A child rights conundrum

All names have been changed and photos blurred to protect the identities of the concerned people.

Muna cut a forlorn figure at the roadside, her two year old son straddling her hip. 

She was deeply troubled. She had elected to move to another refugee camp with the man she loved and her two young children. Her father, a community leader, had forbidden her to take her four year old daughter with her. 

But, it was the desperate gestures of another woman that caught my attention at the UNHCR transit centre that morning. 

The convoy taking refugees to their new homes in Gendrassa camp had stalled. The vehicles were lined up on the road with the ambulance carrying elderly persons in the lead. Passengers were all seated in the UNHCR bus, mostly women and children. Able-bodied men generally ride on the back of trucks with the family belongings. Others walk the 70km distance herding cows and goats, and arrive in Gendrassa many days later. 

I noticed a woman of indeterminate age in the middle of the road behind the bus. There was a young man with her and one of my UNHCR colleagues. The woman seemed to be pleading with the young man. At the same time, my colleague was appealing to her to get on the bus, giving reassurances that her son would be safe with UNHCR. The woman did not seem to be convinced. 

Later I learned that she was a widow. She had several young children on the bus. The young man, whom I shall call Yusuf, was her eldest son. 

By then I had been in the refugee camps long enough to recognize the importance of families maintaining togetherness as a coping mechanism. Later I deduced that Yusuf's mother had legitimate concerns about her son's security, and desperately wanted him to get onto that bus. 

Yusuf, on the other hand, chose to remain in Jamam with Muna, the young woman who had chosen to be his bride against her father's wishes. By daring to live with Yusuf she had incurred the old man's wrath. The father had forbidden Muna from taking her four year old daughter with her.

Eventually Yusuf's mother allowed herself to be convinced. She boarded the bus albeit reluctantly, and the convoy left for Gendrassa. I approached the couple to hear their story. 

Muna told me the people from her village walked for five days before reaching Elfoj at the border. They fled because of war. She and her husband Muktar carried their two children on their backs; the boy was then a little over one year old and the girl was just over three.

Muna said they all lived in Elfoj for about a month. During that time, Muktar divorced her, invoking ṭalāq in accordance with tradition. According to Muna, Muktar told her father he wanted nothing more to do with her (Muna) or their two children.


In due course, the community was transported by UNHCR and NGOs from Elfoj to Jamam, where Muna lived with her father and the rest of the family. 

Sudanese refugees in Upper Nile live in clusters that are named after their village of origin, in a sense maintaining the social fabric that would have been ripped by the trauma of forced displacement. This being said, the choice of where to live is voluntary; no individual is forced to live with their community. 

To me, Muna's defiance symbolized a chip off the old block. She said her father was headstrong, a very proud man. He owned plenty of cattle and was the sheikh (leader) of his community. Audaciously she had chosen to go away, to marry Yusuf against her father's will. Still, she conceded, if he refused to release the child she had not the power to go against that wish. It was evidently more than a battle of wills. The rights of a child, her child, were at stake. 

Muna was heavy-hearted. She said her little boy was very attached to Yusuf's mother. He had cried to see his would-be grandma go away that morning. Her uncles had advised that she (Muna) should just go. She was tempted to do so, but something was holding her back--she could not desert her own flesh and blood. Her own mother died when Muna was a young child. "A child's place is with the mother," she said, adding that her daughter was ill with fever and was not eating well. She needed to look after her.

Muna showed me her ration card. Both her children were registered in her name, according to UNHCR regulations. As the principal caregivers, mothers are entrusted with the responsibility for collecting entitlements on behalf of their children. Exceptions are made where the mother is absent or is otherwise unable to care for the child. An example of underlying concerns is that a man might remarry, or divert  (eg. sell) food and other forms of invidivual assistance, and thus deprive the child or children.

I probed, trying to make sense of Muna's story. Was she perhaps betrothed to a man of her father's choosing? No, came the reply. Was it a matter of dowry? Negative. In accordance with tradition, Yusuf's family had approached Muna's father to ask for her hand in marriage, offering to pay dowry. Her father had turned them away. Muna's elder brother and her uncles pleaded on her behalf. Her father would not hear of it. Muna could go with her son, he said. His granddaughter would not leave his homestead. 

Muna's maternal uncle Karim found us chatting. He said the old man did not want Muna to leave; he was against the marriage. He said Muna's first husband, Muktar, had since remarried and was living in Jamam with his new wife. He (Karim) and others had tried to get Muna's father to change his mind. The old man was intransigent, arguing that if the children's "owner" were ever to come for them he wouldn't know what to say. In their tradition when a couple divorces, the children become the father's property. 

Afterwards I had a quick chat with Yusuf. He confirmed my suspicion that his mother had been afraid he might come into harm's way in Jamam.  He did not understand what Muna's father had against him. He had humiliated Yusuf's people. When they had approached him to ask for Muna's hand in marriage, he turned them away. Yusuf said he would live with Muna as man and wife, and would look after her children. Yusuf did not think the old man would agree to release Muna's daughter. 

I bade the couple goodbye, puzzling over the conundrum that was revealed to me through a chance encounter by the roadside. Muna's determination to put right the unjustness of her father's decision was remarkable. She could have boarded that bus with her son and Yusuf's family, and gone off to start a new life. She didn't. I thought to myself, Muna's father might disagree with her choices, but did he have the right to prevent her from being with her young daughter. Did the child have rights? Did the mother have rights? 

As we drove back to the UNHCR office, I contemplated the motives of the father I had not met. I saw in his intransigence a risk that he might blind himself to the gathering clouds of change. The unceremonious uprooting of his community and the forced displacement that had brought them to South Sudan were omens. The change would take place imperceptibly with one precedent - and then another - provoking sporadic shocks... 

• He viewed his daughter's actions as an affront... a shock for sure. 
• Would he then not perceive the enforcement of child rights as encroaching on inviolable customary laws... shock. 
• Management of activities in refugee camps would be transferred to elected committees; progressively youth, women, older persons and persons with disabilities would have a voice in decision-making, perhaps emasculating his iron grip ... shock, shock, shock. 

My imaginings evoked the experiences of Obi Okonkwo, protagonist in Nigerian author Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart.

Even now, as I speculate about an individual whose side of the story I did not hear, I wonder how Muna's father could possibly to justify his actions.

As for Muna's story, it is for me a reminder of the distance women the world over still have to go to have their rights and choices respected.  

One family's story

Being unwanted, unloved, uncared for, forgotten by everybody, I think that is a much greater hunger, a much greater poverty than the person who has nothing to eat. 
Mother Teresa 


They arrived at the transit centre in Jamam on a Sunday morning. A UNHCR staff radioed for high energy biscuits and water.
Photos: One family's story: they raised the alarm

It was a family of nine. One mother and eight children whose ages ranged from a few months to 21 years. A good samaritan had brought them from the border to Jamam on the trailer of his tractor. They were sitting under a tree on the ground and on a homemade bed. Their other belongings were in a tent. The mother said her husband, the children's father, had died some months before. She had decided to leave, although the rest of their community remained behind. There was hunger in the land; no sorghum in the fields. 

Photos: One family's story: first contact

When we came back in the evening, the atmosphere was relaxed, almost jovial. It was hard to tell which of the small boys had been sick. Ali had fixed his instrument.
Photos: One family's story: musical evening

This family that had embarked on an improbable journey to escape hunger in Blue Nile state brought on by armed conflict and people's inability to cultivate the land. Seeing them at the way station, with proper shelter, food, water, medical care, domestic items ...and compassionate humanitarian workers who joined them in song and dance, evoked Mother Teresa's quote, "Being unwanted, unloved, uncared for, forgotten by everybody, I think that is a much greater hunger, a much greater poverty than the person who has nothing to eat."

A father's joy

Abdalla Himed is the overjoyed father I met at the UNHCR transit centre in Jamam.

Abdalla had just returned from seeing his wife and newborn twins at the hospital.

He was incredulous. A few days before, he had traveled to Jamam on a reconnaissance mission leaving his wife, the newborns, his mother-in-law and his young daughter at Elfoj, a village near the border. Now they were all here!

Abdalla could not contain his jubilation as he stepped
out of the UNHCR ambulance. His mother-in-law
was behind him.

He would remain at the transit centre with his young daughter and his mother-in-law until his wife and the twins were discharged from the hospital, which is conveniently located a few hundred yards away. 


It is called a transit centre because it is intended that refugees will stay there for at most a few days before being transferred to a formal camp which they will call home until the time comes to go back to Sudan. 


Sunday, August 19. There was an aura of domestic bliss at the transit centre that evening. Women were heading to the water pump to get their supply before closing hours.

They were part of a group of refugees ("new arrivals" in UNHCR parlance) who had been ushered into the transit centre by UNHCR staff a few days before.

Young women squatted by open wood fires preparing the evening meal of kisra, the staple food that is eaten with okra, kudra or wild vegetables.

Mothers and grandmothers played with children. 

Conspicuously, the difficulties of the journey that brought them from Sudan's Blue Nile state to Jamam were nowhere in evidence.  


Each family had already been allocated a tent. They had received food rations to last five days, by which time they should be in Gendrassa, the camp where they  would make their new homes.

The refugees had also received blankets, sleeping mats, kitchen sets, soap and mosquito nets. Those who did not feel well were treated at the nearby hospital. Each person would undergo a full medical screening when they arrived in Gendrassa.

As the sun went down, Grace and I sat with Abdalla. He gushed about the good fortune that had brought his family to Jamam. He marveled at the twist of fate that had brought his convalescing wife and newborn babies, his young daughter and his mother-in-law to Jamam. His incredulity was palpable. His joy masked the burden of his predicament. His boy children had remained in Blue Nile state, Sudan, with his aging mother  and the family livestock.

Two days before, Abdalla had arrived in Jamam from Elfoj near the border with Sudan. Elfoj is one of the main crossing points for refugees fleeing Blue Nile. 

I asked why they fled. There was no food, no sorghum, came the reply. Abdalla said there was no fighting, but hunger was troubling the people. His family had moved to Elfoj hoping to cultivate. The journey was not good. It was a big struggle.


They ate gum arabic on the way. Abdalla's wife was heavily pregnant. She was ill and very tired. She would move for one hour and then sit. She had to rest.

They had five children: three boys aged sixteen, six and four. I remarked that they were too young to have been left behind. He said they were safe with his mother. Then there was the girl aged about twelve and the newborns. 

In retrospect it occurred to me that Abdalla really did not have a choice. He had faced the frightful dilemma of deciding who to take across first. Those little boys were forced to become men while their father brought their expectant mother to safety.

I asked what they were eating. Abdalla had said there was hunger in their village. He responded that they were surviving on goats milk. His mother was taking care of them.


The long slow and very painful journey brought Abdalla, his wife and daughter to Elfoj. They joined his wife's mother who had traveled ahead in June 2012 and was living in Elfoj. It was difficult, he said having to depend on his mother-in-law, unable to provide for his family. They hoped the situation would change so they could go back home.


On 13 August Abdalla's wife gave birth to twins in Elfoj. She was still very sick.

A few days later he decided to come to Jamam.  He had been told that the UN was helping refugees in Jamam. He decided to check before moving his family. He paid money to a tractor driver who was traveling that way, and rode with 32 others--the people now residing at the transit centre with him.

That is how Abdalla came to be at the UNHCR transit centre. 

On that day, 19 August, Abdalla was informed by UNHCR staff that his wife, newborn twins, daughter and mother-in-law had been brought to Jamam by aid workers. 

When I met him, he had just returned from seeing them. The mother and babies would be in hospital for at least four weeks.

Being uprooted is among the worst things experiences one should ever have to go through. It turned Abdalla's life upside down, forced him to entrust the lives of his young children to his aged mother so that he could save the lives of the children who were yet to be born. For all the uncertainty in his life, on that day Abdalla could only marvel at his family's good fortune. 

Later he would have to rescue his three sons, his mother and his herd of goats which were his family's movable assets, leaving behind the house and the land that was his home.

At dawn they despaired

What if we had not rushed to that open field in Jamam as the cloud darkened the sky? The  atmosphere of that UNHCR tent... the rain pouring outside, refugees too tired and hungry to speak, 19 uncomplaining children, mostly toddlers...

Later I remarked about the emotion to a colleague. He said to me, Terrie, those were just 35 refugees. Usually there are several hundred or several thousand. In May we had 32,000 arrive in one go! 

This evokes an entirely different scenario.

I documented the events and my musings on three Facebook albums:
(1) At dawn they despaired
(2) By dusk hope restored
(3) What if... there was nothing for the refugees?

* * *

Huddled inside this UNHCR tent with 35 refugees
we had just rescued from a field, the torment
these 9 women, 7 men and 19 children had endured during
the uncertain journey that brought them to Jamam was
almost palpable. Outside it was pouring with rain.
They were mostly silent. Small children were hidden
in the folds of their mothers' clothes.
  [Photo: UNHCR/T.Ongaro].

At the small (300-capacity) UNHCR transit centre in Jamam I came to witness the anguish of refugees who, having abandoned themselves to an unknown fate, were visibly wearied by the experience of long walks to an uncertain destination and of sleeping out in the open without proper food or clean water. 

That journey was not for the faint-hearted. Those who were afraid had put aside their fears. Literally there was no choice, only the knowledge that others had gone before them and the faith that it could be done.

For refugees who walk the 70km distance from the border to Jamam, the UNHCR transit centre is where they get their first inkling that organized help is at hand.

I rode with the advance party as they went to organize the
convoy. In the car they discussed with section of Jamam
camp they would work on later in the day, informing
refugees how they should prepare for the relocation to
Gendrassa and telling them what they should expect.
[Photo: UNHCR/T.Ongaro]

Monday 27 August was a typical workday for UNHCR staff in Jamam. One team was headed to the larger (1,000 capacity) UNHCR transit centre, complete with tents, latrines and showers. Their first task that morning was to see off a convoy transporting several hundred refugees and their belongings to Gendrassa, the new camp that had been established almost 70km away. 

I jumped into the ambulance with the advance party. They were going to prepare the persons with special needs, mostly persons aged over sixty years as well as pregnant mothers or persons who were ill. 

When the team arrived with the bus, it was immediately
decided that the family would not leave. The bus was
despatched to join the convoy, the boy was immediately
rushed to the nearby hospital [Photo: UNHCR/T.Ongaro]

My colleagues dropped me off at the smaller way station. I had come to say goodbye to a family that arrived the previous day in the morning. They had spent the night there. They were going to Gendrassa to start a new life. They were having breakfast. However, I could see all was not well. One of the sons lay on the ground; the mother squatted next to him. He was not feeling well. He was feverish. His head hurt. The day before we had taken him and his younger brother to the hospital. They were both told to return if they did not feel better. 

As soon as my other colleagues arrived the young man was taken to the nearby hospital.

I was getting ready to return to the office when suddenly we were informed by radio that a group of over 30 refugees (referred to as "new arrivals" in UNHCR parlance) had been spotted in a nearby field. We turned around and headed for the intersection between the main road through Jamam and the 70km road to the border.  


Sure enough we spotted the refugees as we approached the junction. My colleagues Grace and Yasmeen went straight into action.

They told the women and children to get into the vehicle that had brought us, and radioed
for a second vehicle carry the men and the belongings which were scattered on the ground.

As the women and children scrambled into the vehicle, it started to rain.

The refugee women and children were visibly dazed, as the men gathered the belongings.

This coffee urn, passed on in the middle of the drama, evoked thoughts about precious belongings.
What would you cling on to if you had to leave?

View from inside the UNHCR tent.

The children... mostly toddlers. Everyone had spent many nights in the open,
the mothers warding off mosquitoes with their clothes.

Uncomplaining children. They just sat close to their mothers.

The boy's eye was swollen. Others who were not well had been taken to hospital.
No doubt relativizing his discomfort to the threats they had all faced,
his parents said it was ok... just an insect bite.

 This mother will have carried the youngest; the other two would have had to walk.

Hungry? Tired? Afraid? Most likely... all of the above.

His eyes is still swollen. Yet, he is silent.

The men arrive with the personal belongings.

Women's sticks to carry food and water, jerry cans; farming implements for the men.

 

Chicken

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Precious grinding stone.

Cold and wet, the men enter the tent.

Grace explains UNHCR's work as we wait for drinking water and
high energy biscuits to arrive.

The refugees are visibly exhausted.

It is pouring outside. They would have been drenched. 

 

The team arrives with high energy biscuits and water. The young lad must go to the hospital.

Outside the ground is a mess. No way to avoid the gluey mud.  

The young chap is hoisted into the air and taken to the waiting car.

Everyone perks up with the energy from the biscuits.