Some of the tents used by the survivors of the raging floods.[Rosa Agutu, Standard]
I slept a rich man, then woke up poor waiting for relief food,” Says 50-year-old Bashir Siyadh who lost all his investments during the floods. A parent’s dream is to at least provide the basic needs for their children; Food, shelter and clothing. What happens when such needs are not fulfilled? What does it do to a parent’s mind when you lose everything when just a few months ago you had a homestead, children going to school, healthy livestock, and healthy vegetables on the farm?
From sleeping in a warm bed to sleeping on mats in tents. From eating food from your farmto waiting for relief food. This shift can not only interfere with physical but mental wellness.
“I had wealth that I had accumulated for decades. I knew my future was secure but in a blink of an eye, I went from being financially comfortable to poor. Back to zero,” Says Bashir Siyadh.
We meet Bashir at Marafa village in Tana River County. He is seated with fellow men under a tree. He is among the residents who live in temporary shelters provided by the IOM International Organisation for Migration. Bashir had 150 goats and sheep and 51 cows left with 16 cows.
“I lost my livestock while crossing to the dry land during the floods. I lost others because I could not find a place to feed them, others died of diseases. My cows have a hard time conceiving or lose the pregnancies because of lack of food, and diseases,” he says
Bashir wishes he had sold his livestock.
“You know when everything happened, I was still in shock. Also trying to make sure everyone is safe but now when the shock is gone, I wish I had sold some of them and kept the money in the bank,” he says
Due to congestion, there was an outbreak of cholera.
“Since there’s no hospital nearby. Red Cross had to come with mobile hospitals to salvage the situation,” he says
“We just want our lives to go back to normal. Permanent houses and medicine for our livestock” says Bashir
Joe Mbalu, the Acting Secretary General in charge of Programmes at the Kenya Red Cross. [Rosa Agutu, Standard]
Education was also halted for 3 months. Right now the children go to school however, they still struggle because of a lack of food. Apart from livestock, the floods also affected farmers.
The long rains changed their lives. As the land dried, albeit still risky some of them have decided to go back to their farms and plant, saying, “We cannot wait for relief food. We have families to feed and life has to move on.”
We meet Athman Mohammed Jilo in Gala Mani, Tana River County. Athman also lives in temporary shelters provided by IOM International Organisation for Migration.
We find him near his tent. The Gala Mani temporary shelters are beside the road. Across the road and a few meters down at shore of river Tana is where most residents had their homes and farms.
Athman takes us to his farm, and along the way we see other residents also farming. They have started with maize. Before we reach Athman’s farm a bigger part of the area is covered with mango trees that provide unmatched shade and a slight economic boost when they sell the mangoes.
We finally reach Athman’s farm. He has planted maize and green grams.
“Before the floods, we used to use water pumps. Right now armyworms are our biggest challenge. I have lost two harvests because of the armyworms,” he says
Athamn says when the rains started they were grateful not knowing it would change their lives. Most of them were ready to harvest, but the floods washed away their hard work. They are requesting for farm tools and seeds.
Another resident is 72-year-old Grace Luwa. Luwa is seated with fellow women on a mat outside the temporary shelters.
“I had my vegetables on the farm, but everything was ruined by the floods. I have never struggled looking for food because I had everything I needed on my farm but things changed,” she says.
Bashir Siyadh, who lost all his investments. [Rosa Agutu, Standard]
Armyworms and wildlife are ruining their crops.
“The worms have ruined everything. Some hippos step on the maize and take us back to square one,” she says
Just like Bashir and Athman, Luwa says they do not want to rely on relief food, they want to be equipped so that they can fend for themselves.
“IOM has helped us with non-food items, and we are grateful. But we want to be assisted with pesticides, seeds and farming tools, the rest we can do for ourselves,” Says Luwa
Authorities
The Minister for Health in Tana River County, Joshua Kofa says the cholera outbreak was highly influenced by the congestion.
“We had isolation units. Cholera is a sign of bad sanitation, we partnered with the Ministry of Water, to transport clean water to those areas. We treated the wells and gave them tablets that treat drinking water,” he says
Kofa adds that they did rapid tests before announcing the outbreak. They also sensitized the masses on good sanitation.
A non-governmental organization built toilets made of iron sheets in the camps following the sanitation challenge.
Milka Karai, the Director of Service Delivery Unit in Tana River County says that their main agenda is to ensure the residents are safe.
“We have come up with measures to ensure the residents are aware of early warning signs of disasters. So that we save lives and property,” she says
Head of Programmes at IOM Kenya Sharif Faisal, says the plan is to look for longer-term solutions.
“We have a whole spectrum of stakeholders involved. We are working very closely with the county government. The governor has reached out to partner with IOM. The Tana River government has this cluster approach, where they plan to relocate vulnerable communities to higher ground and create permanent solutions for them; shelter, health facilities, and education. We are discussing with development partners to see what is possible.” He says
On finding permanent solutions, The County Government of Tana River has set aside land for relocating flood victims to higher grounds.
“This undertaking is very expensive because it means moving infrastructural investments like schools, health facilities, and water structures to the new areas. The people have now embraced the programme and slowly it is gaining traction. The County government and some partners have supported through the distribution of building materials and temporary shelter facilities for schools and health facilities and collapsible water tanks,” says County Secretary Mwajuma Hiribae
However, some residents are reluctant to move claiming they cannot farm in the highlands. Joe Mbalu, The Acting Secretary General in charge of Programmes at The Kenya Red Cross, says it’s very difficult to move communities, the decision has to come from them. However, they can farm in the riparian areas but live in the highlands where the cluster villages are.
“There are discussions because this will happen again. There are areas where they can go for farming but keep their families from those areas so that when floods come everyone is safe. We have activated warning protocols, where we monitor and give them real-time information,” he says
Mbalu says they monitor the levels of the monitor so that they can warn the communities in time. By Rosa Agutu, The Standard
A court case against the Belgian state for its racial policy in Congo has kicked off this week, with the legal complaint at its origins reported to be a historic first for Europe.
Five victims of racial segregation in Congo filed against the Belgian state in 2021 regarding its policies at the time of its colonial rule between 1908 and 1960.
The five women were born in Congo between 1946 and 1950 and assert that Belgium was guilty of crimes against humanity, seeking compensation for the suffering they endured as a result of their abduction and segregation and also asking for documentation on their origins and background.
The women were each born from a relationship between a Belgian man and a Congolese woman during the period when Congo was a Belgian colony.
They were taken from their families and taken to orphanages, like most children of mixed race relationships. These children were placed in Catholic missions in the Belgian Congo, but also in places such as Rwanda, far from their homes.
According to documents found in colonial archives, the abductions of such children were organised by Belgian officers, with the knowledge of the Church.
The five victims behind the 2021 complaint lost their case at first instance, with the court ruling that “however unacceptable it may be today, the policy of placing mixed-race children in religious institutions for racial reasons was not, between 1948 and 1961, considered by the Community of States to be a crime against humanity”.
As for the accusation that the Belgian state had “violated fundamental rights”, the court considered that the claimants' action, brought 60 years after the events, was outside a reasonable statute of limitations. The victims have since filed an appeal. The trial continues. By Helen Lyons, The Bulletin
The initiative will be launched at the first knife crime summit aimed at addressing what the prime minister has called a national crisis
LUTHER STAR Idris Elba will join Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer and Home Secretary Yvette Cooper at the first annual knife crime summit today (Monday September 9) to launch a new coalition aimed at tackling an issue that has been described as a ‘national crisis’.
The coalition, called the Coalition to Tackle Knife Crime, will involve campaign groups, families affected by knife crime, young people, as well as Elba’s Hope Foundation.
Solutions
It will collaborate with tech companies, sports organisations, the NHS, and the police with the aim of understanding the root causes of knife crime and developing solutions.
The government has said it hopes the coalition can help halve knife crime within the next decade.
Ahead of today’s summit, Elba expressed his support for the initiative as well as emphasising the need for long-term solutions that empower communities.
“We need to tackle the root causes of knife crime, not just the symptoms” said Elba. “The coalition is a positive step toward rehabilitating our communities from the inside out.”
Describing knife crime as a ‘national crisis, the prime minister will draw from his legal career as former Director of Public Prosecutions, where he witnessed its impact and reiterated the government’s promise to halve offences within a decade.
Devastating impact
Ahead of the meeting, he said: “As Director of Public Prosecutions, I saw firsthand the devastating impact that knife crime has on young people and their families. This is a national crisis that we will tackle head on.
“We will take this moment to come together as a country – politicians, families of victims, young people themselves, community leaders and tech companies – to halve knife crime and take back our streets.”
Ministers are working on steps to tighten regulations on dangerous weapons which includes banning ninja swords as well as strengthening laws on online knife sales.
Commander Stephen Clayman, the national policing lead for knife crime, is conducting a rapid review to understand how knives are sold and delivered to under-18s online, aiming to close legal loopholes.
He will report to the Home Secretary Yvette Cooper by the end of the year. Clayman has warned that knives are too easily accessible and hopes to collaborate with the government, retailers, and the third sector to bring long-term change.
10-year plan
The coalition’s launch marks the first step in the government’s 10-year plan to tackle knife crime, aiming to keep Britain’s streets safe and build on the Home Office’s Young Futures programme to prevent youth violence.
The summit follows meetings in June, where Elba and Sir Keir spoke with families of knife crime victims.
Pastor Lorraine Jones told Sir Keir and Elba at the meeting that she saw her son, Dwayne Simpson, killed with ‘one jab wound’ that ‘went straight through his heart’.
She said: “We want to be around the table with you, because we do have the answers right now. We’ve got patrols, Idris, volunteers that are patrolling before school and after school, because we haven’t got enough police officers.
“We haven’t got enough people in the community, we are desperate. And the most brutal thing is we’re saying it’s becoming the norm. We don’t want it to become the norm.”
The actor also met the King to discuss reducing youth violence through the King’s Trust. Having benefited from a Prince’s Trust grant as a teenager, Elba launched his own initiative, Don’t Stop Your Future, which is calling for an immediate ban on zombie knives. Source: Voice Online
China has offered to provide additional military aid and training to African countries as it seeks to strengthen its security ties in the face of multiple challenges on the continent. President Xi Jinping made this offer—which includes 1 billion yuan ($140.5 million) in military aid and training for 6,000 soldiers and 1,000 police officers—during a speech marking the opening of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) summit on Thursday, September 5. Beijing will also invite 500 young military officers to China to participate in exercises and patrols with their African counterparts and assist in demining efforts, a major concern for some countries due to past and ongoing conflicts.
Details of the package and the countries that will benefit have not yet been announced, but the commitment contained more specifics than the one made at a previous summit in 2021, which included an offer to participate in security projects and joint training exercises on counterterrorism and peacekeeping. However, unlike in 2021, Xi did not mention efforts to control the spread of small arms.
China has intensified its military engagement with African countries in recent years as it competes for influence with the United States. Last year, its military diplomacy ranked Africa second only to Southeast Asia in terms of the number of "high-level" meetings, according to the Asia Society Policy Institute think tank. In recent months, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has participated in a series of exercises with African countries, including an anti-terrorism exercise with Tanzania and Mozambique last month.
China also took part in a naval exercise with Russia and South Africa earlier this year, which drew particular scrutiny due to South Africa's role as a strategic partner of the United States. China has long been a major destination for African military training, including for hundreds of senior commanders trained in PLA institutions. It was also the largest supplier of arms to sub-Saharan Africa between 2019 and 2023, providing 19% of total arms imports and narrowly surpassing Russia, which had long held the top spot and accounted for 17% of imports during this period, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. In addition to small arms, China is a major supplier of equipment such as drones, tanks, and armoured vehicles.
China's long-term focus on Africa means it does not view the continent solely as "a source of strategic resources," but it is also "trying to build political relationships and listen to the views and interests of African elites that were not a top priority for most Western countries." China's influence also has a security dimension, reflected in its military aid. Only now is the West seriously attempting to counter China’s influence by listening to Africa’s voice... The question is whether such efforts are too little, too late. China has provided some form of military aid to nearly every country on the continent as it seeks to strengthen ties and protect its economic interests.
At the end of August 2024, the PLA donated a new set of equipment—mainly howitzers and their accessories—to Benin, which has seen an increase in militant attacks as part of the broader Islamist insurgency across West Africa. Djibouti, in the Horn of Africa, is also home to China's first overseas naval base, and PLA warships regularly participate in anti-piracy patrols in the Gulf of Aden and waters off Somalia.
Military support to Africa could be part of Beijing’s use of the Belt and Road Initiative to gain greater control and presence in geostrategically important regions. Defence News Army
After the village of Bogoro, in the Ituri region of north-eastern Democratic Republic of Congo, our correspondent went to Bunia to interview other beneficiaries of the International Criminal Court’s Trust Fund for Victims. These are victims of Thomas Lubanga, the other Congolese militia commander convicted by the ICC. Their experience is different from that of Katanga’s victims, and the reparations programme there is not yet over.
The Bogoro massacres were committed in February 2003 against a backdrop of inter-ethnic violence between Lendu and Hema in the province of Ituri, north-eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Germain Katanga’s militia, the Force de résistance patriotique de l’Ituri (FRPI), supported by the Lendu, went on a punitive expedition against Thomas Lubanga’s militia, the Union des patriotes congolais/réconciliation et paix, which had set up a base in that village inhabited mainly by Hema.
But before convicting Katanga in 2014 of crimes against humanity and war crimes, the International Criminal Court (ICC) convicted Lubanga in 2012 of recruiting child soldiers. And at the end of 2017, the judges set Lubanga’s collective reparations obligation at $10 million. As Lubanga was declared indigent, the court ordered the ICC Trust Fund for Victims to implement these reparations for 2,500 victims, including 2,100 direct victims (former child soldiers) and 400 indirect victims (parents and close relatives).
Unlike the reparations in the Katanga case, which were implemented by the Fund itself, those in Lubanga’s were carried out by organisations deployed in Ituri. The woman we will identify by the initials NND for security reasons is a former child soldier who was forcibly recruited in 2002 in Nyangarayi, a village in the neighbouring territory of Djugu, when she was selling bananas to help her mother feed her family. Barely 12 at the time, she was raped, conscripted and sent to fight in Lubanga’s UPC.
“This rape fills me with emotion every time I remember it and makes me want vengeance. They stole my virginity and gave me gynaecological problems,” she told Justice Info in Bunia, the capital of Ituri, where we met her in July.
The limitations of business support
NND fought in the UPC for a year and, according to witnesses, served as an escort girl to Lubanga, then to Bosco Ntaganda, another Congolese warlord convicted by the ICC. She managed to escape when the rival Lendu militia came to attack the UPC in Nyangarayi, enabling the young girl as she was then to join her family in Bunia before finding refuge in Beni, in North Kivu. “In Beni, people who had seen me going around as an escort girl in Lubanga’s entourage alerted the security services, who threw me in prison, calling me a spy for the Ituri militia. When I was less than 15 years old, I spent three days in prison,” says this young woman who went all the way to The Hague to testify against Lubanga.
Since 2021, NND has been one of the 2,500 beneficiaries of collective reparations linked to the Lubanga case. Under the auspices of the Italian NGO Coopération Internationale (COOPI), which is implementing the programme, NND has received $850 in support for an income-generating activity (IGA) that has enabled her to open a business selling food (beans and rice) and drinks. “When we started up, we had too many expenses. Out of the $850, we had to pay rent, electricity and various state taxes. The business seemed to be doing well, but the capital was insignificant in the face of the difficulties.
It wasn’t enough to feed you or clothe you. You had to struggle to survive,” she recounts. “We were promised support, but there was no financial backing, so it was worthless. I was forced to sell my items before my rent ran out,” she continues as she welcomes us into her former shop, converted into a dormitory while waiting for her landlord to reimburse her for remaining months.
In addition to the IGA support, NND has also received medical treatment for a fracture she sustained while fleeing the violence, as well as educational support. The reparations programme is financing further education for this former child soldier, who fears unemployment in a country where finding employment is a headache.
Upar Waron is another former child soldier who lost his older brother and father in the ethnic violence in Ituri. He benefited from education and IGA support that helped him finance his medical studies in Bunia. Although the 33-year-old has now finished his studies, he faces a new obstacle. “All the support invested is in danger of being wasted, because I’m struggling to find the money to register with the Order, which is a prerequisite for working as a doctor. The pharmacy that the Fund helped me to open only worked for five months because I had to sell it to finance the rest of the costs not covered by the Fund: they only agreed to pay us 400 dollars a year, whereas we need more than 1,000 dollars for the final year alone,” he explains.
In the Katanga case, some beneficiaries told us that the Fund agreed to support the schooling of children or relatives of the victims who had reached school age. But in the Lubanga case, the situation seems different. “Now they are insisting that they will only provide university education for the victims. But I’m already the father of a whole family, I have children, and what concerns me is feeding them rather than going back to university. Couldn’t they rather finance university studies for our children? We are no longer young nor have the time.
The trials took a long time and now reparations are available, but we’re no longer in a position to study,” explains Bienvenu Baraka, who is in his late thirties and served as a child soldier from the age of 12. During our visit to Bunia, Bienvenu confirmed that he had also received $850 in aid for an IGA, training in plumbing and physical care. “In my six months as a child soldier, I fought in Katoto, Iga Barrière and Komanda. It was on the Komanda front that I fell into a gold mine. I suffered a fracture that kept me in pain for more than ten years. Thanks to the Fund, which has given me treatment, I now have prostheses,” he says with satisfaction.
Ruth’s satisfaction
Like Baraka in Bunia, Ruth Biangire, whom we met in Bogoro, is one of the victims of Lubanga who is delighted to have been given something to rebuild her life. She also received $850, which enabled her to start a bean business, sell fuel and open a butcher’s shop in this cattle-breeding village. “I've managed to diversify my sources of income. Every week, I’m able to slaughter a cow, and every day I can sell 600 litres of fuel (1 litre costs 1.5 dollars). My income helps me to meet my needs properly,” says this satisfied young woman as we pass her sitting on an “azunu”, a seat made from pieces of wood, behind the display of her fuel bottles on the road near Bogoro’s main crossroads.
David Sabiti Mugeni, chief of Babiase, of which Bogoro is the capital, says that the reparations have helped many. “Some may say that the reparations are not proportional to the damage suffered, but they should be pleased that they have at least helped many beneficiaries. Had it not been for the reparations, many would be living as beggars. Reparations can’t cover everything, the important thing is to manage the little you have received well,” says this traditional leader.
What the victims in the Lubanga case, for whom the ICC Reparations Fund programme is due to end in 2026, do not know is whether they will receive the symbolic individual allowance of $250 that was allocated to all Katanga victims.
Women left without care and victims ignored
“My big problem, like that of many women, is gynaecological care,” continues NND. “At the hospital, I was told that the rape I suffered during the war had reduced my chances of giving birth. The same is true for several women who have endured the same situation. But when we ask the people supporting us to provide us with appropriate gynaecological care, they say they have limited resources, even though this is the most important need for us women. Putting this aside troubles us. We don’t feel healed.”
Bienvenu Baraka and Upar Warom are concerned about former comrades with whom they fought in the UPC militia who have received no assistance from the reparations programme. “We need to think about those who have not been identified as victims.
I know two of my former comrades in the UPC who have never got anything, even though we endured the same ordeal,” says Warom. “My two brothers were also in the movement, but the identification took place while they were away digging for gold, far from Bunia,” says Baraka. “So they missed the opportunity to benefit from the reparations. I also know people who were identified to benefit from reparations but whose names were never sent to Bunia.”
In Bogoro, in the Katanga case, local notable Etienne Kagwahabi told us that identification had been carried out while many were still refugees in Uganda. “For the sake of social peace, the court should look into ways of including all these victims who have been left out in the cold,” he says.
Other victims left out are those considered undeserving because they suffered crimes that were not considered by the ICC judges. This is the case of Maki Tchetchu Olivier, who was severely tortured while trying to defend his sister, NND. He met us while we were interviewing her. “When they took my sister from Nyangarayi, I chased them. They also arrested me and took us to Rwampara [UPC headquarters],” he says.
“They isolated my sister in a house where I heard her screaming as she was still being raped. While I was running to the house to try and help her, they took me and tortured me. I was tied up for two days, full of blood. I was taken to a hospital where I spent three months in a coma. Today, I have prostheses in my arms. I also suffered, but I’ve never understood why I was left out of the reparation process for crimes that ruined my life.”
“An apology would be enough”
NND claims they were assured in The Hague that on their return to Ituri, Katanga and Lubanga would ask the victims for forgiveness for the harm they caused. But since the two former warlords’ return to Ituri in May 2020 after their surprise release in Kinshasa as part of a pacification move, “they have never asked us for forgiveness”, she says.
“I get angry whenever their names are mentioned. They ruined my life, they stole my childhood,” says NND. “I didn’t have a normal school education. They destroyed my virginity, my fertility.” But, she adds, “for me, an apology would be enough”.
NND and her brother Olivier explain that the violence of the early 2000s destroyed the social fabric in Ituri and that, in their view, real dialogue is needed to reconcile the many families that have been torn apart. “We are Lendu, but I served as an escort girl for a Hema [Lubanga]. This has never been accepted by members of my family, who still believe that my father sent his daughter to fight with the Hema to kill her Lendu brothers. But no, I was conscripted by force. At home in our village, in Djugu, our family do not visit us because they still think we served the opposing camp,” says NND, tears in her eyes.
In the end, everyone would probably agree with Mrs. Tibelio, in Bogoro, who believes that “the best reparation is peace, because if there is peace, we will be able to develop all our activities, including those supported by the ICC.” ByClaude Sengenya, Justice.info
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