Manchester City of Sanctuary, People’s History Museum, RAS Voice, The Whitworth, and local school children joined forces and showed their opposition to the government’s scheme to banish refugees to Rwanda in a new online film released today (Friday 23rd September, 2022). The film marks the launch of campaign coalition Together With Refugees’ Fill the Skies with Hope action that calls on the new Prime Minister Liz Truss to end the cruel policy.
Staff, volunteers, school children, campaigners, members of the public and people with lived experience of being a refugee flew hundreds of orange heart-shaped paper planes at People’s History Museum, The Whitworth and a local park to fill the skies with hope and call on the Prime Minister to end the scheme to banish refugees to Rwanda.
Ana Asatiani from Manchester is part of RAS Voice and One Strong Voice and came to the UK as a refugee from Georgia in 2013. She said: “I think this is a really horrible, concerning policy. It is inhumane, immoral and unlawful. It is punishing people just because of how they arrive in the UK, but the UK doesn’t have safe routes to get here. I’ve been through the system myself and I know what it’s like. This policy should be scrapped.”
Zofia Kufeldt, Programme Officer at People’s History Museum who took part in filling the skies at People’s History Museum with messages of hope, said: “At People’s History Museum, the national museum of democracy, we are filling the sky with messages of hope and send those seeking sanctuary our love; we want them to know that they are in our hearts. We believe in human rights, fairness and equality and the Rwanda scheme stands at odds with this in every possible way as a brutal and hostile approach to those that most need our help. We urge others to join us in sending messages to the new Prime Minister to show the hope that we all have, and the strength of feeling behind the campaign.”
Their protests were captured for an online film released today as part of a nationwide Day of Action where groups across the country show their opposition to the cruel scheme to send refugees to Rwanda. The day marks the start of the paper plane Fill the Skies with Hope action which will run until 9th November 2022.
Groups and people across the country will make and fly orange heart-shaped paper planes with messages to the Prime Minister to call for the Rwanda scheme to be scrapped. The planes are orange and heart-shaped as this represents the call for a kinder, more compassionate approach to supporting refugees.
The planes will be gathered together after the action has ended in November and delivered to the Prime Minister.
The scheme to send refugees to Rwanda means that people who arrive in the UK seeking refugee protection via routes that are unofficial, such as by small boat across the Channel, could be banished to Rwanda. They will not be allowed to have their claim for refugee protection heard in the UK and there will be no official route for them to return to the UK from Rwanda.
This is a key time for the government with a new Prime Minister, as it sets out its plans ahead of the Conservative Party Conference. It also comes as the scheme is being challenged in two hearings in the High Courts. The outcome of these will be announced in October.
