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Seizing This Moment of Hope: Current Humanitarian Situation and Response

Seizing This Moment of Hope

The humanitarian situation in the DRC has improved greatly over the past few years, but still remains one of the most serious crises in the world. Almost 450,000 people are refugees in neighboring countries, while 1.6 million are displaced inside the DRC. While calm has returned to many areas, pockets of extreme violence persist. Hundreds of thousands have been displaced since January 2006 due to offensives, supported by MONUC, by the Congolese national army (the FARDC) against armed groups in the east. In addition, FARDC troops, underpaid and undisciplined, are now the main perpetrators of human rights abuses in the country. Their extortion of food and labor, and widespread practice of rape, are major causes of displacement, and continue to provoke confl ict with local armed groups.

The first setting which requires humanitarian assistance in the DRC is therefore one of crisis and displacement, where lives are in danger; the second is one of resolution and return, where lives are being rebuilt. In the DRC, both of these settings are sometimes found in the same area, requiring agencies to implement different responses at the same time. In addition, despite the elections and the hope for peace, crisis and displacement will continue throughout the east in the coming years even as resolution of the crises and returns increase.

Saving lives. Joint operations between the FARDC and MONUC since the beginning of 2006 have pushed hundreds of thousands out of their homes; malnutrition rates skyrocketed following displacement in late 2005 among IDPs in central Katanga; 45,000 newly displaced are holed up in the southern part of Ituri, starving because the World Food Programme does not have enough on hand to feed them. These are all examples of displacement where a sudden influx of people requires immediate assistance. Another group on the move, however, are those on their way home. In the southern part of South Kivu Province, along the shores of Lake Tanganyika, Congolese refugees returning from Tanzania have been forced to seek shelter on the way, while they earn the money they need to get home, or while they wait as their villages are rebuilt. In Mitwaba, in central Katanga, demobilized Mai-Mai combatants and their families are stuck in camps, waiting for assistance promised by the government in exchange for disarming. Host community residents are also heavily affected by displacement and return. In general, these are places where people seek shelter temporarily, where humanitarian assistance needs to meet minimum standards for survival without encouraging additional displacement.

Rebuilding. In the past few years, as fighting has died down in the east, former IDPs and refugees, as well as ex-combatants and their families, have started to arrive back in their home villages. Others are resettling elsewhere, having decided that they cannot go home because nothing is left, or do not want to go home because they do not feel safe. Return and resettlement are particularly visible in Djugu Territory, the scene of some of the worst massacres in Ituri, but are also happening in northern Katanga, along Lake Tanganyika, and in North Kivu. These people, along with those who never left, need to farm in order to survive, but do not always have the seeds and tools they require. In addition, they want some assurance that their villages will be rebuilt, that normal infrastructure, such as sources of clean water, schools, and health centers, will soon be available. Stopgap measures, such as schools in temporary structures, are a necessary fi rst step, but must be carried outin a way that leads to sustainable development.

Overall, a range of groups needs assistance:

People who have been displaced for years, but are still looking for a way to go home or resettle permanently. Women are the targets of sexual violence so widespread that they consider rape as a harrowing but expected hazard of daily life.

People suffering repeated displacement, often over short periods, either fleeing from and then returning to their homes or being pushed from one refuge to another.

IDPs and refugees who are in the process of returning home or resettling elsewhere.

Ex-combatants, many accompanied by their families, who have been demobilized and are trying to rebuild their lives.

Residents of host communities that shelter the displaced as well as those who never fled in areas of displacement and return.

In addition, there are specific groups vulnerable to human rights abuses. Ethnic minorities have been a frequent target of attacks in some areas (prompting them to perpetrate human rights abuses of their own in response); children (both boys and girls) are kidnapped or recruited for armed groups; and women are the targets of sexual violence so widespread that they consider rape as a harrowing but expected hazard of daily life.

Life for all these groups in the eastern DRC is precarious. Most IDPs crowd host communities, living among the population with friends or family members, or putting up temporary shelters on small plots rented in exchange for day labor. This puts enormous strain on resources already limited by the lack of social infrastructure such as markets, law enforcement, schools, and health centers, not to mention natural resources such as arable land and water. In the South Kivu village of Hombo, for example, the resident population of 4,420 has had to welcome an additional 40,000 people displaced from their homes. When a sudden influx overwhelms the capacity of a host community, makeshift camps spring up in any safe, open area. Before help arrives, shelters built from branches or reeds and covered with straw crowd together, with just enough space between them for cooking fi res; water is sometimes far away and rarely clean, and latrines usually non-existent. Some may earn money as day laborers or petty traders, but most are obliged to wait for assistance.

Rape is an especially serious problem in the eastern DRC. The World Health Organization reported more than 41,000 cases of sexual violence in Maniema, South and North Kivu, and Katanga between 1998 and 2005; given problems with reporting, and especially as Ituri is not represented, the real number is probably much higher. As with other issues, the current situation is contradictory. Médecins sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders, or MSF) recorded fewer than 5 cases of rape per week in its Ituri facility in July 2006, down from 40 per week 15 months earlier. In the Rutshuru area of North Kivu, however, MSF recorded 200 cases in August 2006, far above the average of 64 cases treated each month.

In all areas in eastern DRC, humanitarian needs related to both displacement and return are exacerbated by chronic underdevelopment. Poor roads, difficult access to markets, few educational opportunities, inadequate health care, low status of women: all are conditions found throughout the country, due to governmental neglect and mismanagement, that undermine the capacity of communities to cope with crises.

Nevertheless, it is clear that the humanitarian situation in the east of the DRC has improved in certain areas if not evenly. Djugu Territory in Ituri and Fizi Territory in South Kivu are largely calm, with those driven from their homes during brutal fi ghting just a few years ago now returning. In the north of North Kivu, many roads are safe to travel again, allowing aid agencies to reach hundreds of thousands of displaced people. Above all, mortality has decreased in places where fighting has stopped, not necessarily because people were getting killed directly, but rather because they now have greater access to life-saving medical treatment. These changes demonstrate that concerted international effort can have an impact, that it is indeed possible to make a difference in the DRC. Congolese refugees return from Tanzania aboard this boat, under the aegis of UNHCR. After making the long trip across Lake Tanganyika, refugees often find their villages and homes destroyed. Increased assistance in clean water, education, and health care will help them rebuild their lives.

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