ASSESSMENT OF THE CAUSES AND CONSEQUENCES OF ILLEGAL MIGRATION: THE CASE OF RETURNEE MIGRANTS IN SILTI WOREDA, SILTE ZONE, SNNPR, ETHIOPIA

Abstract The study assessed issues of illegal migration presents recent empirical evidences within time period practices of the Silti wereda in target four kebeles. The main objective of the study is to assess the main causes and consequences of illegal migration. The study was employed purposive and simple random sampling techniques. The research used both qualitative and quantitative research approaches. The best of both approaches while assessing the detail on illegal migration .Primary and secondary sources of data were used in the collection of data. In this research basically, primary sources were used for first-hand information to achieve the objectives of the research and they were predominantly collected through questionnaires, interviews as well as focus group discussion. The secondary data was collected from a review of key informants and personnel"s and influential. The collected data from 256 respondents properly analyzed qualitatively and quantitatively and data analysis was made using tables and percentage. The findings from this research provided evidence that poverty at household level, brokers and peer groups were the dominant factors to reinforce illegal migration of particularly the young generation in the study area, while intermediaries might collect significant amounts of money from trafficking migrants. Migrants were exposed to a series of suffering causing untold psychological and socio-economic impact on the livelihood of families and the community in particular and the country at large. In addition domestic dependency and opening door for the spread of HIV/AIDS were among the major finding. The results suggested that development strategies should be put in place in order to design integrated interventions that contribute to reducing poverty and backwardness which were the main causes for illegal migration. The study has revealed how illegal migration seriously has been sources of death suffering without differentiation between male and female migrants and the role of tedious journey in aggravating the problems. In addition to these certain social problems others such as divorce, school dropout, reduction in productivity and others societal problems have been the order of the day. Moreover the major factors for illegal migration as indicated from the study were economic problems, social factors, peer influence, and the roles of brokers. Also the consequences of illegal migration as identified by the study and explained by returnee immigrants and key informants were exacerbating human rights violence, further local dependency after returning homeland as well as psychological problems. Beyond all these, the most sensitive problem encountered by the study society is the loss of its productive force.