This research sheds light on the phenomenon of the externalisation of the EU border – with a particular focus on what concerns the areas of return and reintegration – and unpacks its interaction with the Southern context of The Gambia. First, it addresses the legitimisation of the policy objective of sustainable reintegration and carries out a comparative assessment of assisted return across six European countries. Second, it explains the involvement of Gambian non-state actors in EU-funded externalisation from the point of view of actor-network theory (ANT). Third, it delves into the moral economy of voice entailed by the practical involvement of return migrants in the International Organization for Migration (IOM)’s sensitisation activities. It finally looks into the evolution of a returnee group, as it deals with the professionalisation demands of the international community and its own communitarian dimension. The research overall conveys the conflictual, fuzzy and unpredictable nature of externalisation in the South, beyond the linear and technical description of it provided by policy-makers in the Global North.