Why Sudanese are not eager to go home
By Mugumo Munene
NAIROBI, Feb 26, 2005 (The Nation) — Thirty-three-year-old Mohammed Ahmed Osman is devastated. His father, mother, two brothers, nephews, nieces and village-mates were all killed in one night of terror visited upon the otherwise quiet hamlet in the Darfur region of south-western Sudan.
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Home beckons for these Sudanese refugees in Uganda.(UNHCR). |
Mohammed was to have been killed. Those who visited mayhem on the hapless villagers – the infamous Janjaweed militia – must have thought they had killed him as well.
The militia descended on Mesmeiye village in the sprawling region one night and started setting huts on fire.
Terrified villagers were burnt to death in their sleep. Some died as they struggled to break out of their huts and free themselves from the fire.
Those who found their way out of the death trap were stopped by bullets fired by the bloodthirsty Janjaweed. It was unbridled mayhem.
Mohammed was away visiting his farm, tending his crops for a few days after which he would return to the village.
On the way back, with his family – his wife and three children – a “messenger of doom” warned him against returning home. The Janjaweed could still be in the vicinity…. and would surely kill him.
A few days later, he risked his life and returned to find the ruins that were once his home. His relatives’ bodies were scattered everywhere.
“There were bodies everywhere, children, women, men…. there was death everywhere,” said Mohammed, his face contorted in pain, his head bowed as memories of the devastating loss came flooding back.
“I want to go back and kill my father’s killers. We cannot live together. Let no one cheat you that black men (southerners) and Arabs (northerners) can live together. The Arabs killed my people,” said Mohammed.
As he narrates his heart-rending experience, his wife, Salwa Mohammed, sits by quietly, occasionally chatting with other women while children Mushab, 8, Mahasin, 5, and Maas, 3, play with dirt, oblivious of their predicament or simply too young to care about their uncertain future.
Mohammed found a home away from home at the Kakuma refugee camp in northern Kenya, more than 1,800 kilometres away from his village, on January 27.
This was the culmination of a 27-month journey that began back home when death struck.
He fled the village along with his wife, children and relatives from surrounding villages. They were 21 in all.
They wandered from place to place, looking for help, surviving on handouts from mosques and food from well-wishers.
Once, they attempted to travel to Khartoum by train so that Mohammed could find work as a gardener in the capital city and support his family. They were stopped by soldiers at a train station mid-way and ordered to return home.
“They told us that there was no fighting. They told us we could not go to Khartoum. We should just go back. But we could not return. I had seen death. I could not argue with them. They were threatening to send me to prison if I did not go back,” Mohammed, speaking in halting English, told reporters in Kakuma.
A truck driver helped them and took them away from the danger. The driver gave them some money. They wandered some more and finally found their way to the Nuba mountains, where the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement officials helped to airlift them to Kakuma where they could get help.
They are not alone.
Young Dennis Marial was flown in from southern Sudan a few days ago.
He says he wants to go to school in Kenya so that he can become an ambassador for Southern Sudan some day.
Why flee after the peace deal?
“The SPLA and the Government are conscripting young men into the army. I don’t want that. I want an education,” he says.
At 19 years, Dennis is now the family head of his seven siblings and in charge of eight other relatives who escaped to Kenya with him.
He last saw his parents 10 years ago and does not know where they fled to. But Dennis believes that they are alive and hiding somewhere in Sudan.
“There is still tension even after the peace deal, mainly because it did not rain last year. We don’t quite trust the peace deal. Young men are recruited into the army by force and there is still fighting in some parts of the country,” says Dennis.
The journey by a truck to the relative safety of Kakuma from his home in Southern Sudan takes no less than seven days.
The conflict in Darfur was sparked in 2003 when rebel groups took up arms against the Khartoum government in a struggle over resources and power.
Khartoum retaliated by arming nomad militias – Janjaweed. The militia are reported to have committed atrocities including murder, rape and arson.
This was to grind salt into the wounds of a country already living under the intense civil strife of 22 years.
These are the tales of death and destruction that each of the more than 66,000 Sudanese refugees have left behind. Memories of misery. There are 35,000 more in the same camp who came from other countries, mainly Somalia.
The Sudan civil war has kept on for 22 years, leaving more than two million dead and millions others internally displaced.
According to the Nairobi agreement signed on January 7, SPLM/A’s leader, Dr John Garang de Mabior, will become the Sudan’s First Vice-President and the President of Southern Sudan for six years, pending a referendum that will decide the future of the two regions.
The guns have fallen silent after the signing of the peace deal, but the wounds of the long civil strife will take time to heal. And if the position of the refugees is anything to go by, the mistrust between those who fought in the bush for many years will remain.
Back in Kakuma, the World Food Programme is faced with a looming crisis.
Their silos are fast running out of food supplies.
Donors had stopped their supplies in the hope that the refugees will return home after the peace deal was signed last month.
The WFP Kenya country director, Mr Tesema Negash, said: “There is a shortage of food. The 130,000 refugees in Kenya, 87,000 of whom are in Kakuma, depend wholly on the WFP and other donors. Either we have food or we don’t. By April, the cereals will run out. By August we expect that a shipment from the US will arrive but we have the gap to deal with. We are appealing to all donors to help us source the food locally in Kenya or in the region to help us bridge this gap.”
Other donors who have been contributing to the refugee upkeep include the European Union, Canada, Japan, Australia, New Zealand and non-governmental organisations.
The US is by far the largest contributor of food aid to Kakuma and Southern Sudan.
American ambassador to Kenya William Bellamy, who visited the camp on Tuesday, said: “We will continue with our high level supply.”
On the looming crisis, Mr Bellamy said: “I will talk to my staff and my fellow ambassadors back in Nairobi to see what can be done.”
Mr Negash added: “We are asking them to be as generous as possible and we hope that Ambassador Bellamy will tell them how serious the situation is.”
Elsewhere, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees is planning a mass repatriation following the signing of the peace deal.
The Kenyan UNHCR country director, Mr George Okoth-Obbo, said: “We have received 847 Sudanese since the beginning of the year, who are mainly young, single men. The two major reasons cited by those we have interviewed are food security and aspiration for an education. There is also insecurity brought about by militia activity in pockets of the country. We have received 47 from Darfur who arrived in bad shape due to malnutrition but we expect that the in-flow will stop.”
Mr Obbo, who visited the camp this week accompanied by Mr Bellamy and Mr Negash, said: “We have established a presence in Sudan to make ground preparation for the mass repatriation. We have planned to start mass repatriation towards the end of the year but it’s difficult to say when it will actually come to an end.”
Mr Negash says that refugees were reluctant to return because of the dilapidated or non-existent infrastructure.
“Some of the refugees may be willing to return but we do not know when. It depends on what is available in terms of health facilities, schools and roads. There is the question of land mines which pose a great risk to those returning. We do not expect any significant changes this year and we will continue with what we have been doing,” Mr Negash said.