LDN and STEP: Relocated Zaporizhzhia Communities PotentialDevelopment Opportunities Search

Publication date: November 1, 2024

Author: Yuliia Bilyk, Legal Development Network Communications Manager

67 Central Territorial Communities moved to Zaporizhzhia City in March of 2022, following Zaporizhzhia Region’s partial occupation. The residents tend to believe in de-occupation, hence not moving far away from home. However, while waiting for de-occupation, people are forced to live in uncertainty, with lower income, and at the end of the day to be faced with the decision of what to do next, whether to keep waiting or to settle down in a new place. Yet another area for concern is where to start once it’s possible to return home. ‘How community and government can support the relocated Communities now and after their return’ — is a new subject of the Legal Development Network and STEP NGO (Zaporizhzhia City) initiative.

Such a large-scale and concentrated relocation experience to one city has become a unique phenomenon of our time. Although many community residents are scattered across Ukraine and European countries, community administrations are functioning and not only care about conditions for the development of all those industries operated in the homeland but also constantly maintain a steady connection with their people. However, as the war continues, the issues of relocated communities are getting worse, and these issues are also unique due to the absence of previous experience of long-term displacement.

Accordingly, new approaches and mechanisms are required to solve the issues completely. Legal Development Network (hereinafter — ‘LDN’) and the Zaporizhzhia-based NGO Strategies and Technologies for Effective Partnership (hereinafter — ‘STEP’) initiated a series of closed discussions with community representatives in order to develop a list of effective solutions for the relocated communities. The outcomes of these discussions will form the foundation of Zaporizhzhia’s community reintegration plans, and successfully applied practices can serve as guidelines for communities in Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and other regions when they return home after the de-occupation of the territories.

Relocated Communities Challenges

‘While in the first years of the great war, the communities that moved to Zaporizhzhia knew what to do: they opened community hubs, provided humanitarian aid, and organized training, nowadays, with every passing day, the hope for a quick de-occupation is diminishing and they do not know how to live their lives. We are able to meet their basic needs, but we need to have a vision for the future,’ — shares Oleksii Ahientaiev, Head of the NGO ‘STEP.’

Anton Stasik, Lawyer of NGO ‘STEP’, draws attention to the ‘meaning crisis’ relocated communities in Zaporizhzhia are currently experiencing.

‘For more than two years, the residents of the communities have been holding on to their faith in the Armed Forces of Ukraine, in a speedy de-occupation, in the opportunity to return home, rebuild, restore what they have lost and continue their peaceful lives. The realities have shaken the faith, people are getting frustrated and need new meanings for existence.’ — notes Anton Stasik.

As a result — a gradual loss of connection between community residents and communities, more stable settlement in new places, parents choose schools for their children at their place of residence — in Zaporizhzhia, other cities and villages, abroad — rather than mostly distance learning in those community schools whose teams and resources have so far been preserved. In this regard, in addition to the crisis of meanings, communities are facing a crisis of institutions, as Yurii Mosaiev, Associate Professor at the Department of Psychology and Social Work at the Khortytsia National Educational and Rehabilitation Academy, emphasized.

‘At the beginning, the communities managed to work well because they left with whole units. In each, especially in large communities, the hub was used to provide medical services, education, and support to students who had left and even engaged in the educational process in the occupied territory. During the first year after the occupation, communities in Zaporizhzhia worked just like they did at home, and even more, attracting resources from international partners. But over time, the state began to impose financial restrictions. For example, the National Health Service of Ukraine significantly limited funding for doctors, and the healthcare sector was classified as social protection. Teachers‘ salaries have also been reduced.’ —Yuriy Mosayev outlines the problem.

‘Our main task is to keep the team that will return after the de-occupation of the community. And also, to preserve the stratum of society that left and is here today. We have to keep these people, keep their faith because a lot also depends on their psychological state and mood. We are taking care of this issue and making sure that we look like a whole, united, monolithic team in the city of Zaporizhzhia,’ — emphasizes Oleksandr Pravosud, Head of the Yakymivka Village Community in Zaporizhzhia region.

LDN and STEP goals and initiatives

‘We want the communities to maintain their unity and identity during the occupation of their settlements, no matter how long it lasts, and for people, wherever they are, to keep in touch with each other and with the community, to support it like football fans: if I support Dynamo, then wherever I am, I still support Dynamo.’ — explains Oleksiy Agentayev.

Having experience working with the de-occupied communities of Mykolaiv and Kherson regions, the LDN sees the need and significant potential for preserving the re-located communities.

‘The communities in the South we have worked with and continue to interact with now have been under Russian occupation for approximately 8-9 months. They are still recovering from this experience, but they were particularly confused immediately after the liberation. ‘With our help, the communities were able to draw up strategic development plans that envisage not only the restoration of damaged property but also a long-term perspective: the return of refugees, the creation of employment opportunities, and the development of youth initiatives.’ — says Vitaliy Okhrimenko, Director of Strategic Development at the LDN. – ‘Because the territories of Zaporizhzhia communities have been occupied for a much longer time, we can assume that the reintegration processes will be more complicated. Instead, our task is to keep the communities intact and self-sufficient today and thus simplify their path to return home when the time comes.”

The first discussions are taking place in early November. Later, the results will be the subject of an open discussion, scheduled for early December.

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