Evolution of the Evicted - Encouraging Local Methods of Peaceful Coexistence
Sudan is a vast country, and Darfur in the west is a large expanse that prior to 1994 did not know the identity of three states. From Reuters to Richmond, the situation in Darfur is categorized as Genocide, Tribal warfare, civil war, or government sponsored unrest. Terms such as janjaweed, rebels, Arab militia and bandits are used to describe the various parties that are determining the fractured paths of the Abuja peace talks, international press, and the various scars of past and current tribal reconciliation processes. It seems that from distant shores, and around the policy forum tables it is easier to paint broad strokes to describe the pieces of Peace that will stem the flow of this conflict. Washington, the European Union and the UN all have their ideas. But what are the local methods and means? What is the evolution of the evicted, and what platforms and methods do they have to work through the various discussions, debates, and discourse that surround them?
There are many small steps towards peace. Reconciliation is a process and one that often involves many transgressions along the way that allow for one party to see the humanity, the fallibility and the weakness of the other side. In Darfur, Sudan there are many pieces of the equation, and with many ethnic groups, weakened native administrations, disaggregated populations in pressured places, and the international community oscillating between conflict and compassion there are a myriad of complexities that civilians face. Civilians are the ones who must make the decision for peace, and they are also the ones who understand best the path to this conflict. They are the ones who have walked miles to separate themselves from the battlegrounds and the pastures in which the warring factions still confront one another over, rangeland, water, resources, and access.
Abu Shouk is a camp for internally displaced persons (IDPs) located in the middle of the desert. Although it is only a few kms from the center of El Fasher town it looks as though it were set in the middle of the Sahel. There are no trees and as far as the eye can see there are various shades, colors, and configurations of make shift shelters, some in the form of pre-fab plastic covered tunnel shelters, but most made of what wood and poles they can find, covered with small pieces of cloth, blankets and in some cases even clothes. It seems to be an endless sea of people trying to find shelter in sandstorms, blazing sun, and an environment that provides little to no protection. Abu Shouk has been in existence since April of 2004 and is home to some 71,000 people.
Abu Shouk is slowly taking on the shape of a large village, made up of many different people from parts of North Darfur who fled the fighting and destruction to find themselves struggling to define this new space in which they live. Structure is provided through the family first, then the Omdas and the Sheiks that have led and sometimes followed their people to this place that is meant to provide food, water and shelter. Abu Shouk is immense and seems to be a sprawling slum set in the middle of the Sahel. Stretching as far as the eyes can see is a jumble of colorful makeshift tents, shelters and shacks. Already the colors of these shelters are faded by the sun and they are covered in a cloak of desert sand, making mute their once vibrant shades and designs. There is nothing brilliant to this assemblage now, although the sight is overpowering. All available space seems to be filled. There are donkeys, and goats, chickens and children of all ages. It is a rural city springing up from these dry desert sands.
Peace is a process and you cannot have peace without people of different views, perspectives, and experiences sharing their thoughts, fears, and stories to come to a mutual understanding between the parties that were victims and foes. In Abu Shouk there is not only one side to this conflict in Darfur. Abu Shouk is made up of different tribes, and there are even some Arab identified families that have found themselves swept from their homes too, by waves of fire, displacement and extreme fear of attack or retaliation.
The people of Abu Shouk are not isolated anymore separated by miles of desert between themselves and the next small village. They can walk to the health clinic, to a latrine or even to a hand pump or water yard. They can walk, and they have been walking, exploring their new surroundings, marveling at the people that they would never would have met, and slowly emerging into city life, bordered by the desert roads that lead to El Fasher town.
Abu Shouk has existed for over a year and one can see that there is a settling to the patterns in the camp. Abu Shouk is beginning to evolve as people seek to improve the shelter provided to them. The desert sand in some areas of the camp resembles the surface of the moon and is full of deep wells in the earth where brick making is the major industry. Free water yields to brick making an activity that is not only a livelihood issue but also one of security and stability. The water tables are low, the rains are meager and this activity alone is using close to 500,000 liters of water per day. In this cloaked culture, providing walls against the elements and prying eyes allows for families to talk and gather safely far away from this necessary madness. It also creates something that belongs to the IDPs and is not given from the international community. Ahlam, a woman from the Tawilla area in El Fasher now living in Abu Shouk is proud of her compound and when asked about her construction and home she states, “Now I can bathe my children away from all of the eyes that watch me”.
There is a pattern that emerges in these places that we all must be aware of. There are new communities emerging in the IDP camps. They are no longer the small villages isolated by miles of sand. They live closer and are experiencing not only the chaos of a relief and humanitarian environment, but are also meeting new neighbors, having new problems and even developing new conflicts. This world is dynamic and as overwhelming to many as the original trauma from which they fled. Many no longer feel that they will be returning home this year, and have begun to look for land closer to El Fasher to plant and for new livelihoods to provide food for their families.
The people of Abu Shouk are developing coping strategies, and small shelter-side markets to supplement the World Food Program rations that do not always represent the diets and foods that they are use to. They are also developing and refining strategies for peace, mitigation of conflict and new skills to maneuver a world that is much more global than what they knew before. They are doing it well, and with little help from the international monitors and mechanisms that pride themselves with managing a disaster of the scale of Darfur.
The people in Abu Shouk have organized themselves along international lines. The lines defined by proposals and projects that call for IDP participation, councils, and women’s centers. Psychosocial counseling, protection, gender based violence (GBV) and conflict mitigation all are terms they have become familiar with. But how does the local context merge into these mega camps? How are the local methods captured and who defines and distributes the messages from small to secular so that these messages can be shared and discussed to form some path to peaceful dialogue?
Peace in the south of Sudan has taken decades and the Comprehensive Peace Agreement is still rooting itself through legend and legitimacy. It is a long agreement and one that many people in the South will not have read. It is the stories and the oral means and methods that have allowed people to walk for miles and months back to the places that they have fled. In Darfur the stories are still told, of insecurity, fights and rapes. The memory of most people in Abu Shouk is strong and they recognize that this new village, although vast has opportunity that did not exist before. It also has disease, dialects and discourse that they have not heard.
Local capacities for peace exist in small forms in these camps. Abu Shouk has become a form of globalization for the people of Darfur. Many villages blend into one large superstructure that then is full of international staff and programs that provide not only the basic, but also a perspective and a place that encourages new stories to develop and rooted ones to find a place in not only the minds of the locals but into the pages of the International Press. Peace is political in Sudan and as Musa Hilal and Fur leaders travel in Darfur to promote their own form of Tribal reconciliation. Processes are also happening in places where Musa Hilal has not been.
In Abu Shouk people are talking about returning and about staying right where they are. They are changing their shelters, and making brick walls and paths through the plastic pre- fab tunnels that provided the means to escape the desert sandstorms and scorching heat. They are using words like security and safety and do not expect a comprehensive peace. They know that this will take time and they are designing and defining their own ways to construct community and conversation between neighbors that are new and an environment that requires local methods to be new, innovative and inclusive. This is the face of Abu Shouk and probably the face of most IDP camps in Darfur.
Peace processes have always been political and perilous. They involve high stakes and cause catastrophic civilian casualties if the fighting continues. But in order to have these large successes it is also important to note the small ones. There are platforms in places like Abu Shouk where things are happening. People are talking, playing soccer together and making bricks side by side. They are talking about their fears, and talking about the rebels. They are learning that they have mechanisms to cope with their new surroundings. If you ask them questions they do not always have the answers, but they do have ideas. They have been adapting their shelters, and changing their diets. They are also expanding their views and learning about larger structures that their smaller village structures now fit.
Places like Abu Shouk are places that breed pressures and conflict. These camps also provide for varied perspectives and an opportunity for people to learn about other cultures and experiences. Abu Shouk has been in existence in North Darfur for over a year, and perhaps it will exist for many more. The basics are critical, but so is the building, discussing and dialogue for peace, development and cooperation. These relief environments provide opportunity as well as distress and many of these opportunities have already been found on the ground. The question is to see where we are placing structures and programs, where the seeds for community involvement and mitigation may already exist. These camps may be developed along international lines and in grids, but they will evolve based on the needs of the evicted that are seeking to find roots in the places where they are.
There are many small steps towards peace. Reconciliation is a process and one that often involves many transgressions along the way that allow for one party to see the humanity, the fallibility and the weakness of the other side. In Darfur, Sudan there are many pieces of the equation, and with many ethnic groups, weakened native administrations, disaggregated populations in pressured places, and the international community oscillating between conflict and compassion there are a myriad of complexities that civilians face. Civilians are the ones who must make the decision for peace, and they are also the ones who understand best the path to this conflict. They are the ones who have walked miles to separate themselves from the battlegrounds and the pastures in which the warring factions still confront one another over, rangeland, water, resources, and access.
Abu Shouk is a camp for internally displaced persons (IDPs) located in the middle of the desert. Although it is only a few kms from the center of El Fasher town it looks as though it were set in the middle of the Sahel. There are no trees and as far as the eye can see there are various shades, colors, and configurations of make shift shelters, some in the form of pre-fab plastic covered tunnel shelters, but most made of what wood and poles they can find, covered with small pieces of cloth, blankets and in some cases even clothes. It seems to be an endless sea of people trying to find shelter in sandstorms, blazing sun, and an environment that provides little to no protection. Abu Shouk has been in existence since April of 2004 and is home to some 71,000 people.
Abu Shouk is slowly taking on the shape of a large village, made up of many different people from parts of North Darfur who fled the fighting and destruction to find themselves struggling to define this new space in which they live. Structure is provided through the family first, then the Omdas and the Sheiks that have led and sometimes followed their people to this place that is meant to provide food, water and shelter. Abu Shouk is immense and seems to be a sprawling slum set in the middle of the Sahel. Stretching as far as the eyes can see is a jumble of colorful makeshift tents, shelters and shacks. Already the colors of these shelters are faded by the sun and they are covered in a cloak of desert sand, making mute their once vibrant shades and designs. There is nothing brilliant to this assemblage now, although the sight is overpowering. All available space seems to be filled. There are donkeys, and goats, chickens and children of all ages. It is a rural city springing up from these dry desert sands.
Peace is a process and you cannot have peace without people of different views, perspectives, and experiences sharing their thoughts, fears, and stories to come to a mutual understanding between the parties that were victims and foes. In Abu Shouk there is not only one side to this conflict in Darfur. Abu Shouk is made up of different tribes, and there are even some Arab identified families that have found themselves swept from their homes too, by waves of fire, displacement and extreme fear of attack or retaliation.
The people of Abu Shouk are not isolated anymore separated by miles of desert between themselves and the next small village. They can walk to the health clinic, to a latrine or even to a hand pump or water yard. They can walk, and they have been walking, exploring their new surroundings, marveling at the people that they would never would have met, and slowly emerging into city life, bordered by the desert roads that lead to El Fasher town.
Abu Shouk has existed for over a year and one can see that there is a settling to the patterns in the camp. Abu Shouk is beginning to evolve as people seek to improve the shelter provided to them. The desert sand in some areas of the camp resembles the surface of the moon and is full of deep wells in the earth where brick making is the major industry. Free water yields to brick making an activity that is not only a livelihood issue but also one of security and stability. The water tables are low, the rains are meager and this activity alone is using close to 500,000 liters of water per day. In this cloaked culture, providing walls against the elements and prying eyes allows for families to talk and gather safely far away from this necessary madness. It also creates something that belongs to the IDPs and is not given from the international community. Ahlam, a woman from the Tawilla area in El Fasher now living in Abu Shouk is proud of her compound and when asked about her construction and home she states, “Now I can bathe my children away from all of the eyes that watch me”.
There is a pattern that emerges in these places that we all must be aware of. There are new communities emerging in the IDP camps. They are no longer the small villages isolated by miles of sand. They live closer and are experiencing not only the chaos of a relief and humanitarian environment, but are also meeting new neighbors, having new problems and even developing new conflicts. This world is dynamic and as overwhelming to many as the original trauma from which they fled. Many no longer feel that they will be returning home this year, and have begun to look for land closer to El Fasher to plant and for new livelihoods to provide food for their families.
The people of Abu Shouk are developing coping strategies, and small shelter-side markets to supplement the World Food Program rations that do not always represent the diets and foods that they are use to. They are also developing and refining strategies for peace, mitigation of conflict and new skills to maneuver a world that is much more global than what they knew before. They are doing it well, and with little help from the international monitors and mechanisms that pride themselves with managing a disaster of the scale of Darfur.
The people in Abu Shouk have organized themselves along international lines. The lines defined by proposals and projects that call for IDP participation, councils, and women’s centers. Psychosocial counseling, protection, gender based violence (GBV) and conflict mitigation all are terms they have become familiar with. But how does the local context merge into these mega camps? How are the local methods captured and who defines and distributes the messages from small to secular so that these messages can be shared and discussed to form some path to peaceful dialogue?
Peace in the south of Sudan has taken decades and the Comprehensive Peace Agreement is still rooting itself through legend and legitimacy. It is a long agreement and one that many people in the South will not have read. It is the stories and the oral means and methods that have allowed people to walk for miles and months back to the places that they have fled. In Darfur the stories are still told, of insecurity, fights and rapes. The memory of most people in Abu Shouk is strong and they recognize that this new village, although vast has opportunity that did not exist before. It also has disease, dialects and discourse that they have not heard.
Local capacities for peace exist in small forms in these camps. Abu Shouk has become a form of globalization for the people of Darfur. Many villages blend into one large superstructure that then is full of international staff and programs that provide not only the basic, but also a perspective and a place that encourages new stories to develop and rooted ones to find a place in not only the minds of the locals but into the pages of the International Press. Peace is political in Sudan and as Musa Hilal and Fur leaders travel in Darfur to promote their own form of Tribal reconciliation. Processes are also happening in places where Musa Hilal has not been.
In Abu Shouk people are talking about returning and about staying right where they are. They are changing their shelters, and making brick walls and paths through the plastic pre- fab tunnels that provided the means to escape the desert sandstorms and scorching heat. They are using words like security and safety and do not expect a comprehensive peace. They know that this will take time and they are designing and defining their own ways to construct community and conversation between neighbors that are new and an environment that requires local methods to be new, innovative and inclusive. This is the face of Abu Shouk and probably the face of most IDP camps in Darfur.
Peace processes have always been political and perilous. They involve high stakes and cause catastrophic civilian casualties if the fighting continues. But in order to have these large successes it is also important to note the small ones. There are platforms in places like Abu Shouk where things are happening. People are talking, playing soccer together and making bricks side by side. They are talking about their fears, and talking about the rebels. They are learning that they have mechanisms to cope with their new surroundings. If you ask them questions they do not always have the answers, but they do have ideas. They have been adapting their shelters, and changing their diets. They are also expanding their views and learning about larger structures that their smaller village structures now fit.
Places like Abu Shouk are places that breed pressures and conflict. These camps also provide for varied perspectives and an opportunity for people to learn about other cultures and experiences. Abu Shouk has been in existence in North Darfur for over a year, and perhaps it will exist for many more. The basics are critical, but so is the building, discussing and dialogue for peace, development and cooperation. These relief environments provide opportunity as well as distress and many of these opportunities have already been found on the ground. The question is to see where we are placing structures and programs, where the seeds for community involvement and mitigation may already exist. These camps may be developed along international lines and in grids, but they will evolve based on the needs of the evicted that are seeking to find roots in the places where they are.
posted by kukuziwa at 2:23 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home