Oxfam Horn, East and Central Africa Blog

DR Congo: To leave or to stay? An impossible choice

A new Oxfam survey on the situation for communities in eastern DR Congo has found shocking levels of violence against civilians, perpetrated by rebels, militias and the Congolese army. The survey covered areas affected by ongoing military operations against various militias. Oxfam’s Eddie Mackila talks about the experience of researching the report and talking to young people who are left facing an impossible choice – of leaving their lives in the village behind or staying at risk of violence:

This is the second year that I have helped to run a survey of communities in eastern DR Congo. I draft the questionnaire which is then used by our local partners – courageous people working in very challenging conditions to gather testimonies of hundreds of people from villages affected by the conflict. One of the questions we ask is whether they feel safer now than they did last year.

Every year I wait and hope for an answer that doesn’t come. I imagine hands raising in unison as everyone agrees that the answer is “yes, we feel safer.” People would cheer, as happens in a normal life. But here we are far from a normal life.

In reality, as I listen to the responses I know that the answer will be long. Sometimes I will almost have to stop the person talking because the list of problems they encounter day to day is virtually endless. Murder, rape, harassment, robbery, forced labour, the stigma of a community…

Occasionally people do say they feel safer. Then, without pausing, they tell me how their friend was killed nearby as he slept in his house; how one of their daughters has been forced to become the wife of a soldier; how their sister-in-law gets harassed and has to pay soldiers or militia at a checkpoint on the road just so she can get to hospital to get treatment for her diabetes. Safety in this part of Congo is all relative.

This year, looking for fresh opinions, we decided to focus on youth and discussed the current situation with many young villagers. Many of the girls and boys across North and South Kivu said this year has been even harder for them. The militia groups are still here, but now there are also more government soldiers due to the new military offensive known as Amani Leo. In many cases I heard, the increased presence of armed men on both sides has brought new threats to their everyday lives.

Nikiro*, a young boy of 16, told me: “I’m not going to school anymore. I went there to study – not to have to break my back to fetch water or carry bags for the military.” In many places, schools have become a recruiting ground for soldiers to force young people to work for them.

The girls are often shy, because to talk about safety means to talk about terrible things. 15 year-old Asha* told me she left school after she was raped by a soldier. Now she has to live with him as his “wife”. The soldier said he would pay the dowry later, but even if this happens Asha is facing a life of mockery and rejection by her family, friends and community. Her father, Bwana, told me: “It’s a loss for the family, which has invested a lot in her. We sent her to school, only to see her going like this (for free). Her friends do not talk to her anymore, they don’t want to be associated with her.” I don’t understand where these reactions come from. It’s unfair – a double punishment for the poor girl.

“We want to get married, but if people see us with soldiers they will think we are their women,” say the girls.

Asha told me that other girls in the same situation had left the village – “They were forced to go and live with the military. Whether they choose to leave or stay, without the support of their family it is very hard to survive here. It is even worse for the girls who are raped by rebels – people who are not even known in the village. When they are pregnant and giving birth, nobody wants the children to be registered here. They are regarded as foreigners – children who will one day leave the village.”

Hearing this makes me think about my own children, who will one day be Asha’s age.  I wish for them and all the children to live and grow in a place where people will look on them as the children that they are and protect them from harm.

Young boys at work in the fields

To stay or leave? That is the question facing many of the young people I spoke to. To leave is to escape, to no longer be the one everybody is talking about behind their backs or the one bearing the child of an unknown father. To leave is to avoid being left alone in a village that will never forget that you didn’t have the choice to honour your parents.

For boys, to stay means the risk of being forcibly recruited to go to fight, or to be accused by the rebels of supporting the military, or by the military of supporting the militia. To leave is to expose yourself to the unknown, without really ever knowing when you will be able to return to help your family in the fields or finish your studies.

It is an impossible choice – but one faced by far too many young people across eastern Congo.

* Some names have been changed to protect identities

Download the full briefing note:  “Women and children first: On the frontline of war in the Kivus”