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What role do the federal and Polish governments play?
I was intelligently surprised by the generosity of the Polish government. Ukrainians can legally live in Poland for 18 months and the government gives them access to the country’s social coverage system.
The Polish government reacted temporarily when the refugees began to arrive and drew up an action plan.
On March 12, 2022, just over two weeks after the Russian invasion began on February 24, the Polish parliament passed a comprehensive law granting Ukrainians fleeing the war cover and the right to work in Poland. and public education, which covers not only education from kindergarten through grade 12, but also college enrollment. The Polish government will also pay Ukrainian families one-time bills of €63 to help cover expenses, such as food and school supplies.
Local governments began to react even more quickly.
I found that in many tactics they have played a more central role in the relief effort. In the city of Lublin, for example, the Social Committee for Aid to Ukrainians was established a few hours after the start of the war.
This coalition of organizations and citizens continues to provide 24-hour assistance, meals, legal assistance, child care, and translation assistance, among other services. Other peoples will be offering other degrees of support, but this one is independent and has the support of the national government.
Each city organizes relief and integration differently, but all actively collaborate with local civil society organizations, fitness professionals, and citizen groups.
However, there is a catch. Many towns are run by mayors of opposition parties, and they say the national government takes all the credit for this well-managed crisis when they are the ones who pay and do the work.
According to Krzysztof Kosiński, mayor of Ciechanów, a small town in central Poland, the city has not earned money from the national government to spend on helping refugees. Local leaders need more foreign popularity to pass on to the other people who make the paintings: local governments and personal citizens.
How long can this scenario last?
Several Poles have told me that they and other Ukrainian refugees are at a critical point.
According to one estimate, Polish citizens themselves spent more than 2 billion US dollars in the first three months of the war. I’ve heard many other people say that they no longer get any reimbursement from the government.
Poland is not a country. As elsewhere, its economy is shaken by emerging costs. Polish inflation is the highest since 1997, at 16%, and energy costs in particular are soaring.
Many Poles who have mobilized towards Ukrainian refugees no longer have the money or power to continue. Time in the refugee camps would possibly be coming to an end.
Does Poland get a foreign budget for these efforts?
Poland has gained a significant budget from abroad. The United States provided about $50 million to Poland for the relief effort.
The United Nations has created a consultant developed to help countries and organizations identify the many wishes of refugees and the agencies and organizations that will help address them. But the consultant introduced 3 months into the war, when local efforts were already underway. The consultant, more importantly, did not provide those organizations with cash to fulfill known wishes.
At that time, Polish cities and citizens were already making the paintings on their own. The UN has identified the paintings of local Polish organizations and occasional groups, but this is not the same as giving those local organizations the money they need for their paintings.
Across the region, there has been a challenge to obtaining cash for local teams from donor countries such as the United States and foreign organizations such as the United Nations, CARE, Oxfam and Plan International. Following a donor convention in May 2022, the National Director of the Norwegian Refugee Council reminded convention participants that they will need to keep their promises by making sure the money reaches frontline volunteers and local teams.
Humanitarian Innovation Hub, which is funded through the UK government, in particular ed that after 3 months, the maximum cash from foreign donors remained unused due to “compliance requirements”. ” which are too onerous for small teams of volunteers to gather.
Many Poles I interviewed, as well as some Frankish mayors, noticed those same disorders and the mismatch between those who have the money and those who paint, paint.
I will soon return to Poland as a Fulbright Scholar to better understand why so many Poles have mobilized to help Ukrainian refugees and how governments join network organizations and private citizens in those efforts to help others fleeing a nearby war zone.
This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site committed to sharing concepts from education experts. Written by: Patrice McMahon, University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
Read more:
Ukrainian refugees may not return home, even long after the war ends.
The Ukrainian refugee crisis may also last for years, but host communities may not be prepared
Patrice McMahon does work, consults, owns shares or obtains investments from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed any applicable partnerships beyond her educational appointment.