05/02/2003

This man and his wife and five children have been displaced from Basra since March when his house was bombed.  He has no extended family.  He came to Al Amarah and found the school and decided to live here.  The school has been severely looted and all the windows are broken.  His wife just had their fifth child on May 1, 2003, in this school classroom.  A local midwife came to assist with the birth.  The husband does not work but has some food remaining from the Oil-For-Food program.  Although there is a faucet in the school, there is not always running water.  Sometimes he goes to the river.  Neither water source is potable.  His family is the only family living in the school, and the school officials have asked them to leave.  He does not know where he will go.  The neighbors have been helping with food.  The family does not feel safe, and he explained that there is “so much shooting at night.  No one walks at night.  [There is] no peace because we have no government yet, and we are afraid of the thieves and disorder.  We do not let our daughter walk to school because of security.  We need order.  We want an Iraqi government, and we still do not have freedom because there is no government.”