In the DRC, UN Peacekeepers Help People Feel Safe Enough to Return Home
21 February 2007
While many thousands of people remain in camps for displaced people in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, others made the decision to go home. Some of those who have returned explain why.
Along the shore of Lake Albert lies the small village of Datule—a place of frequent militia attacks and many deaths in the conflict that began to grip the DRC in 1998, forcing more than a million people to flee their homes.
But since June 2006, said Chief Singo Pele, people have started to come back to Datule.
"When we heard that there were government soldiers here, together with MONUC, we knew it would be safe for us to return," he said, referring to the United Nations peacekeeping mission in the country. Without those soldiers there, Pele said, people would not have been able to return.
In the hills in Iga Barrière, people have been returning to the village of Lingo, too. There Tchethu Singoma, the head teacher of the school, gave a broad smile and the thumbs up when asked about the current security situation.
"Total security!" he said. "Before, we were troubled by war. The two groups, that were causing all the fighting, came together and talked, and after their discussion they agreed to stop the war. And people felt it was safe to return."
Again, it was the presence of MONUC that helped people feel secure enough to come home, added the village's head teacher, Generose Fwaling.
"People started to return when they saw that the MONUC soldiers were here," she said.
Not far from the village of Kagaba, a MONUC base has also been lending a feeling of security to the area. It's one of the reasons people from other places have begun to settle around Kagaba, where camps for displaced people have also grown up.
"Our wish is this: That the MONUC soldiers stay here," said Ayi Gerar. "We really don't want them to leave."
