Dr Des Pyper, who used to run the Family Dental Care clinic on David Place, said the subject of bringing families to Jersey is ’emotional’ especially during times of ‘prudence’ with government spending.
The 70-year-old volunteers as a dentist in Kotu, Gambia, with Muslim families in townships and said he believes the Island can offer help in a way that can suit everyone.
More than 500,000 migrants have fled to Europe since the start of the year. The majority have come from war-torn Syria but thousands have also travelled from countries such as Eritrea, Afghanistan, Nigeria and Gambia.
Earlier this month Chief Minister Ian Gorst suggested the Island could accommodate five or six Syrian families. The remarks sparked a backlash from concerned members of the community and hundreds attended a fiery public meeting at the Town Hall where those opposed to the idea of Jersey offering asylum to refugees questioned whether the Island could afford it and raised the possibility of a culture clash with Muslim refugees and even the risk of terrorism.
The dentist, who returned to the west African country last week, also said he believes Jersey has the financial capability to offer aid and volunteers to refugee camps and referenced a Jersey project that sent aid to civilians caught up in the Chad war.
‘I do not think it would be hard to get volunteers if the expenses were paid for by the States,’ he added.
Dr Pyper first began volunteering in Gambia after he travelled there on holiday and visited a clinic in Kotu. ‘They asked me if I could start work tomorrow,’ he said.
The Islander, who has a home in St Helier, returned to Jersey then travelled back out to Gambia armed with two backpacks full of dental supplies donated by dentists from across the Island. One third of Gambians live below the US poverty line of $1.25 a day.
He added: ‘I genuinely believe the Island wants to help in some tangible way. Remember – these refugees have nothing but hope.’
Jersey has hosted refugees fleeing political or religious persecution in the past and is perhaps best known in this respect for offering shelter to Charles II and later Victor Hugo.
One of the mass arrivals to the Island came in the 16th century when the Huguenots – members of the Protestant Reformed Church of France, also known as French Calvinists – fled the country during a series of religious persecutions.
The St Bartholomew’s Day massacre in 1572, during which Catholics killed thousands of Huguenots in Paris, plus the withdrawal of a proclamation granting French protestants equality in society led to two main periods of mass exodus from France.
It is estimated that Jersey and Guernsey may have housed several thousand Huguenot refugees during the late 1500s and late 1600s.
Charles II was twice sheltered in the Island during the turbulent years of the Civil War and Jersey went on to become the first place to recognise him as King of England – two gestures for which the Island was rewarded with land and the Royal Mace.
And when Victor Hugo declared Napoleon III a traitor the author clashed with authorities and relocated first to Brussels and then to Jersey, where he was safe.
However, he soon fell out of favour here as well after he supported an Island newspaper that had criticised Queen Victoria. Hugo moved to Guernsey where he lived with his family between 1855 and 1870.
