Student: Diana Zenklusen

More than 35 years passed and the Sahraouis are still living in refugee camps.They still don’t have any perspective to return to their homeland. In the late 1975 the refugees started to arrive in Tindouf area. It was already populated by ethnic Sahraoui’s.1 Tindouf was a natural place for the Sahraouis to establish themselves. Because of lo- gistical and ethnic reasons the refugees were used to the Hammadah. Hammadah, a dry flat rocky plane desert in the northwest Sahara is between Morocco, Algeria and Western Sahara. It made life hart.
Over years, they built their settlements on sandy land close to cities. The isolation created a strong sense of union and community. Everyone was seen as a part of a big family.This created a democratic state.
The Sahraoui camps are a unique appearance in the world of refugee.They succeeded to build a self-managed state in exile.Also geographically the Sahraoui camps differ from other refugee camps. They have a single settlement for administration, only - Rabouni. Rabouni is the head quarter of the government-in-exile, the Sahraoui Arab Democratic Republic (SADR) and is its administrative centre.
Nevertheless self-sufficiency in such an inhospitable environment is hopeless.They are still heavily dependent on outside aid.