By Gawaar Juich

Tongogara Refugee Settlement, Zimbabwe

A difficult period has arrived for refugees in Zimbabwe. With global humanitarian funding shrinking and international agencies scaling back, refugees and asylum seekers in Tongogara Refugee Settlement brace for harder days ahead. UNHCR closed its Regional Bureau for Southern Africa in Pretoria on 1 October 2025, citing steep donor declines. Operations in Zimbabwe will continue, but with what the agency calls “a much smaller physical presence.”

The emotional toll and confusing reality of what the future holds for protracted-displaced refugees in Tongogara was inflicted earlier in 2025 when the U.S., historically the largest refugee-admissions country, indefinitely suspended its Refugee Admissions Program (USRAP), leaving hundreds of refugees in the resettlement pipeline stranded. 

Tongogara is home to over 13,000 refugees and asylum seekers from the Great Lakes Region, Mozambique, and the Horn of Africa. This displaced population largely depends on donor-funded healthcare, food aid, education, and livelihoods already shocked by climate change. Despite the Government of Zimbabwe's policy shift from camp to settlement, the country’s encampment policy, dating back to the 1990s remains in place and currently restricts refugees on both the right to work and freedom of movement. Limited vocational skills further challenge refugee youth who often seek innovative avenues to earn a living.

Now fears grow that the situation will only worsen and deepen vulnerabilities of the refugee community if healthcare, education, water and sanitation, and livelihoods crumble. This will leave refugees more exposed to poverty, disease, exploitation, and the loss of basic protections. Lack of funding for youth-led interventions risks undoing gains in child and youth protection as youth volunteers who help run such programs retreat. Funding cuts have strangled critical community-led projects meant to curb gender-based violence, PSEA, and other essential protection programs, further endangering the refugee situation within the Settlement.

Yet how elastic is refugee resilience? Tongogara Refugee Settlement has witnessed noteworthy achievements since 2017, thanks to the Settlement Authority’s Transformation Agenda that recognises refugees as partners in humanitarian and development programs. 

One of Zimbabwe’s key pledges and commitments under the Global Compact on Refugees (GCR) is enhancing Refugee Self-reliance through access to livelihoods. 150 hectares of agricultural land have been allocated to benefit refugees and host-community farmers. Farming activities are carried out under the climate-smart irrigation program. A vendor market jointly run by refugee and host-community vendors has become an active economic hub. More than 200 small enterprises: shops, butcheries, barbershops, and grinding mills, to mention a few, were established, boosting income generation and reducing dependency on aid. Public transport and banking services have been extended into the Settlement, improving mobility and financial access. Three refugee-run ICT Youth Hubs offer digital-skills training, closing the digital gap faced by young refugees. The government's resumption of issuing refugee travel documents has enabled refugee youth to pursue higher education abroad, demonstrating progress toward protection and durable solutions.

While these gains are transformative, they remain fragile, as many depend on external funding and could be reversed without sustained support.

Earlier in November 2025, the government, through its Ministry of Public Service, Labour & Social Welfare official X account, confirmed its readiness to take action. "Following USAID’s withdrawal of global aid, including UNHCR support, the government has assumed full responsibility for the welfare of over 13,000 refugees at Tongogara Camp in Chipinge, covering the associated costs." Confirmed by the minister Hon Edgar Moyo. This statement indicates hope for refugees in Tongogara, as it shows the government’s intent to grant wider access to public services and socio-economic rights.

A million-dollar question arises: Are refugee-led organizations (RLOs) within the Settlement ready to step in? The UN Refugee Agency I believe, is uncertain as to what level this is possible, for it is clear RLOs had not been capacity built and resourced, so they have no muscle to flex. UNHCR’s Field Office ahead of the organization’s closure of its field operation never had a meeting with refugee-led organizations, least of all designing a strategic intervention gap RLOs could strive for before they closed. In Zimbabwe, RLOs traditionally do not participate in Big Brothers NGOs and government program meetings; however, lately, the Settlement Authority and UNHCR at some levels strategically invite RLOs to partner meetings, which indeed is a milestone recognition of RLOs' work, but not yet a Seat at the table. 

Tongogara has a dynamic and young population, with over 86% being children and youth. Past crises have prompted some of the most notable refugee-led organizations to emerge. But have they been prepared to take the bull by the horns and complement the government, UNHCR, and operational partners in delivering high-cost programs amid the tight funding climate?

RLOs in Tongogara can undoubtedly affirm their potential as key players. What must happen is giving them a small sustainable financial support, as modest as compared to funding for large organizations. This can enormously scale their impact. RLOs have demonstrated potential in resource mobilization and success in project implementation largely by their own.

To highlight two RLOs, as the saying goes, the pudding is in the eating. During the COVID-19 lockdown, a refugee student-led group formed TWEENS (Together We Educationally Empower Non-Privileged Students). When the pandemic closed schools, refugee children faced the added challenge of lacking internet and digital devices. TWEENS organized home-study sessions that improved students’ pass rates. Today, the organization has grown from home-based tutoring and a resource library into a full-fledged community-based organization that tutors refugee youth preparing for O-Level exams, supports scholarship applications, and offers extra-curricular skills. TWEENS has even provided financial assistance to some learners sitting for Advanced Level exams, a rarity in the Settlement since UNHCR ended sponsorship of A-Level programs years ago.

Tongogara experiences weather extremes: summer temperatures soar above 40°C, dusty spring winds sweep through, and autumn rainstorms give a seasonal sense of the area. Being in Region 5 of Zimbabwe’s agro-ecological zones, the Settlement is highly prone to droughts, extreme heat, and erratic rainfall. As climate change intensifies, the area’s climatic conditions continue to deteriorate. There has been concern about the human-wildlife conflict as the area is a few steps away from the Save Conservancy.

In 2019, tropical climate-induced Idai hit the refugee settlement, destroying housing and sanitation facilities and leaving thousands of vulnerable people in need of urgent humanitarian aid. The settlement is particularly exposed because it is in a low-lying area exposed to flash flooding, and most refugee shelters are made of unburnt mud brick walls that could not withstand the torrential rains and floods. The cyclone destroyed and severely damaged over 1,000 refugee homes, affecting 5,300 people.

Two years later, in 2022, refugee environmental activists formed the Refugee Coalition for Climate Action (RCCA), now a community-based organisation with a vision of building resilience in communities vulnerable to climate change by mobilising young people to be frontline actors addressing Tongogara’s most pressing environmental issues in a community where refugees do not have access to electricity and depend on wood for energy, driving deforestation and land degradation.

Through tree planting, climate education, and cleaning activities, RCCA is up to the challenge. The organization has recently established an 800m² nursery, which will serve as a community tool for advancing afforestation and as a sustainability model for income generation, as tree seedlings present a market in the district. Thanks to the Settlement Authority and partners like Cohere for the support. Disaster struck the organization in early November when the area experienced its first rains of the season, accompanied by hail and strong winds that leveled the nursery. A total of 149 structures and buildings were destroyed, damaged, or partially damaged. This has put the organization back to the drawing board to mobilize funding again to renovate the nursery.

In the Refugee Settlement, Zimbabwe, farmers frequently lost crops because chain-link fences intended to protect irrigation schemes were either damaged by animals or deteriorated over time, exacerbating stresses from drought and other climate-related shocks. To address this, the Refugee Coalition for Climate Action (RCCA), with the support of UNHCR’s Environment and Climate Action Innovation Fund, trialled the introduction of bio-fences, planting 2,200 drought-resistant sisal and pear cactus plants along two kilometres of farmland. These climate-resilient, environmentally sustainable, and cost-effective live fences protect crops from animals, improve soil stability, absorb carbon, support biodiversity, and can be processed into cattle fodder. The project also promotes gender inclusion by engaging women and girls in roles traditionally held by men in the settlement. Despite limited funding, RCCA volunteers have maintained the initiative and are helping refugee and host community farmers to replicate it, demonstrating how investments in community leadership promote sustainability and scale.

Despite the burning passion and innovation to offer solutions to the most pressing needs in their community, RLOs in Zimbabwe run on shoestring budgets. Unlike other refugee-led organizations in Central and Eastern Africa, it is a double-edged sword for refugee-led organizations in Zimbabwe. The donor landscape rarely covers Zimbabwe; if it does, most proposals designed by RLOs are unlikely to succeed as they hardly meet bureaucratic donor requirements, making it hard to scale up success.

In 2023 to 2024, the Settlement Administration supported four RLOs to register as community-based organizations. This authenticates the RLOs’ existence and opens trust for partnerships on the ground while opening eligibility to CBOs grant opportunities. But owing to the 2025 Zimbabwe’s Private Voluntary Organisations (PVO) Act, the law that requires NGOs and community groups to transition or register as PVOs before operating, it has become daunting to register as a refugee-led organization primarily led by persons of forced displacement. This policy risks sidelining RLOs and constrain their access to funding, curtailing their transformative work when their work is needed the most.