Islamic migrants traditionally send money to their homeland to assist the less fortunate. More and more often that money is spent here, on Muslims who live in poverty almost unseen. ‘Many people experience a great distance from the government.’
His smile reaches from ear to ear. ‘I have regained hope for a bright future’, says 28-year-old Ahmad. With a gift from the National Zakat Fund, the Syrian refugee can follow a recognized online business administration course. In this way he hopes to advance in the Dutch labor market.
Ahmad has been in the Netherlands for a year and is bursting with ambition. But he’s not making a cent. The twenty-something is one of approximately 550 Dutch Muslims who have been helped by the National Zakat Fund in the past two years. The fund distributes money donated by Dutch Muslims who have more money. According to ‘the third pillar’ of Islam, Muslims with a reasonable income are obliged to give about 2.5 percent of their assets to the less fortunate: the so-called zakat.
Zakat means something like ‘growth’ or ‘purification’. The idea is that by allowing others to grow with a financial contribution, the giver itself also grows. Until recently, the gifts of Dutch migrants almost entirely flowed to the countries of origin in the Islamic world. Following the example of Canada and Great Britain, among others, the Netherlands has had a fund for two years with which Muslims can allocate this money to needy fellow believers in the country where they live.
people smuggler
Ahmad is still waiting for the promised home in Rotterdam in the asylum seekers’ center in Dronten. Months after he received his residence permit, he received his BSN number this summer, which allowed him to start working. But with the money he now earns in a distribution center, he is unable to repay the debt to his family in the Damascus area.
An uncle paid for him the lion’s share of the approximately 10,000 euros to the people smuggler who helped Ahmad flee the war in Syria and reach Europe. And so Ahmad, like many refugee compatriots, has so-called informal debts: debts to family or friends. Ahmad heard about the National Zakat Fund through a friend. ‘I said: what? Do they just give money? I couldn’t believe it at first.’
‘I wish you the best of luck in making your dreams come true’, says Nora el Abdouni, also with a broad smile. The experienced social worker heads the social work team of the National Zakat Fund – in 2015 she was voted social worker of the year. This afternoon she visits Ahmad to see how he is doing.
Listening attentively, El Abdouni says how much she admires his drive. ‘You start with a 1-0 arrears in the Netherlands, with debts and without a home. And yet you work and study at full speed.’
El Abdouni, with initiator Imad el Fadili, is the driving force behind the National Zakat Fund. Their goal is clear: to fight poverty among Dutch Muslims with zakat from the Dutch Muslim community. Of the approximately 1 million Dutch Muslims, about one in five would struggle with financial problems.
In addition, the fund wants those seeking help to feel strengthened when fellow believers from their own community stand next to them who support them unconditionally. And, if necessary, the fund refers them to regular assistance.
The Invisibles
El Fadili, formerly a corporate consultant, says he was impressed by the power of Islamic philanthropy in Malaysia in 2017. In the Netherlands he saw how much zakat from Muslims still went abroad. ‘The focus of the next generations of migrants is more on the Netherlands, but there was no infrastructure yet’, says El Fadili. ‘I wanted to build it, to give Dutch Muslims the opportunity to allocate their money locally and make a difference here.’
Two years ago, El Fadili established the National Zakat Fund as part of the Global Fund. It now receives almost a million euros a year. This Thursday, the fund will present its first report on the experience gained at a conference with councilors and representatives of welfare organizations from all over the country. The title speaks for itself: The Invisibles. An exploration into poverty among Dutch Muslims.
It is striking that the vast majority of applicants to the Zakat Fund are not known to the regular authorities, but they apparently dare to approach this fund through family or friends. ‘There is a lot of mistrust of the government and aid workers’, says El Abdouni. ‘Many people experience a great distance.’
The social work team of the fund, for which dozens of volunteers are committed, makes contact with the applicants. The advantage is that they speak Syrian, Turkish, Arabic, Berber, Urdu or Bosnian; many applicants do not speak Dutch well. ‘Because as Muslims they offer help to fellow Muslims, the distance is also smaller than to a Dutch aid worker’, says El Abdouni. ‘We take the time to listen carefully to the people first. With compassion and with confidence.’
Confidence is also reflected in the fund’s working method when an applicant raises an emergency: simply give freely disposable money. In the event of an emergency, for example if an eviction or energy cut-off threatens, the money can be in the account after a day. How much the National Zakat Fund gives depends on the situation, the fund prefers not to mention precise amounts, in order to avoid skewed eyes. ‘Such a gift gives people hope again, also because they feel strengthened by our trust.’
The applicant must show his bank statements and a debt overview in advance. The volunteers then check, for example, whether there are addictions or unexplained transfers. ‘We do screen, but we assume a positive view of people’, emphasizes El Abdouni. “We don’t expect people to cheat. We have noticed that it works if you trust people radically and intensely.’
Informal debts
Initially, half of the applicants had a Moroccan background, but in recent months the fund has received a striking number of requests for help from Syrian Dutch people. ‘We see a lot of poverty among this group’, says El Abdouni. For example, because they incur a lot of costs when furnishing the house after family reunification and because they do not know their way around Dutch society. ‘We sometimes see children sleeping on the floor.’
In their work, the volunteers also notice how big the problem of informal debts is, among Syrian Dutch people, but also among other groups. In some families there are ‘informal bailiffs’ at the door every week, who can pose a threat if they come to claim the money. Informal debts are not recognized in formal debt restructuring or by administrators. According to El Abdouni, it makes the threshold to the authorities even higher.
Moreover, the pressure of informal debts may increase formal debts. ‘During the screening we see, for example, that money intended for the rent and the energy bill is transferred to a specific person. That turns out to be an informal creditor.’
The Syrian Dutchman Ahmad also experiences the debt to his uncle as a heavy burden on his shoulders, he says. And he is certainly not the only Syrian refugee with this problem. ‘The pressure is great, we all feel it.’ In the asylum seekers’ center he often hears fellow residents having difficult telephone conversations with family in the home country. ‘These questions: where does our money go? There they think you can earn tons of money the moment you arrive in Europe. They don’t believe it’s different.’
Ahmad also sees how compatriots in the Netherlands allow themselves to be exploited by employers, who make them work fourteen hours a day for a meager wage. “They do everything they can to repay their debts to their families as quickly as possible.” Because he is one of the few in the asylum seekers center who speaks good English and is handy with computers, he sometimes helps his fellow sufferers with, for example, opening an account.
‘You are almost a social worker yourself,’ says El Abdouni to Ahmad when he said goodbye. “Let me know how it goes, and if we can support you in any way.”
She often hears spicy stories. They affect her, says El Abdouni, and it gives her great satisfaction if she can improve a situation with the fund. Doesn’t she think it’s unfair that if her neighbor who isn’t Muslim gets into trouble, she won’t be able to claim the fund?
“I understand this question, we get it more often,” says El Abdouni. ‘Its strength is that it is a fund for and by Dutch Muslims, which actually lowers the threshold. If the Dutch Muslims are doing better, the Netherlands is doing better. It hasn’t happened yet, but suppose a Dutchman without the Muslim faith really has nowhere else to go, we’ll help out.’
‘It feels good that you get so much confidence’
That the help of the National Zakat Fund consists of more than giving money is apparent from the story of Ali (41, he does not want his real name in the newspaper), one of the first Dutch Muslims to receive help. El Fadili had only just started the fund when he was captivated by a story in a local newspaper about this man with an Islamic name who lived in a hut in the outskirts of Utrecht. He decided to go into the woods, but could not find him. After a prayer, El Fadili was about to turn back, when Ali ran to meet him. ‘I saw immediately: this man is looking for me,’ says Ali. “Then we talked for an hour.”
Ali’s life has changed dramatically. He has had his own rented house again for a month. The meeting meant a lot to him, Ali says. ‘That Imad from Amsterdam comes to visit me in the forest, just that, as a Muslim, as a brother. He only came to talk, to give. He asked if I needed money. I said no.’
The conversation was a tipping point, Ali says. “It got me thinking. About faith, about what is important in life.’
The meeting also made a big impression on El Fadili. “I saw immediately that this works, if you don’t wait for someone to call for help,” he says. ‘If you approach someone and make personal contact with them in an equal way, then someone feels seen, literally and figuratively.’
Ali had become homeless in 2019. His company broke down and when his relationship broke down, he was out on the street. In the woods around Utrecht he built an ingenious hut, complete with a fire extinguisher. It was hard work, says Ali. ‘For example, if all your clothes are wet and you can’t get them dry and it’s cold. Sometimes I was really hungry too.’
During that period, he gained less and less trust in people and contact with the aid workers was initially difficult. The aid agencies will destroy you, Ali thinks. ‘It’s waiting, waiting, waiting. Then you knock on someone’s door and they refer you. Or they make an appointment for two weeks.’
Partly thanks to the Zakat Fund, he gained more confidence again, says Ali. That’s how he came back to the emergency services. He eventually got a house through the organization the Intermediate Facility. ‘We’ll keep in touch with him’, says El Abdouni. “I trust that if he needs anything, he knows where to find us. Then we’ll arrange it. But he can also do a lot by himself. He never really asks anything.’
Ali: ‘I don’t like to ask. But it feels good that you get so much confidence from the people of this fund.’