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Portrait of Noel Kabanda Ssemayobe

Noel Kabanda Ssemayobe

Humanitarian lawyer and practitioner, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees

Visiting Toronto Metropolitan University

Spring 2026

Noel Kabanda Ssemayobe is a humanitarian lawyer/practitioner with over 12 years of experience in humanitarian work, with particular focus of forced displacement in Africa, and has worked with United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and its partners in Uganda, Tanzania, Niger, Burundi, Kenya and Malawi. He holds a Master of Refugee & Migrations Studies from Uganda Martyrs University Nkozi, and a Bachelor of Law (LBB) from Makerere University in Uganda. He has also undergone several humanitarian specific trainings in the last twelve years.

Until March 2025, Noel was the focal point for complementary pathways at the UNHCR Malawi office in Lilongwe, coordinating the World University Service of Canada’s (WUSC) Student Refuge Program (SRP) at Dzaleka refugee camp, through which several refugee students resettled to Canada for further studies and asylum. The program was started in Malawi in 1998 and ended in 2024 due to funding gaps. It facilitated over 350 refugee students from Dzaleka refugee camp to relocate to Canada to pursue university education.

Noel also coordinated Canada’s Economic Migration Pathways Pilot (EMPP) through which skilled refugees from Malawi are accessing job opportunities in Canada through the different platforms and programs, such as TalentLift, Talent Beyond Boundaries and WUSC’s Hospitality Industry Welcomes Refugee Employment- Economic Mobility Pathways Project (HIRES-EMPP) program.

Noel is solution-oriented, and open to learning new and alternative approaches to problem solving. He believes in the use of diverse approaches to problem solving. He enjoys working in teams to complete tasks. He has a well-diversified protection background in the humanitarian context.

Research focus while a Fellow with CERC

Noel will focus on the dynamics of labour mobility for skilled refugees and displaced persons from the receiving country's perspective, from arrival and integration/social cohesion, working conditions, social protection and policies and governance frameworks in place to address potential exploitation, and skill gaps. The research will also look at the long term impact of labour migration to both the migrants and Canada as the host. This will inform programming for UNHCR and its partners, especially as far as upskilling for refugees and other displaced persons is concerned in the rapidly changing labour market.

Noel's time at CERC Migration will also be useful in shaping a topic of research around labour migration for his future PhD study, benefiting from the CERC Migration research network.