The forgotten refugees

Goma, Sunday morning, we are on our return journey from bigger refugee camps direction Goma. The air smells of sulphuric acid from the Vulcan. We pass a small camp some 15 km away from the city, in the suburb “ Lac Vert”. There are about a hundred of huts surrounding the local church. We don’t find an announcement panel of one or another organisation present in the region. I ask the driver to stop the car in order to find out about the local situation.
Some people come to me with timid greetings. The children are full of scabies are malnourished and dressed in dirty rags. Children still wave in a friendly way.
Some people come close to me and my driver, who is my interpreter. Many people speak French. They take me to the refugee camp. All have similar stories to tell us - they ran away from their villages because of the war and fighting which is going on for several months, and they don’t dare to return to their villages. They are desperate for they do not receive help from anywhere.
The huts are built with nothing more than what reed sticks, dried palm branches and some tarpaulins. They live in a hut, which measures 2 m. by 1.5 m, with no less than 6 people. It is the place where they live and sleep and are a little protected from the rain.
They are in search for food and use any mean to get it. They can get medical care or what is called so from a local dispensary, where most of the medicines are not available .The first question that rises in me is whether there is no cholera ,because the hygienic situation is as such that an epidemic could start at any moment.
I hear stories of their misery of having to leave their homes and village to escape violence and war, not knowing where to go and where they will reach and not knowing if they will ever be able to return to their homes. They have been already ion other camps where they would not get help from anywhere. They left the camp in the hope to find a place where they would be assisted.
Because it is Sunday most of the men have gone to search for some food. The main question is if they will find anything. Terrible situations which make me sick. I have a sudden feeling that all that misery is making me really sick. I realise that I can’t help this by myself. I can only listen to the people and I promise that I will be back in the afternoon.
I ask them to make some pictures.
In the afternoon they are already waiting anxiously and when they see me they are very happy that I kept my promise. I am invited to the sacristy of the small church and some more refugees join, they have the same long stories and they feel relieved if they can tell their story of misery again and again and how they have been crying for help in other camps but could never succeed. I explain to them that I can not do miracles and I promise them to go tomorrow to the vice governor and will surely try to organise help. They do not expect me to do miracles but I see in their eyes the expectation that I will surely arrange to help them.
They show me the situation of the refugees in the camp and how everybody lives in inhuman circumstances.
It is time to leave and feel convinced that I will be their voice and take it up for the forgotten refugees. I am convinced that Memisa will be capable of making the difference.
We leave without knowing if we will succeed to come to their rescue.
What I have seen is only the top of the iceberg. The needs are immense. but everybody hopes and calls for peace .
Br. Luc Vansina, ofm Cap.
Goma, DRC
National Coordinator of Memisa Belgium in DRC