The agency said it is appealing the decision and hopes the matter can be resolved quickly. The agency urged the government of Sudan to allow it to continue its vital humanitarian efforts, which affect hundreds of thousands of lives.
Penny Lawrence, Oxfam's international director, said, "If Oxfam Great Britain’s registration is revoked, it will affect more than 600,000 Sudanese people whom we provide with vital humanitarian and development aid, including clean water and sanitation on a daily basis. 400,000 of them are affected by the ongoing conflict in Darfur, where people continue to flee from violence, and the humanitarian needs remain enormous. It will also affect another 200,000 poor people in the east of the country and Khartoum state."
Oxfam Great Britain has operated in northern Sudan since 1983 and currently has 450 staff, 90% of whom are Sudanese. Oxfam is an independent, impartial non-governmental organization, with absolutely no links to the International Criminal Court. Oxfam does not have an opinion on the Court's activities, and our sole focus is meeting humanitarian and development needs in Sudan.
]]>In the DRC, increasing violence has forced people to flee from their homes, and led to the deaths of almost 1,500 people a day. Though no other conflict causes that kind of death rate, Oxfam's workers hear similar stories of murder, rape, and displacement from men and women from Colombia to Sudan every day. Sixty years after the main Geneva Conventions enshrined civilians' rights to protection, they are violated in every current conflict.
Some states and non-state actors choose to kill civilians, or pursue strategies in which civilians are too likely to die. Some governments choose to protect their citizens: to keep them safe. Some do not protect all of them, or not well enough. There are, however, successful examples of protecting civilians that show what governments and others can do when they choose to.
They have an interest in protecting civilians, because mass atrocities fuel the conflicts that, in an interdependent world, create security threats that cannot be contained. And an increasing number of governments have a "moral interest" too, because their electorates expect them to help prevent, not just condemn, the atrocities they see beamed around the world through modern information technology.
To do so, they need to make four key changes.
In early 2003, two rebel groups—the Sudan Liberation Army (SLA) and the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM)—both from Sudan's western region of Darfur, launched major offensives on government bases there. The rebels claimed that Darfur had suffered decades of political marginalization and economic neglect from the Sudanese government in Khartoum. Government forces responded and the fighting escalated. Arab militia, commonly known as Janjaweed and widely believed to be supported by the government, attacked villages, forcing inhabitants from their homes—particularly in those villages and among ethnic groups thought to be sympathetic to the rebels. Now, those rebel groups have splintered into numerous factions and the situation is growing increasingly complex.
Estimates of the total number of people killed vary widely. The Government of Sudan pegs the figure at 10,000, while many activists say the true amount is up to 400,000. Most reports say around 200,000. Violence is one cause of death. Many people have also died from illness and malnutrition—particularly early in the crisis. Since then, the enormous humanitarian response has stabilized conditions in the camps, but renewed insecurity is threatening this progress, and the large-scale displacement of people across Darfur is continuing. Already this year more than 200,000 people have abandoned their homes in the face of ongoing attacks.
Some of Darfur's camps for displaced people are the size of small cities—teeming with tens of thousands of people, many of them having been there so long that they have replaced their makeshift shelters with homes of mudbrick.. But unlike cities in the western world, these dense settlements have no modern conveniences. Pit latrines and water faucets are all communal. Food is cooked over open fires. At night, it's dark. There is no electricity.
Shortages of basic necessities add to the tedium of days spent with little for people to do. For many stranded in camps far from their villages, fields, and pastureland, life has become one long wait—for food rations, for limited amounts of water, for peace. Because of attacks on its convoys, the World Food Program, which helps to feed more than 3 million people in the region, cut rations in half in May and threatened again in early September to suspend some deliveries. In July,2008, about 50,000 people got no food aid at all because of ongoing insecurity. And now, there are fears that malnutrition is rising again.
But leaving the camps is not an option. Many people no longer have homes to return to: The fighting has reduced their villages to ashes. And venturing beyond the perimeter of the camps exposes people to attack. There are continual reports of women being beaten or sexually assaulted when they leave to collect wood for their cooking fires or fodder for their animals.
Almost daily attacks—including vehicles being hijacked, aid workers assaulted, offices robbed—have made it increasingly difficult for humanitarian groups to meet the needs of some of the more than four million people across the region who need help. Darfur is a dangerous, and deadly, place to work.
More than five years after the conflict first erupted, millions of people continue to live in fear without adequate protection—even after the United Nations Security Council passed a resolution more than twelve months ago approving the deployment of the largest peacekeeping force in the world. Known as UNAMID, the force is meant to have 26,000 military officers, police officers, and civilian personnel. But by September, 2008, only a little more than a third of that force is now at work in Darfur—less than 10,000 troops—and they are short of not only things like helicopters, but some of the most basic equipment, too. Troops have been painting their helmets blue—the color the United Nations uses—because there are not enough UN helmets to go around. And forces can't go out on long patrols because they don't have enough ration packs to support those missions.
The international community has failed the people of Darfur by not giving UNAMID the support it promised. Countries around the world are responsible for the delays in deploying the troops and providing for their needs. The ongoing violence—perpetrated by the Sudanese government, rebel groups, and militias—is also hampering deployment. The logistical challenge is enormous in bringing large numbers of troops and equipment from Port Sudan across 1,000 miles of rough terrain—some of it without roads. And the UN's own lengthy procedures slow the works down, too. But Sudan has agreed to the force and it?s up to the international community to work with the government to ensure the troops are deployed.
UNAMID, however, is only part of the solution. A ceasefire and a return to peace talks are also essential.
The crisis in Darfur can't be resolved in isolation from other conflicts and tension roiling the region. There is violence in Chad and the Central African Republic. The peace in South Sudan is fragile. UNAMID is not the only peacekeeping force in the region. It needs to coordinate closely with others as any change in security in this part of the world could trigger large movements of people across borders. The peacekeepers must plan together to address the safety of everyone.
]]>A crowded camp sheltering 25,000 people from the horrific violence of Darfur's five-year-old conflict may seem an unlikely venue, but this is no ordinary pop concert. The tunes are traditional, but the lyrics talk of hygiene and explain how people can avoid fatal diseases. Kaltoum is one of a dozen women who have teamed up with Oxfam to hold weekly music festivals in Shangil Tobai in North Darfur. The concerts bring an afternoon of fun to people who have had fled attacks on nearby villages—but they educate as well as entertain.
"Singing is a part of our lives and we like to sing whenever and wherever we can," says Omer, sipping a small glass of extra sweet tea after the concert ends. "We enjoy it, and the people listening enjoy it, but most importantly our singing now helps change people's lives for the better."
"We take Oxfam's advice about good health and sanitation and put it to our own music," she continues. "You can see the songs changing listeners' behavior. The camp is much cleaner now and there are far fewer cases of malaria and diarrhea. Children wash their hands now without being told. When you tell young children to wash they don't always do as they're asked—but when we sing it to them they join in and have fun, and they really pay attention."
The songs change over time to reflect the needs in the camp, adds Zaharisa, another member of the group. "We used to sing about the need to clean the latrines regularly, but now people are doing this well so we no longer have to sing about it. At the moment my favourite song tells people how to safely and hygienically dispose of waste and get rid of rubbish."
Zainab Basher, an Oxfam health promoter in Shangil Tobai, helps the women organize the concerts. She says the impact has been enormous.
"We hear women and children singing the songs at home and work, and the communities keep asking us when the next performance will be," says Basher. "Now the women perform at weddings and religious festivals, as well as the weekly concerts. Each community has its favorite singers, and keeping latrines and water points clean has become a source of pride. Everyone wants to keep their area of the camp the cleanest. Participation in regular clean-up campaigns has increased greatly."
As the conflict has dragged on five long years, Basher says she and the Oxfam team have had to adapt their work. "We held committee meetings, we visited people's homes, and we trained individuals to become community health mobilizers, but the longer people are here in the camp, the more these methods become routine and ineffective. We needed something new and exciting, so we approached the women singers and they were very keen to help."
The concerts are held in different areas of the camp each week, attracting an audience of hundreds each time.
"We want as many people to hear the songs as possible," says Omer. "Oxfam gives us megaphones for the concerts, to make them louder. The next step is to get cassette recorders to tape the concerts, which we can hand out as gifts to neighbours and relatives so people can listen to the messages at home. Not everyone can sing but we still want to involve them somehow. Some of the women who can't sing are good at playing drums, while others help us write the lyrics."
All over the world, children like to imitate their favourite pop stars. Darfur is no different, and Kaltoum and the women have inspired a new generation of singers who meet every week at the Oxfam health centers in the camp. One popular chorus goes:
"Let us go to school to read,
Let us learn to be healthy,
Let us clean ourselves,
All children, let us do this."
Manahir, a 15-year-old girl from the camp, leads a group of children aged 5 to 16. Some sing, some bang on small drums, and others just clap and cheer. A chant of "clean the jerry can, clean the latrine" gradually gets faster and the drums louder, until the children lose their breath and burst into applause.
"We have great fun, and we learn at the same time," says Manahir. "My friends and I come to the center every day from all over the camp."
Nearby, as the women's concert reaches its finale, another singer named Mahasa takes the megaphone and leads a chorus in praise of Basher and the Oxfam team's recent distribution of blankets and jerry cans for carrying water.
"We thank the aid agencies and the people around the world who send us these things when we have nothing," she says. "If they didn't help us we wouldn't be able to stay here in the camp. We'd have to go home and be attacked all over again."
]]>This is where Asewe stays when she's in Goz Beida, a small town in eastern Chad whose outskirts are now flooded with about 52,000 people forced from their villages by factional fighting. But when it's safe, her home is a tent at Kerfi, one of several sites in the area that the displaced Chadians have temporarily settled.
"That's what my beneficiaries are using," says Asewe about her tent. "It's good to use what my beneficiaries are using."
It's there, at Kerfi, that Asewe likes to be best—in the midst of the people she has come to help. A registered nurse and trained midwife, she is a public health promoter for Oxfam, leading a team of three staffers and a committee of 15. Her job is to work closely with families, showing them how to prevent the spread of waterborne diseases. A musical voice, a warm smile, and an untempered passion are her tools.
Asewe came to this region of Chad in mid-July 2007—at the height of the rainy season—her second posting to the country in a long humanitarian career that has carried her around the world from the tsunami-ravaged coast of Indonesia to Afghanistan, Pakistan, Sierra Leone, Ethiopia and back to Chad. It was raining that first time here, too, back in 2004 when refugees from the Darfur region of Sudan were streaming across the border, many of them having walked for days to reach safety.
She was assigned to Bredjing, a camp that now has a population of close to 30,000 people. But back then, it was just beginning to grow, a chaotic sprawl of families, ragged and tired, desperate for food, water, and shelter.
"It was a very difficult situation. Every morning we would come and we would find at least 100 people, towards the wadi, just squatting around," recalls Asewe. "Some would come with small plastic sheets. Some would have traditional mats, but some would have literally nothing. It would be raining the whole night. The children would have literally nothing on top of their heads."
Many of them didn't survive.
"They put in their own graveyard. Every morning organizations like Doctors Without Borders had outreach people just to count how many graves. Yes. So it was very very painful when they first came."
For nine months, Asewe worked with Oxfam, and alongside other organizations, to bring some order to the camp.
"I left happy, though," she says, "because I had seen the beginning and I saw all the changes—everybody putting in a lot of effort." Besides getting water and sanitation services in place, aid groups had even managed to set up activities for children. And the overcrowding was relieved a bit when some of the refugees moved to a new camp—one that was planned for them in advance, so water systems and latrines were already in place.
For the first few weeks of her posting to Kerfi, about 45 kilometers south of Goz Beida, Asewe couldn't even get there. The heavy seasonal rain had swollen the seasonal river, or wadi, swamping parts of the village, and making it impossible for trucks to cross. The short drive from Goz Beida to Kerfi took six or seven hours through the rain, as drivers struggled to negotiate the mud and gushing streams.
Doctors Without Borders was the only aid organization working in Kerfi at the time, said Asewe and it had managed to get there before the rains began to fall. It had parked two of its trucks on the far side of the wadi rushing by the village.
Eventually, workers built a small raft from old drums. An Oxfam driver would deliver Asew to the wadi's edge, and she would float across, her feet dangling in the water, to catch a ride on the other side in a Doctors Without Borders truck.
"We did that until September," Asewe said. "We were not able to get a driver across until October so that delayed all the possibilities."
But once she was able to set foot in Kerfi, Asewe wasted no time in laying the groundwork for her program.
In crowded situations, where there is little room for people and their animals to live as they are accustomed, the spread of waterborne diseases poses a major threat. In December Kerfi was home home to more than 3,000 displaced people—on top of the 4,200 who were already living there.
"The major issue was there was a lot of wadi water, but no clean water," said Asewe, noting that Doctors Without Borders was treating numerous cases of diarrhea. "It was pathetic. The host community, having been completely surrounded, also lost the area they would use for extra space. Their main complaint was they hardly had any place to get their animals to graze." Nor did they have any place left to use as a bathroom.
"Hence the demand for latrines and water," says Asewe.
In convincing people to adopt new ways of doing things, it's important to make them part of the process—so they own it, too. But first, Asewe has to find out what they know, and in this case, it quickly became clear that people were not making the link between the dirty wadi water they were relying on the diarrhea they were suffering from.
"That gives you a key basis where to start," says Asewe.
She organized a development committee of nine women and eight men from Kerfi who would eventually help her with the big task of public education. After some training, together they settled on three main messages they needed to convey to the community.
The messages may sound simple to western ears, but for the residents and displaced people of Kerfi, they could mean the difference between life and death.
Here is what the health promotion committee and Asewe want the people of Kerfi to do:
Part of Asewe's public education program also includes granting families ownership of community latrines—along with cleaning and maintenance duties. About 20 people share each latrine. When a cluster of three or four have been built for people who are under the care of one chief, Asewe arranges for a handover ceremony, with plans made for who's going to keep the latrines clean and how they'll close them down when they're full. And with each latrine, Oxfam provides a latrine kit—a brush and bucket for cleaning.
Some people get the messages very quickly; others are slower to change.
"The best people to target are the children," says Asewe. They learn quickly and adapt readily. "For adults, they may be able to understand, but changing habits may not be so easy."
But whatever the frustrations may be—wadis overflowing with water, insecurity that keeps her tied to Goz Beida, the slow pace of people's adaptation—Asewe says none of that is enough to snuff out the enthusiasm she has for this work.
"I'm still so happy to be the public health promoter who goes to that little house and finds the child and plays around with them and see how you could improve their little lives," says Asewe. "That makes me more happy. It's quite an opportunity and a blessing."
]]>There can be no way forward for Darfur until all parties to the conflict stop fighting and stop attacks on civilians. Yet, at the moment, the violence continues, causing untold misery for millions of people—with thousands more attacked and fleeing their homes every week the conflict goes on. People across the world must let their politicians know that the suffering of so many Darfur citizens will be tolerated no longer. The international community must put greater sustained pressure on all parties to immediately cease hostilities and return to the negotiating table.
For five years the world has promised the people of Darfur that it will protect them from violence—yet there is still no peacekeeping force capable of giving civilians the protection they need and deserve. The new United Nations-African Union force, known as UNAMID, deployed at the start of 2008 but is still woefully under strength, with only a third of its 26,000 personnel on the ground and a lack of equipment, training, and political backing. The force urgently needs more international support. Getting UNAMID on the ground took 18 months of enormous political effort, but this will be wasted unless the force is made strong enough to actually protect people.
The humanitarian response in Darfur is among the largest in the world and has had an enormous impact on people’s lives. Early in the crisis, large numbers of people died of malnutrition and disease, but over time the mortality rates have been cut and people now have greatly improved access to vital services such as water, food, and healthcare. Yet daily targeted attacks on humanitarian workers are making Darfur an increasingly dangerous and difficult place to work. Oxfam’s staffers are still managing to assist over 400,000 people – but it is becoming ever harder to do so. The international community must ensure that all the many parties to the conflict respect international humanitarian law and allow aid to reach those who desperately need it.
Despite the vast humanitarian effort and the need for a stronger protection force, the only sustainable solution to the conflict is a political one. The peace process has stalled again recently and world leaders must provide sustained, coordinated leadership to reinvigorate efforts to unite the countless factions and bring all parties back to negotiations. Greater effort must be made to ensure such talks are truly representative of the people of Darfur, by increasing the involvement of civil society and marginalized groups, and reflecting the needs and concerns of all Darfur’s many ethnic groups.
While soldiers and militia fight, it is the ordinary people of Darfur who suffer. They want nothing more than an end to the conflict and to be able to get back to their normal lives – but they need our help to make this happen. People all over the world can help ensure their political leaders do not allow attention on Darfur to fade after five years. Darfur must not be allowed to become yet another “forgotten crisis.” To do so would condemn millions of its people to years more suffering.
]]>"Life is water," says Oxfam's Brahim Abdel-Madjid. "Without water there is no life at all—enough water, sufficient water, good quality water."
Here at Koloma, that is what Oxfam is helping to supply to some of the 180,000 Chadians chased from their homes by recent waves of violence between rebel forces and government troops. About 7,400 displaced people have settled at Koloma, one of seven sites in and around Goz Beida in which Oxfam is now providing emergency services for a total of 52,000 people.
And for some, the help aid groups have offered, coupled with the advantages of being near a town like Goz Beida with its new hospital, mosque, and market, hold enough promise for a better life that home no longer beckons them.
"Some will not go back—even with security," says Abdel-Madjid, who is the team leader for Oxfam's public health education programs in the Goz Beida area. "Most of the people living in the temporary sites had never traveled to Goz Beida to see that there's a big market. You can trade. You can start a new life."
Clean water is certainly one of the lures—a benefit that has helped to soften the hardships many have experienced as their family members have been killed, their homes ruined, their villages abandoned.
In the mottled light inside a mat hut at Koloma, a crowd of women—and a baby or two—has gathered. These are the sushies—the female leaders of their communities. Sitting on the ground, folded in their colorful wraps, they talk about their lives since fleeing their villages and coming to this sandy sprawl of makeshift shelters. Abdel-Madjid translates.
Food is in short supply, they say. And they have no land to farm. To earn money to buy extra food, they gather wood in the bush to sell in the local market.
Many of them have lost everything in the conflict. Fatouma Sosal tells of the four huts that once belonged to her family in Tiero. All of them were burned down. She talks about the millet she used to grow in her fields and her lost self-sufficiency.
Kadjidja Mahamat says the days here at Koloma can be long, filled only with the chores of trying to keep her temporary household in order: cooking food in the morning—if there is food—washing her children's clothes, patching her hut.
But at least there is water—clean and ample—and for that the women are happy.
In their villages, says Abdel-Madjid, families used to drink from the same source in which they bathed and also shared with their animals, which left their droppings nearby. People were sometimes sick and their children would have "blajose," or bloody urine. But with clean water supplied from a large Oxfam storage tank erected at the edge of their settlement—and a new understanding of waterborne diseases and the importance of good hygiene—problems like diarrhea have disappeared.
"A lot of these people are coming from huts in the middle of the desert. They get to Goz Beida and suddenly they get clean water, schools, health care," says Sarah McHattie, an Oxfam program manager. "I don't think we'll see a big return."
The question of when—and if—displaced people will return to their villages is a complex one, says Poul Brandrup, Oxfam's country program manager in Chad. There are many factors people weigh in making that decision.
"They need to be convinced that they will be able to re-establish sustainable livelihoods," says Brandrup. "Safety is important. So are primary health services and water. And we are increasingly hearing their strong wish for their children to be able to attend school."
One of the realities is that the temporary settlements in which people can now access those essential services are, in fact, "artificial," says Brandrup. They offer limited possibilities for people to establish and maintain themselves over the long-term. For instance, without Oxfam?s assistance, communities could not sustain the kind of water systems—with deep boreholes and expensive diesel-powered pumps—on which they now rely.
"The displaced understand that it will not be possible for all to stay in the current sites," Brandrup adds. "At the same time, many villages have been destroyed and land taken over by others so return in those cases is no longer an option."
Economic and social development for rural villages may play a key role in some people's willingness to return.
"It is not possible to drill thousands of boreholes to replace the existing water systems," says Brandrup. "But people can learn to develop traditional open wells better and to ensure that water is not contaminated by animals or unsafe practices. This is, in most cases, the way to go when and if the displaced people can return to their villages."
Khadidja Saleh has already made up her mind about that—at least for the moment. She doesn't intend to leave Gassire, a settlement for 16,300 displaced people on the other side of Goz Beida.
Not far from the steady thump of an Oxfam generator pumping water for this temporary community, Saleh welcomes visitors into her home. A collection of three huts for her extended family, Saleh's improvised compound is like many crowded onto this dusty patch of earth, cobbled together from branches, plastic sheets, thatch, and grass matting.
The mother of six children, Saleh, her husband, and their family made it here safely after a three-day walk from their village of Fagatar—a place she does not want to go back to.
"Many, many people have been killed and no one took time to bury them," she says through an interpreter. "There will not be peace there."
Instead, she says, she would like to stay here and possibly farm a little plot where she can grow vegetables such as ochra—if she can get some land. It feels safe here, she added. And the water is close by and clean.
In Fagatar, Saleh spent about two hours each day fetching water for her family, lugging it home on the back of a donkey. Here, water taps are a short distance from her home. She and her children visit them four or five times a day, filling a 20-liter jug each time.
Even though there is not enough food for her family to eat here yet, Saleh is confident that the international aid groups that have streamed into the region to help will do just that—make sure that she, and the tens of thousands of other displaced villagers, will have at least the basics for survival.
"Here, the place is safe, so one day the food can come," she says.
But the challenges, including insecurity and lawlessness, that confront aid groups in this poor and remote region are enormous—and the needs of people seemingly without end.
As Saleh's visitors bounced in their truck away from Gassire, they passed a thin and tired-looking woman slapping the rump of donkey, urging it onward with its heavy load of a child and a battered pair of plastic water jugs. From the bottom of one, a steady drip of water caught the light. It drizzled from a rag plugging a hole—an afternoon's labor draining into the dust.
]]>I like to sleep. But by six o'clock the first rays of the sun are coming through the holes in the wall of my family's shelter, the cocks and donkeys start their shouting, and the camp starts to come to life. The first thing I do when I get up is pray. I ask God to look after my family, and bring peace to Darfur. Then I get on with the household chores... so many chores! I boil the water on the fire to make tea, I wash my brothers' and sisters' clothes, and then I clean the cooking pans. I don't enjoy cleaning and sometimes I'm tempted to do it very quickly, but Oxfam is always telling us to clean the pans thoroughly and I'm scared of getting sick if I don't!
By 8 a.m. I'm on my way to the community center. It's a short walk from my house and it's run by Oxfam. At the center I take lessons in hygiene and English. I like the hygiene class because I can see how to make changes in our house that keep my brothers and sisters healthy. Now whenever I see a woman not taking proper care of her latrine, or not cleaning her jerry can (for carrying water) I get very upset with her. I like the English class, too, but it's very difficult. Maybe next time we can speak in English, but I don't think so!
I am not married yet. Insha'allah—God willing—I will be soon. But there are few men my age in the camp. Most people here are women, old men, and children. Many younger men are away fighting. Or dead. There was a boy in my village who my friends used to tease me that I would marry, but now I don't know where he is. So for now I live with my mother, two little brothers aged 8 and 9, and two sisters aged 11 and 13. My father is no longer with us. I'm the oldest, which means I get to be in charge, but also that I have to do most of the work while my brothers get to play soccer.
At 10 a.m. it's time to go home and make breakfast. We have two meals a day—breakfast at about 11 a.m., and then dinner in the evening. I like to eat goat meat but here in the camp it is too expensive. My mother taught me long ago to make stew from vegetables, but it would be so much nicer with some chicken in it. I also like assida, which is one of our famous Darfur dishes. It's like a thick porridge made from sorghum. Back in my village, every time there was a celebration—a wedding, a birth, a new visitor—we would have roasted meat to eat and a big party in the village.
After breakfast I head to the Oxfam water point. I do this at least once every day. At the moment there are big queues. Today I had to wait for more than one hour and it was very hot. But the other women have to wait, too, so I get to catch up on all the news while I'm waiting. I usually take one of my little sisters with me to help carry the water home as it can be too heavy for one person.
We use water for everything. I can't even imagine what it would be like to be without it. Every time I eat I need water—to boil the food, to wash the vegetables, to get rid of the dirt and germs. Everything I drink is either normal water or boiled water for tea. I use the water to wash the clothes of the whole family. We don't have any animals but some of my friends' families have donkeys and the water also keeps them alive and healthy.
The afternoon is more of the same. Living in the camp I really notice how life feels very repetitive. I go to school, I cook and do chores, and then I do it all over again. In the afternoon I go back to study at the community center for an hour or so, and then I go home to prepare the evening meal. Even the food is usually the same.
I very rarely leave the camp. Why would I? Here there's a water point, a market, a community center. Outside there's danger—soldiers and guns. My mother goes out of the camp maybe twice a week to collect firewood, which we can use at home and sell what's left over. This is the only money we get. I feel guilty: It's so dangerous for my mother to do this. The women often get attacked or shouted at or shot at. They won't let me go with her. They say only older women should go as young girls are more likely to be attacked. Secretly I'm glad: I don't want her to go alone, but I don't want to go with her because I'm scared of the men.
When I first came here we saw the camp and the aid agencies and felt safe. Unhappy, but safe. Now even the camp is dangerous. At night nobody really goes outside their shelters. When I'm done cooking I stay home and study. I would like to do my English work but I have nobody to practice with. I study until it gets dark after eight o'clock, and then we go to bed and start the day again.
It's difficult for us here. Look at our shelter—it's very basic. This is not home. Soon the rains will come and then some of the shelters will be destroyed. What will happen to those people? I know the aid agencies are doing their best, but there are so many people here and everybody always needs something. I think the only way our lives will really improve is if we go home. But we can't go home because people are still being attacked. I will stay in Kalma until peace comes. I just hope it won't take too long.
]]>The achievements of Oxfam and other aid agencies in Darfur have been truly incredible. Jan Egeland, the former UN Humanitarian Coordinator, described the humanitarian response in Darfur as among the most successful in the world, and he was right. The high levels of mortality and malnutrition that we saw at the start of the crisis have been greatly reduced. Many people now have better access to water, sanitation, and education than they did before the conflict. However, other things have not improved. People in Darfur still live in daily fear of violence. Those living in camps cannot go outside without risking attack. The number of people in need of help keeps rising. There are now four million people in Darfur who rely on aid.
What are the biggest challenges Oxfam faces now in Darfur?
Safety and security is by far the biggest concern for both civilians and our staff. Our ability to reach people in need is decreasing due to hijackings and attacks on aid workers. Early in my time here I drove for hours through North Darfur, from El Fasher to our programs in Kebkabiya, through quite stunning scenery. Now this road is far too dangerous for us to use and we rely almost entirely on UN flights. In terms of security, we are operating at the very limit of what we can tolerate as an organization, and if the situation continues to deteriorate then we may be left with no option but to withdraw from Darfur. The humanitarian impact of this could be catastrophic. It's vital that the world leaders do more to ensure an end to the violence so that aid agencies can continue our life-saving work.
The crisis is now in its fifth year. Is there any sign that Darfur will move on from being a humanitarian emergency and into a development and recovery stage?
Oxfam has been working in Darfur for more than 20 years, carrying out development work with local communities. We all hope that we can resume this as soon as possible. But at the moment Darfur is still an enormous humanitarian crisis and we cannot resume large-scale development work until there is a sustainable political solution to the conflict. People continue to be attacked and displaced by the thousands. We are still seeing people arrive in the camps where we work. The situation in Darfur is incredibly complex and we have to be very careful. For example, many of the villages that people have fled from are now inhabited by other communities, and if we were to provide development assistance to them we would risk legitimizing this.
What has been your proudest achievement in your time here?
The relationship between non-governmental organizations and the Sudanese government has been complicated and at times difficult. Back in early 2004 we just could not get our staff members the necessary visas and permits to get to Darfur and respond to the urgent needs there. It was very frustrating. Our staffers have since done a wonderful job in building a working relationship with the authorities—both in Khartoum and at the field level—and as a result these problems have now been eased considerably. Without this success, we would not have been able to have such an impact on the ground and provide water and assistance to half a million people.
And your biggest frustration?
When I took up the post of country program manager, Darfur was one of the world's largest humanitarian crises. Today the security situation for people there is perhaps even worse, and the prospect of peace seems as far away as ever. It has been incredibly frustrating to see the hard work of our staff thwarted by insecurity in so many places. In Gereida in South Darfur, for example, the team did a magnificent job to set up water supply to 130,000 displaced people. But since then we have had to withdraw from the area because of insecurity. Across Sudan there are still many challenges. Marginalization and poverty are still endemic, and there are increasing threats to the nationwide Comprehensive Peace Agreement.
Finally, what personal memories will you take from working in Africa's largest country?
Outside Sudan, very little is known about the country, its people, and culture. What does get attention is mostly war and human suffering. Despite the enormous problems in the country, the Sudanese people are incredibly friendly and welcoming. I can honestly say that in my years of working around the world, my job in Sudan has probably been the most satisfying and enjoyable. The Sudanese are also extremely resilient people. It is incredible to go to the camps in Darfur or to the harsh deserts of the east and see how people cope in the face of adversity. It makes me feel confident for the future that Oxfam can work closely with local communities to help build a better Sudan.
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