Hope amidst loss; what I learned from working with refugees in Northern Uganda.
“This is the third time in my life that I find myself a refugee, and each time I have had to start afresh.”
“The way I was tortured was so cruel, I don’t think I ever want to go back to South Sudan again.”
These are some of the harrowing tales I listened to when I had the opportunity to intern with the Refugee Law Project at their Adjumani Field Office from end of May to Mid July. I was presented with this opportunity as part of the Clinical Legal Education module offered by the Public Interest Law Clinic (PILAC) at the School of law, Makerere University. PILAC is in fact the source of many other opportunities I had last semester, but that is a story for another day. In this article, I seek to share my experience working with refugees in Northern Uganda.
Background of the refugee situation in Uganda
It has now been recognised that the world is faced with a global displacement crisis with record-breaking numbers of refugees and migrants moving across international borders. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), there are 68.5 million forcibly displaced people around the world with 22.5 million of these being refugees. These are the highest numbers of displacement on record and this has in turn created the largest humanitarian need since the Second World War. In the past couple of years, news reports about refugees and migrants capsized on the Mediterranean Sea or locked out of Europe have become a common feature in the media.
The disproportionate bearing of the burden of refugees has contributed even further to the big humanitarian need because the poorest countries are the ones hosting refugees and migrants while the developed countries have closed their borders to them. This is what the former UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon has referred to as a ‘crisis of solidarity’ because responsibilities are not evenly distributed. A small number of countries and host communities host disproportionate numbers of refugees, asylum seekers and migrants.
Uganda is home to 1.4 million refugees which makes it the second biggest refugee- hosting country. This influx of refugees is largely attributed to the resurgence of the civil war in South Sudan which is the source of over a million refugees. Uganda’s refugee response program, the Comprehensive Refugee Response Framework (CRRF) has attracted global praise as one of the most progressive and generous in the world because of its open door policy which gives refugees a chance to get a fresh start, in dignity. It is guided by the 1951 UN Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees and the Refugees Act 2006. The Refugee Act provides for free healthcare and education in refugee settlements and permits refugees to move freely in the country. Refugees are given fertile land to grow food for the entire duration of their stay in the country, and can work or set up businesses to help them become self-sufficient and less dependent on handouts.
The situation in Adjumani district
The district of Adjumani is located in Northern Uganda on the border with South Sudan. It is considered to be part of the West Nile sub region even though it is east of the Nile because its inhabitants are of the same ethnicity as those who live west of the Nile. Adjumani district has hosted different groups of refugees since 1954.[1] Figures from the Office of the Prime Minister (OPM), the government agency that handles refugee issues indicate that as of 1st January 2018, there were more refugees than nationals in Adjumani with refugees making up 59% of the total population.
Moreover, unlike other refugee hosting settlements in other parts of the country which have been established on government owned land, the refugee settlements in Adjumani have been established on land donated by the host communities. The latest influx of refugees is caused by the civil war that has engulfed South Sudan for the past 5 years.
However, not all is as rosy as it seems. Even though refugees are allowed freedom of movement and freedom to engage in gainful work, only a handful of them in Adjumani are employed or own businesses in a country already suffering from chronic unemployment. Agricultural production is also very difficult because the land there is not very productive. Hosting such a large number of refugees has also had its toll on the environment. The forest reserves, especially Zoka forest, the only natural tropical rain forest in the district measuring 1259 hectares, have been greatly depleted to create settlement camps or to get wood fuel and charcoal which most of the refugees rely on for domestic cooking.
The influx of refugees especially where they outnumber the local population definitely makes district planning difficult. Moreover, this does not seem to be reflected in the resource allocation to Adjumani district local government in the national budget. Corruption is another challenge that threatens to destabilize the refugee response efforts. Some government officials have taken advantage of the refugee crisis to defraud the government and other donors. In fact, at the start of 2018, there were allegations of inflated refugee numbers, ghost refugees in order to defraud the donors to contribute more money.
My experience working with refugees
Refugee law project is a community based organization affiliated to the school of law, Makerere University. In response to the influx of refugees from South Sudan, Refugee Law Project is implementing a project titled “Securing refugee-host relations in Northern Uganda through enhanced protection” and it is funded by the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The goal of the project is to enhance the protection, well-being and dignity of South Sudanese refugees and their hosts in Adjumani, Kiryandongo and Lamwo districts. The project “envisions a safe and stable place of asylum in Northern Uganda in which all refugees and their hosts, irrespective of their legal status, enjoy their human rights and contribute to the development of the region in line with the comprehensive refugee response framework that has been established by the Office of the Prime Minister.”
Being a law student, I worked mostly under the Access to Justice Department of the project. The ability to access justice for refugees is achieved through the provision of legal representation to those in conflict with the law, providing legal advice, carrying out human rights awareness, community empowerment, research and advocacy. This is especially important because refugees are vulnerable persons who often cannot afford legal representation. In addition, the legal regime in Uganda is different from that in their home country and thus the need to sensitize them about the laws of the host state. Furthermore, the official language of the courts of law in Uganda is English which is not spoken by many South Sudan refugees and yet interpreters that speak Madi, Arabic and Dinka (the predominant languages in South Sudan) are not provided for cases involving refugees thus infringing on their right to a fair hearing.
Outside the access to justice department, I participated in the sensitization of the community about environmental conservation and why planting trees is important to mitigate the effects of population pressure on the environment.
These efforts compliment those of the government in line with the Energy Response Plan for Refugee Settlements in Uganda (ERPRS, developed in March 2018) which focuses on biomass generation, environment conservation and protection, and promotes access to improved energy-efficient cooking stoves, capacity building and use of alternative clean fuels.
The situation in South Sudan represents what most African states experienced at the dawn of their independence. They all started out full of hope and expectations after disposing of one oppressor (the colonialist) only to be oppressed by one of their own (a new dictator) or caught up in the power struggle between politicians or tribes. I met people who had been in their prime before the start of the war and had lost everything. Now they lived in huts on food rations of the UNHCR. Others were respectable men and women who had suffered under northern oppression before the secession only to be tortured or raped by people they thought were their own kin.
Many of them have not lost hope. Slowly, they are picking up the pieces of their live, thankful in the first place to be alive. Many of their relatives did not make it past the border. They desperately want the war to end and to see peace return to South Sudan. Others have resolved never to return. They have embraced the psycho-social support groups established by RLP to support each other morally and emotionally, or have enrolled for the English for Adult (EFA) classes to learn English, the children have returned to school and have a chance to be children again. Some have opened small kiosks and other businesses while others are using their skills in music and sports to keep hope alive.
Even if all seems lost, they are trudging on. They are hopeful that the darkness of war and bloodshed shall come to an end and the beautiful dawn of peace shall rise over the beautiful country of South Sudan. Working with the most vulnerable members of our society is an experience that I will forever relish. Not only did it amplify my belief in the ability to use the law as a tool for achieving social justice but also inspired me to think of other ways to help even other vulnerable groups of people to benefit from its protection.
References
[1] Pirouet Louise, (1988) ‘Refugees in and from Uganda in the post independence period.’ In Hansen Holger B and Twaddle Michael (Eds.) Uganda Now: between decay and development, London: James Carrey Limited. pp.158–174
The views expressed are entirely those of the author and not RLP or its partners.
