By Ammar Johmani
While many Syrian refugees have excelled in learning the Turkish language, which has allowed them to enter the Turkish labor market on a large scale, others face many difficulties resulting in not getting high-paid jobs.
The Turkish language requirement is one of the main problems faced by the Syrian job seeker in Turkey. However, these problems appear to be not confined to those interested in working with the Turks, but rather from the Syrian employers who, like their Turkish counterparts, prefer Syrians who speak Turkish.
-Need and necessity-
There is no doubt, according to media professional Suhaib Mohammed, that the Turkish language has a great impact on life in Turkey and especially in the business sector.
He adds, "tt is obvious that the wages of the Syrian skilled with Turkish are higher than those of the unskilled because the former will have the permanent opportunities to seek work with higher salaries, unlike the second who tends to remain in his job, Hard-to-find, often low-wage jobs. "
"We are talking about a Turkish market, that is, the number of jobs provided by Turks is higher than those by Syrians or Arab employers," he says.
Based on all of the above, Mohammed comes out with the conclusion that "learning Turkish language for Syrians is a need and a necessity, not a luxury."
Additional benefits
For his part, Abdullah al-Rasheed, a worker at a plastic factory in the Turkish city of Adana, spoke of the additional benefits he received after he mastered the Turkish language although he did not change his place of work.
"Before I learned Turkish, I was just a regular worker. My salary was set at 1100 TL a month, but after learning the language, as a result of my daily contact with Turkish workers and perseverance, I was promoted from a regular worker to a production line manager and I had a raise of 400 TL."
"Besides, I was officially registered at the insurance company, and I have legal documents that guarantee my rights as a formal worker." He says.
Asked if his fellow Syrians were getting the same privileges, he said, "they have received promises from the factory owner and they are waiting."
-Career development-
Al-Rasheed illustrates the reality of career development that is impossible to achieve unless the Syrian worker masters the Turkish language, according to researcher Ahmed al-Said.
"The ability to deal with Turkish workers and communicate with them qualifies the worker to work alongside them, that is, in senior positions, taking into account the size of the establishment," says al-Said. "The worker who did not learn Turkish will not jump up to the top."
Al-Saeed said that it is natural for the Syrian proficient in Turkish to have more opportunity in jobs requiring both Arabic and Turkish and in quality jobs like restaurants or stores.
-Strategic Future-
In addition to the above, media professional Suhaib Mohammed believes that learning Turkish gives Syrians confidence workers or otherwise.
"A person who is fluent in language has a greater sense of security over his strategic future in Turkey, and he will also have less fears. He will start another phase at the community level, by building new relations with Turkish society and reaching the so-called social integration."
Mohammed cites the interaction between Syrians and Turks in the failed coup d'état in Turkey in mid-July 2016, concluding that,"this interaction results from social integration."
