In Abidjan, the economic capital, and in the other major cities of Côte d’Ivoire, tens of thousands of them shave the walls, gripped by shame and the weight of their failure. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) calls these former migrants “returnees”; their entourage and Ivorian society call them “the cursed”.
Back home, they are psychologically broken, physically exhausted and often broke, forced to pay back their community-financed migration project. On their own or with the help of associations, these former migrants seek to break the social death grip they have suffered, and reintegrate into society. Others, on the other hand, who feel that the reasons that drove them to migrate have not disappeared, dream of just one thing: leaving again. And they’re preparing for it.
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