WORLD BRIDGE BLOG

When people think of violence, chaos and suffering, there is a tendency to oversimplify, to make firm distinctions between “perpetrators,” “victims” and “heroes”. But reality is never that cut and dry.  Conflict is messy, and the people involved often defy easy categorization.  

On Saturday, Matt and I set out to visit a community of displaced people south of Bunia town in Oriental province (eastern DR Congo).  It is a community that muddies each of these categorizes.

To the naked eye these people – currently numbering about 475 in all – fit the popular definition of “victim”.  After years spent surviving in brutal forest conditions they took advantage of a humanitarian corridor created by the Congolese military to come out of the woods and seek assistance.  Most of the new arrivals at the makeshift displacement camp are suffering from ailments like malaria, parasites and diarrhea.  Almost all of the new arrivals are malnourished and while they have received pots and utensils, as well as some blankets, plastic sheeting, and other “non-food items” from an international aid organization, they have not yet received food.  Even the emergency rations – delivered to the weakest among them - have already run out.

This level of deprivation and suffering is familiar enough to anyone that has followed the conflict in DR Congo over the past decade.  This displacement site is a tiny example of the many, sprawling camps for displaced Congolese that have been forced out of their villages, particularly in the east of this country.  The difference though, between this particular community and other communities of displaced Congolese, is that many of these people are the families of militia fighters; the wives, children and elderly dependents of those who have terrorized thousands of other Congolese people into fleeing their homes.

These people have suffered. There is no question that they have been victimized by this conflict, but they are also linked to the perpetrators of violence, theft, and general terror in their particular corner of this unstable country.

We also met people who blur the distinction between “victim” and “hero”. The local medical clinic – three run-down buildings where overnight patients sleep on straw on the floor, the “examination” room is a wooden bench between crumbling walls, and even the most basic medicines are in sort supply – serves 21 of the 28 local communities.  

It is run by a nurse and her husband, a couple that have earned the respect and – wherever possible – the practical support (supplies, basic equipment) of the international organizations that have been largely kept out of the area due to the persistently high levels of insecurity. With the help of a small local team they treat between 40 and 60 people a day out of their tiny clinic.  

In this place no one is immune to the insecurity and this same couple – local heroes and a lifeline for thousands of people – have themselves been displaced by violence.  Three times in the past four years they have fled their home, and left what little they have in the clinic, to seek safety with family and friends in other towns.  Each time they have returned to an empty, looted clinic and each time they have started again, from scratch, to re-build their home, their lives, and the clinic that is the only source of medical care for so many local people, including the 475 displaced people sheltering in the area.

Heroes, victims and perpetrators; all of these identities are tied together in the uncertain, unstable environment of the DRC.  Other identities – government, military, rebel – are becoming equally hard to distinguish.  The point here is that in DRC, as in most countries at war – nothing is ever quite what it seems.  This is a place that defies simple answers, and where both the challenges and the solutions start with the people who are often left out of the discussion when we paint them with the misleading label of “victim”.