun? We’re about to reach a place where we can be free and happy. In Libya, only suffering awaits.” He knew how to talk to people, how to give them hope.
When we reached international waters, we called for help on the satellite phone that the smugglers had given us. Scrambled German voices responded, and after 30 minutes to an hour, a helicopter spotted us. Shortly afterwards, two small JAC boats arrived to survey the condition of our ship. When I saw them, I thanked God: I was finally safe.
They gave us life jackets and transported us to a large NGO rescue vessel, the Aquarius, run by SOS Mediterranée and Médecins sans Frontières. They welcomed us, gave us food and blankets and took us down into the hold of the ship since it was freezing outside. They told us that they were German, but couldn’t take us to their country because we were in Italian waters. So, they called the Italian Coast Guard to take us to Italy.
By God’s grace, I set foot in Italy on January 14, 2017, in Catania.
