Name: Ali Murtaza

Profile: Hazara refugee from Afghanistan, living in Indonesia.

Advantages: UN-certified, excellent English skills, has a degree in Computer Science, volunteer interpreter, teacher and Refugee Representative.

Risk: At risk of being tortured and killed by the Taliban if returned home.

Canadian contact: Stephen Watt

As a territory guard, Ali Murtaza informed the villagers about some Pashtuns stealing bushes from the village’s territory. Later on, the Pashtuns turned out to be members of the Taliban and Ali’s life came into danger.

To save his life, he fled to Indonesia in 2014 where he got detained for three years in a detention centre. While facing many restrictions, he continued volunteering as a teacher, interpreter and refugee representative. Currently, he is pursuing a computer science degree at an American online university called the University of People. He will be graduating in January 2023. His hope now is to find a group of five Canadian friends who can help him start his life again in Canada.

My Story

My name is Ali Murtaza. I was born in 1993 in Taqchin, a village in the Qarabagh district of Ghazni province in Afghanistan. I belong to the Hazara Shia minority, an ethnicity that has long been the target of persecution and massacres due to their culture, religion, and love for education.

Our village is in neighborhoods with the Pashtun ethnic regions that were active members of the Taliban. My father was a merchant and used to trade things with his Pashtun so-called merchant friend. Ultimately, my father was killed by that person.

I was a school student and also used to study the English language and the basics of computers. Besides my studies, I was running a small grocery shop too. In 2014, I signed a one-year contract for guarding our territory bushes and woods, which we usually used as fuel to keep our houses warm in winter and to cook food. My duty was to watch the bushes and woods not be stolen by other neighboring villages as a side hustle.

Tragic Incident

One day while I was patrolling with my motorbike on the borderline with Pashtuns, I saw a group of people collecting bushes from our territory. I rushed back to the village and reported this to the villagers. They gathered and stopped the Pashtuns. Later on, it turned out that they were members of the Taliban, and the commander of the Taliban sentenced heavy punishment for the villagers and, especially, me for reporting this and causing the problem in the first place. The punishment was a monetary amount for villagers who were involved, and a fine and imprisonment for me.

“I neither had the fine nor I could go to prison where I could end up being slaughtered by the Taliban.”

To save my life, I escaped, and after going through villages for some days, I made my way to Kabul and then fled to Indonesia by boat.

New Chapter of my Life in Indonesia

After arriving in Indonesia in October 2014, the police took me and some other refugees to the immigration detention centre. Life in the detention centre was difficult, with a lack of food, water, and proper health care.

“Also, the new beginning was scary for me since everything was new and different. New people, culture, language, friends, and food including insanely and inhumanely restricted immigration regulation.”

I was lost for the first year. All in all, these challenges doubled my stress and depression levels on top of worrying about my family.

After a year, I had to move on and adapt to the new life. I started helping my refugee fellows by interpreting for them. Seeing their struggles pushed me to voluntarily start teaching them English so that they could communicate directly without needing an interpreter. I established multiple classes based on the student's level of English knowledge and proficiency. After a while, I started a computer class as well and I taught the basics of computers and Microsoft Office. Besides these classes, I also served as the representative for the refugee community.

“My days were occupied by all these activities and it helped me a lot in reducing my stress with a good cause as I could contribute to my community.”

During these three years, I was not only teaching, but also learning, making mistakes, correcting them and growing simultaneously.

I have attended multiple workshops, seminars, and training courses such as leadership, focal points training, teaching skills, and many more. Also, I organized multiple events and programs celebrating students’ achievements and motivating them to light up a horizon of hope for them to continue and not give up. I have received a certificate of appreciation from UNHCR, IOM, and the immigration office for bridging refugees to these parties by serving as a refugee representative, interpreter, and motivator.

“For me, the most valuable and satisfying scene was seeing my students who started learning the English alphabet and now speaking fluently and not needing an interpreter anymore.”

Educational Journey

Teaching computer classes made me realize the passion I have for this field, so I decided to reduce my schedule and focus a little more on self-development. I started studying web development and completed a web development Bootcamp course for almost 10 months. Besides that, I was looking for scholarships for refugees and displaced people until I received a link from the UNHCR representative. That was a scholarship from the University of the People. I applied, was admitted, and fortunately received a scholarship.

My university journey embarked during the Corona pandemic in September 2020. Currently, I am a sophomore doing a computer science associate degree and will be graduating in January 2023. Besides my university, I am working remotely as an intern at a Canadian-based company called Tiny Toronto.

Living as a Refugee

There is so much difficulty in being a refugee. It’s a life of limbo, of endless anxiety and uncertainty. There are moments when disappointment makes you want to give up on humanity. But we have to be strong, make the best of our limited opportunities, and commit to our dream of the future. I live in basic UNHCR housing, with 100 refugees from around the world sharing a single kitchen. Each is given $121 Canadian a month, which even by local standards is well below the poverty line. We are not legally permitted to work, leave the city, drive a car, ride a motorcycle, or stay out past curfew (at dinnertime).

In this situation, I had to choose between giving up and fighting. I chose to fight. I could sit with my legs crossed and mourn my past, or grumble at my current situation and the things I do not have control over. Instead, I chose resilience, figured out a way around challenges and focused on the things that I have control over. For instance, I had plenty of time, and I had a device that I could use. If I couldn’t go to school, I opened a class for everyone to join. If I couldn’t go to a campus university, I had the option of an online university. Despite all the darkness around me, I was looking for a glimmer of hope to hold on to, and I found them.

Of course, taking this path where I was responsible for figuring out and managing everything was never easy. It required resiliency, hard work, discipline, commitment, and consistency, and I will need more of these in the future.

My Dream

Still, my hope and optimism remain strong. I dream of a better life in a safe and welcoming country like Canada, where I can finally achieve my bachelor’s degree in an on-campus university and build my career either in the IT or the Data Science field – and life.

It Can Happen

Making Ali’s dream a reality is possible. Since he is officially certified as a refugee by the UNHCR – unlike the vast majority of the world’s refugees – he qualifies for Canada’s private sponsorship program.

If you would like to sponsor him – or if you’re just interested in helping to bring him here – please contact his friend Stephen Watt on Facebook.

You can reach out to Ali Murtaza directly on Facebook – or by email: a.murtaza3323@gmail.com – or through WhatsApp: +62 898-3834-050.

Reach out and discover how wonderful it is to privately sponsor a good person to start a new life – with your help – in Canada!

Thank you for your support. And help spread the word by sharing this post!