1972 Ugandan Refugees: An Honourable Place in Canada – Home | Rewind with Michael Enright | CBC Radio
In 1972, Ugandan dictator Idi Amin banished Asians from his country, even though many had lived there for generations. Canada opened its doors to 7 000 of the displaced.
Not long after Ugandan leader Idi Amin came to power in 1971, he said he had a dream that Allah had told him to expel people of Asian descent from the country. Many of them were Ismailis.
The Aga Khan, spiritual leader of the Nizari Ismaili branch of Islam represents about 15 million people and advocates tolerance and pluralism. When Amin’s decree came, the Aga Khan called then prime minister Pierre Trudeau asking him to help. More than 7 000 Ugandan Asians came to Canada. It was the first time in Canadian history that Canada accepted a large group of non-European refugees.
Listen to the audio at the source: Rewind with Michael Enright / Jan 05, 2018 / CBC Radio
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Ismailimail 
My Mum Mary Banjo My Sister Shelina and Me We’re the First EVER expelled Asians to land at London Heathrow in 1972 ………… MR KARIM MOHAMED Equal Opportunities Representative for ASLEF at Euston Willesden and Stratford City Depots as a Train Driver in London Driving Trains All Over London with millions of Passengers!
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* Mrs Mary NANJI *
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The story that refuses to go away – the expulsion of Asians from Uganda in 1972. Every year around September it is remembered in all international media. Many Uganda Asians who had left early on will always say they left because of the expulsion. Many non-Ugandan East African Asians also ride on the Uganda Asian brand. In that year alone UNHCR were dealing with 0.5m refugees stroke internally displaced people from South Sudan – yet they gave us so much attention and picked up as many of us as wanted to leave in the last week of the expulsion, stranded for having failed entry to hosting countries. The number came to just under 6,000. Prince Sadruddin Aga Khan head of UNHCR then visited them at two of the HCR centres in Europe. Canada claims honours for taking such a large number of nonwhite refugees for the first time – 7,000 or so. BUT they were pick&choose and as many as 2-3rds of those who applied were rejected, either outright or at interviews. Of course we say Thank You Canada-Thank You Pierre Elliot Trudeau-Thank You Aga Khan (for coming to our rescue) but let us also tell the story as it was. My book Uganda Asians does so from archival material. It’s done now at 2244 pages, 2m words,10,000 images, after almost 11 years of 15hrs per day work. It should launch in July to August this year at 3 parliaments – Uganda, UK House of Lords and Canadian Senate. I was at the Indian High Commission in Uganda yesterday and showed them the India stake in the book – I mean Indians traded with the East African coast from C1st and then after 1870 or so were a presence in Uganda as traders, then railway builders, and again as traders-estate owners and crop processors. That’s what the book is about – Indian-Asian contributions to Uganda, the tale told through people’s stories of how they coped the expulsion, how their ancestors coped the pioneering days, how the expellees coped in their diaspora countries and how the people who never left Uganda coped and the people who jumped back straight on the fall of Amin coped and are coping. 555 individual from-the heart stories in my epic “never done before-never to be repeated” book Uganda Asians. Will Government of India claim ownership [q-mark]. Three past High Commissioners of India to Uganda supported my effort – Niraj Srivastava, Mr Roy, and Ramesh Chandra. HE Chandra even took a-then book to his ministry in May 2015. Vice President of India saw my book in Aug 2017 and expressed wonderment why had he not been told of it and PM Modi saw the 333-pages draft in 2008 when he visited Uganda as Gujarat’s Chief Minister. He said Awjo Desh. Sure all the way to Gujarat and New Delhi.
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