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| May 20, 2008 |
UNICEf and other humanitarian agencies are struggling to provide assistance to this traumatized population. Thanks to their efforts things appear improved, at least in this area; by that I mean better than when I was here in February of 2007. Some people have returned to their homes. I saw women making bricks and people re-thatching their homes. But I also met with people who are too terrified to return to their villages. The Presidential Guards burned their homes and they are afraid they will return, or that the bandits will attack them.
So they have built their shelters deep in the bush, away from the roads.
Many had been injured during the attacks and lost family members. They have been living in the bush for two years. The trees are laden with mangos, so for now there is that to eat, and cassava roots and yams.
"Our biggest worry is the children. They are sick." (
The children were indeed coughing.) "We don't have sheets to cover them. We are tired of sleeping in the bush." An elderly woman held up a cracked plastic pail, "We have only these broken buckets."
When I asked what they are hoping will happen, a woman holding a small child looked me straight in the eye and said,"We don't have any more hope."
IRC
One IRC project provides doors for homes that are being rebuilt.
Another IRC project assists victims of gender-based violence which is ngo-speak for 'Rape'. An all-woman team of 6 aid workers comes twice a week to this two room clinic where a psycho-social worker guides each victim through the difficult process which includes an examination and HIV treatment. Most women do not report their rapes or speak of them to anyone because they are ashamed and because "if a woman has slept with another man she is dirty and must be discarded", I was told.
Also they say nothing because it is pointless to seek justice when there is no legal structure in place. There will be no justice for these women. Furthermore, the perpetrators are nearby. Even so, along just this stretch of road between the two towns, 1164 rapes have been reported in the last year. The rape of children has become more common. The youngest victim was four years old.
The perpetrators are armed groups and family members. Often women are gang raped. Recently a woman was raped by 16 or 17 men who tied her legs and arms to trees and forced her husband to watch.