Egyptian authorities on duty. |File Photo|.
Convoluted Residency Requirements, Costs, Discrimination Impede Access to Schools
Tens of thousands of refugee and asylum-seeking children in Egypt are out of school, in many cases due to significant bureaucratic registration barriers and a lack of free, publicly available education, Human Rights Watch said today.
In a statement shared with The Golden Times, Human Rights Watch called on the Egyptian authorities to immediately remove the barriers keeping refugee and asylum-seeking children out of school, and international partners should urgently support humanitarian funding for education for refugees in Egypt.
The Egyptian government requires proof of residency as a prerequisite to enroll in public schools, an impossible hurdle for many refugee and asylum-seeking families.
Amid Egypt’s deteriorating economic crisis, fees, including for school enrollment and transportation, are also a barrier.
At school, some children face bullying, abuse, and discriminatory practices from other students and teachers, further deterring enrollment or leading students to drop out.
“Many refugee and asylum-seeking children in Egypt have found the school doors firmly shut, depriving tens of thousands of their fundamental right to education,” said Bassam Khawaja, deputy Middle East and North Africa director at Human Rights Watch. “Egyptian authorities should ensure that all children have access to free, public primary and secondary education, regardless of their legal status.”
As of November 2024, Egypt hosts 834,000 refugees and asylum seekers registered with the United Nations Refugee Agency (UNHCR).
This is more than double the number from a year earlier, and the real number is most likely much higher, with the Egyptian government estimating that 1.2 million people have fled Sudan to Egypt.
The United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) estimates that there are 246,000 school-age refugee and asylum-seeking children in Egypt, approximately half of whom were out of school as of October.
A recent assessment found that nine thousand children arrive every month and approximately half of those recently arrived were out of school.
These numbers do not include the estimated 100,000 Palestinian refugees who have crossed into Egypt from Gaza in the past year and who do not register with UNHCR. According to a diplomatic source in Cairo, the vast majority have not been able to secure legal residency or enroll in public schools.
Human Rights Watch conducted 27 remote interviews with refugee community leaders, teachers, parents, and other family members from Sudan, South Sudan, Yemen, Eritrea, and Palestine.
Human Rights Watch also conducted two remote interviews with representatives of humanitarian organizations and a diplomatic source in Cairo. Researchers also reviewed Egyptian laws and regulations, official statements, and publicly available information and wrote to the Egyptian Ministry of Education and Technical Education on October 8 and to UNHCR on October 24, but did not receive a response.
“All children are receiving education except mine. One of my sons drew a picture of his school in Sudan, reflecting on his memories,” said a Sudanese father unable to register his children in school.
Egypt’s 1981 education law guarantees the right to free education for “citizens.” The government should amend the law to encompass all children in the country, including refugees, Human Rights Watch said.
School enrollment for non-Egyptians is regulated by Education Ministerial Decree 284 of 2014,which allows them to enroll in private schools but generally curtails their access to public schools, except for nationals of Sudan, Libya, Saudi Arabia, and Jordan who hold residency permits. The decree does not otherwise grant access to public schools for refugees except for students who receive scholarships from UNHCR.
A November 2023 ministerial directive amending the 2014 decree permits refugees to “exceptionally” enroll in public schools. According to UNHCR, access to public education “on equal footing to Egyptians” is currently only available to nationals of Sudan, South Sudan, Yemen, and Syria. UNHCR does not provide a legal basis for the restriction to those nationalities.
The Egyptian government fails to fully guarantee free education, since public schools charge fees for both Egyptians and non-Egyptians. Some categories of students are exempt, but not refugee or asylum-seeking students.
Some of those interviewed said that refugees and asylum seekers from non-Arabic speaking countries are discriminated against in enrollment, which affects access to public schools for sizable populations, including some 40,000 registered from Eritrea and 18,700 from Ethiopia.
Under international law, Egypt is bound to guarantee that all children, irrespective of legal status, have a right to education without discrimination.
Egypt is party to several international treaties enshrining the right to free and compulsory primary education and progressively free secondary education, including the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights and the Convention on the Rights of the Child.
As a party to the Convention Against Discrimination in Education, Egypt is under an obligation to give foreign nationals living within its territory the same access to education as is its own nationals. Egypt has also ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, which guarantees children with disabilities the right to “access an inclusive, quality and free primary education and secondary education on an equal basis with others in the communities in which they live.”
The Egyptian government should allow refugee and asylum-seeking children of all nationalities to enroll in public schools and remove bureaucratic barriers such as the residency requirement and school fees, Human Rights Watch said.
Egypt’s international partners should increase their funding for education programs and ensure that funds are channeled for their designated purpose.
The UN has appealed for additional funding to scale up access to education for refugees in Egypt following the conflict in Sudan, however, only 55 percent of the appeal was funded as of November.
“Egyptian authorities should stop putting up walls that keep children who have already had to flee their home countries from getting an education,” Khawaja said. “We’ve seen in other refugee crises how barriers to education do enormous harm to an entire generation of children, and Egypt’s policies now risk doing the same.”
