Western Sudan donkeys save lives, die of hunger in war
By Nima Elbagir
AL-FASHIR, Sudan, April 19 (Reuters) – Families fleeing fighting in Sudan’s arid west wonder how they will feed their children when they return home as donkeys they rode to safety die of exhaustion and starvation.
Donkeys helped save thousands of lives carrying women and children to safety from marauding Arab militiamen in the Darfur region and are vital to the African farming communities.
“When an attack happens, the first thing they (villagers) were doing is to put the children on the donkeys and send them first,” Anna Riatti of the U.N. Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in al-Fashir, the capital of Northern Darfur state told Reuters.
The militiamen, or Janjaweed, have been driving African farmers and their families out of their villages in Darfur in what international organisations have called ethnic cleansing and even attempted genocide.
Two main rebel groups took up arms against the government in Darfur last year complaining the government neglected the region and armed the militiamen. The Khartoum government says the mounted Arab militiamen are outlaws.
The African villagers say the gruelling journey to safety through scrubland takes its toll on the donkeys. Some do not survive, others die later.
“Our donkey has died since we came here. I sent my wife and two children on its back when the Janjaweed began attacking so I knew they were safe,” said Mohammed Musa Adam, 35, who escaped the fighting to the Mashtal Camp in al-Fashir.
Hundreds of thousands of people have been displaced and more than 100,000 have fled across the border into neighbouring Chad.
SYMBOLIC DONKEYS
UNICEF’S Riatti says the donkeys are suffering because their owners are too scared to go outside and find grass for them to eat.
Emaciated donkeys wander looking for food in rubbish tips among the makeshift shelters where 38,000 people live in cramped conditions around 800 km (500 miles) southwest of Khartoum.
The road out of al-Fashir is littered with the sun-baked remains of donkeys that fell before completing their journeys.
Before the fighting, the donkeys carried water for crops and transported the produce to the market. The African farming communities fear there may not be enough donkeys to allow them to restart their lives.
Abdel Raham Issa, 38, a camp resident who fled his home in the area north of al-Fashir says the donkeys must live.
“The most important thing now is grass for the donkeys. If they die how will we work the land when we go home?” he said.
UNICEF estimates each family in Northern Darfur state has between three to four donkeys on average.
“The donkey is now a symbol,” said Anna Riatti after a meeting to discuss raising money to buy the donkeys’ food.
The death of the donkeys is not only a catastrophe in economic terms for largely agricultural communities but also an emotional loss for people who have lost so much else.
“When you speak to these people about their donkeys, you really realise that they are considered a part of the family,” said Riatti.