Inside the wonderful Stoke-on-Trent charity supporting city’s asylum seekers

Hundreds of asylum seekers and refugees have come together to celebrate the work of a Stoke-on-Trent charity. They have all received help, support and guidance from Asha North Staffordshire, a charity which supports refugees and asylum seekers.

The charity welcomes everyone seeking asylum and offers them the support and help they need. The organisation believes asylum seekers and refugees should ‘live safely, free from poverty, discrimination and exclusion, and be treated with compassion and respect’.

Chief executive of Asha, Godfrey Seminega, aged 59, of Berryhill, told StokeonTrentLive: “We started it in 2004 as a community group to support refugees and asylum seekers. We became a charity in 2006 and I was the founder of the charity.

“I came here as an asylum seeker from Rwanda in 2003. I went through a very traumatic experience in the asylum seeker system. I was begging for £1 on the street in London. I had been a public medical advisor in Rwanda. I was forced out because of political reasons.

“I was lucky because my case was straightforward and I was granted refugee status in three weeks. I applied for a job to work in Stoke-on-Trent for the NHS Primary Care Trust as a project worker.

“Stoke-on-Trent is a special area for refugees. There was no community support and from my experience you need something to support asylum seekers so they do not go through the same system, so they do not have to beg on the streets.

“We started a support group. We are now a big organisation and support 2,300 people every year.

“We are open six days a week, Monday to Saturday, and we run English classes and give immigration advice. We offer emotional support for women and children. We run a children’s club and an after work club.

“We receive funding from charitable organisations, The Big Lottery, BBC Children in Need to support children, Lloyds Foundation, the Stanley Thomas Foundation and other small grants. We have support from the Methodist Church and Catholic churches in Newcastle and Stoke and individual donations.

“We have 128 volunteers and 80 per cent are refugees and asylum seekers. The rest are from the local community. We have been based here in Cooper Street, Hanley, Unit 7, since we started.

“As well as the classes and clubs we take asylum seekers to do voluntary work in the community. Yesterday we took asylum seekers to do litter picking in Hanley Park.”

Godfrey added: “We have asylum seekers and refugees from all over the world, 74 different nationalities. We are extending our services to South Staffordshire and East Cheshire. These are not illegal immigrants. They have a right to be here according to the 1951 Geneva Convention.”

He said British society needs to welcome asylum seekers and refugees in the same spirit as Germans and Polish people were welcomed in 1945.

Godfrey added: “Secondly they do contribute to the local community. You can get a haircut for £10 around the city.

“A lot of the businesses on Waterloo Road, Cobridge, are run by people from refugee backgrounds. That street was dead. Now it is very vibrant with restaurants and shops. All the people along that stretch are all people with refugee backgrounds. They are paying tax and contributing to the local economy. Ninety-nine per cent of people do work and they do pay tax.

“We are fighting to get them work. There are jobs. They can work and pay tax to the government. We support about 400 people a week.”

Sahar Haghighi, aged 35, came to the UK in 2022 after being forced out of Iran due to religious differences.

The graduate in plant pathology said: “It was not safe to stay there. I came with my family, my husband and daughter. We came to London and were moved to Stoke-on-Trent.

“First, I went to a hotel near Nottingham. The roof had problems and they moved us to the Best Western Hotel in Stoke-on-Trent.

“It took one-and-a-half years to get asylum and to be granted leave to remain. About one year ago we moved into a house in Tunstall.

“When in the hotel, Serco introduced us to this charity. They helped us to get asylum. It was the only place we could gather and see our people. There are other Iranian people here.”

Sahar, who had her own clothing business in Iran, now works for the charity one day a week and is now looking for full-time work.

She added: “I miss my homeland. I could not have achieved leave to remain without Asha. Asha and Godfrey guided us where to live, they had English lessons, they helped me fill the forms in, they had a lot of activities for women and children. My daughter is eight. She is at school. We now call Stoke-on-Trent home. We could not have done it without Asha.”