2024-01-06 20:30:43
Muhammed Anwar Kattan has lived in Turkey for almost 13 years. The 32-year-old fled from Aleppo to Gaziantep, a few dozen kilometers north, just as Syrian President Assad’s war against his people had begun in 2011. A year later, Alaa Alani took the same route in the hope of a better future. Emel Shamma didn’t think about leaving her homeland at the time. But five years later she no longer saw any reason to stay in the old trading city of Aleppo, which had been bombed to the ground. In 2017, she packed her things, took her son and headed to Gaziantep.
Andreas Mihm
Economic correspondent for Austria, East Central and Southeast Europe and Turkey based in Vienna.
There she is now sitting on a dark leather couch, her hands folded in her lap. Her knees are drawn up, a white hijab covers her hair and surrounds her carefully but reservedly made-up face. It takes a few minutes for her to overcome her shyness. It is her office where she welcomes people for conversation.
Grow quickly with Lokum
The ambitious woman runs a rapidly growing business in the city of millions. 17 employees produce and sell the traditional dessert Lokum. The 39-year-old start-up entrepreneur is a minor celebrity in Gaziantep. She knows: “I am an idol for many refugee women.”
An “idol for many refugee women”: Emel Shamma : Image: Tat Global
Shamma used to live as a housewife in Aleppo. In Gaziantep she worked in a Lokum factory until she became self-employed. The money for this came as a micro-investment from NGOs and the EU. She started in 2020 – and didn’t let Corona get her down. She sees business as competition: “I always want to be the first.” The business card says: “TAT Global Chairwoman”.
Without German help, Shamma would not be where she is today. You, Kattan, Alani and other Syrians are part of a project run by the German Society for International Cooperation (GIZ). This helps founders to set up their own businesses and illegal workers to switch to the regular job market. “If we create jobs here, it will be good for Turks and Syrians. That is the most important goal,” says Beytullah Bayar, the GIZ employee on site. This is not entirely selfless from the German federal government. What does Gaziantep Chamber of Commerce President Mehmet Tuncay Yıldırım say? “If the Syrian refugees do not go back or are better integrated, then sooner or later they will come to Europe.”
1,300 jobs were created with German help
The Federal Development Ministry is providing 74 million euros for this from 2019 to 2024. In Gaziantep, more than 500 businesses were brought out of illegality, and 1,000 throughout Turkey. This alone created 1,300 jobs. 1,300 times less incentive to leave Turkey for Germany.
Millions of Syrians have been expelled from their homeland since 2011, many have fled abroad, 900,000 to Germany. According to the United Nations, almost four times as many have found shelter in Turkey: 3.3 million. They have experienced expulsion, flight and arrival in a new, strange and not always friendly environment. 438,000 live in Gaziantep alone, near the Syrian border. More are only registered in Istanbul.
Expecting them to leave soon, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan welcomed the “brothers” in 2011. A large majority in surveys are now in favor of sending the “guests” back. Even the left-wing CHP took the national-chauvinist card in the fight for the presidential election in May and promised a quick deportation of the refugees.
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