The Conflict In Sudan And Realities In The Democratic Republic of The Congo
The situation occuring in Sudan may not just be the result of the situation in Darfur, but actually has to be understood in the wider, cross-bordering reality of the region.
The first image this conflict presents is "racism" between Arabic people and Black ones. In general, all the open conflicts we are experiencing in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and its neighbouring countries are based on discrimination and humiliation.
Once one ethnicity or tribe oppresses another - either by means of violence or by impoverishment, and to economically and politically dominate and impose an oligarchy - the situation turns from bad to worse, because those who feel discriminated and humiliated develop hatred against the oppressors and their relatives as well.
What is perpetuating these conflicts is the well known "minority protection policy" supported by the International Communities, or specific countries, that ends up allowing for irregularities and anarchy from the side of minorities in many countries. It is also proved that the minorities' power, according to our experience in the Great Lakes Region, is based on imposing military strategies. This can be seen as a "weakness" for these minority groups which become little by little more self-centred and are therefore not ready to share resources with other groups. This psychological weakness leads them to megalomania and discrimination and creates a situation where other groups feel humiliated. This sense of humiliation grows into hatred and ultimately leads to physical violence and then into war.
Mineral sites and transactional business networks, agencies and individuals "feed" these lasting conflicts by providing armed groups with the financial means to strengthen their military control on mines. The revenue from these resources is not used to solve communities' problems but instead is used to enrich warlords and to respond to foreign partners' demands and hidden agendas.
In the South Kivu Province of the DRC where we are based, we don't have direct follow up on the situation in Sudan. However, there is still some influence on both the conflict in Sudan and those in the Eastern part of the DRC, beginning from "Province Orientale" with the Hema-Lendu conflict in Ituri District (See Bunia) to the North and South Kivu provinces with Banyamilenge (Tutsi community originated from Rwanda) issues.
To illustrate all this, I would like to share a recent story about one Sudanese girl named Adidja Twina from Darfur. She is seventeen (17) years old. She says she fled with her parents from Sudan to Uganda many years ago, when she was still five years old. After she had lost her parents in Uganda, she was taken by a Congolese family to Beni in North Kivu Province.
What the girl found particularly discouraging and depressing was that when she arrived in Beni, she encountered a similar climate of hatred by the Nande tribe (a Bantu community) against the Hema's, who were being assimilated to Banyamulenge because of their similar phenotype (morphology) and they are both pastoralists.
Adidja became a target because she is a black girl who looks like the Hema people. That is why Adidja is scared of being attacked by Mai-Mai militias in Beni and decided to flee south from Beni to the nearest town of Butembo. Unfortunately, she experienced the same difficulties there. She left Butembo to Goma, then from there to Bukavu and Uvira in South Kivu. She was received at the DDRRR Transit Camp within the UN Peacekeeping Mission's site on Saturday 21/08/2004. As the United Nations Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUC) Disarmament, Demobilization, Repatriation, Reintegration and Resettlement (DDRRR) Transit Camp in Uvira has been settled only for demobilized combatants and their dependants, there was no room for Miss Adidja. She was finally accommodated during the weekend, waiting to be transferred to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) at the beginning of the following week. On Tuesday 24/08/2004, the DDRRR section agreed her transfer to ICRC.
Working as an Interpreter within the DDRRR Section at MONUC headquarters in Kavimvira, at the Northern edge of Tanganyika Lake, I submitted the MONUC Handover certificate to the Child Protection agent from ICRC who took Miss Adidja to AVREO, a local Child protection organisation. A week later I met her on the road, riding on a bicycle toward the border between the DRC and Burundi. When I asked her what was wrong, she told me she had just been thrown out by the AVREO centre's supervisor because she went out for Muslims' prayer although the AVREO's agents were trying to force her to pray at the Catholic church.
I suspect AVREO might have believed they were hosting a "spy" as Miss Adidja looks like the Banyamulenge who fled because of their leaders' politicking, trying to attract the International community's attention to the eventual "extermination of the minority" that would have been planned against their ethnicity throughout the DRC. While living in the Transit camp at Gatumba in Burundi, the Banyamulenge were massacred during the night of the 13th and 14th August 2004 and there were 160 people counted as dead.
Any way, there are direct connections in term of the consequences between the conflict in Sudan and those in the DRC, Uganda and else where. The Adidja case is just one of thousands of similar situations in Africa. Now nobody knows whether she succeeded to cross the border and enter Burundi, or she was caught between the city and the border to another destination.
When I tell this story, I feel uncomfortable, because I am the one who received Adidja at the MONUC DDRRR Transit camp and transferred her to ICRC. After she was dismissed from the AVREO Child protection centre where she should be waiting for the result of tracing works to be done by ICRC in order to find out her uncle who she thought could be living in Kigoma-Tanzania.
As for me, I could have decided to keep her in my family but the last time I saw her she was almost crazy from despaired and didn't allow any discussion of the matter. Actually there was no actual plan to deal with this sudden incident, though I have been taking care of three other orphans in addition to what I have got to do with my two kids. Yet I did feel powerless and guilty. Adidja disappeared in the nature.