Feeling abandoned

"It is he who feeds me." Arranging the wood in tiny piles, her daughter Clara is bundling them with a tight knot of stringy grass. Tomorrow they will take a day off from the arduous work in the forest, where they have spent the previous days chopping down trees and hauling heavy logs back to the village.

It might be a day off from the forest, but not a day for resting. Along with four more children, she and Clara will set out before dawn towards their stall at the nearby highway, all heads loaded with the bundles of firewood that is their only means of survival.

Two years ago Pauline Malanda (48) lived a perfectly normal life in the village of Ngoma Tshetshe, The Republic of Congo, tilling her land and waving off the children to school each morning. "Then the soldiers came," she recounts. "They burned everything. We fled to the forest."

In 1997, order started breaking down in Congo. In a heated prelude to the approaching presidential election, fighting broke out between militias loyal to president Lissouba and those of his predecessor, Dennis Sassou Nguesso.

Soon the capital Brazzaville was plunged into civil war mainly fought along ethnic lines between Nguessos’ northerners and Lissouba’s supporters from the south. The neighbouring countries of Angola and the Democratic Republic of Congo joined in the fray, driving Lissoubas forces out of Brazzaville and installing Nguesso as president.

Since then, southern "Ninja" militias have twice attacked the government in an attempt to reinstall the rule of Lissouba, each time in vain.

After the latest attack, launched in December 1998, government soldiers and Nguessos "Cobra" militias decided to root out resistance. For six months they drove the Ninjas still further south, taking the war to the countryside and leaving behind a trail of destruction. Up to a million southerners fled into the giant rain forest.

Accusing them of connivance with the rebels, government soldiers sealed off access to the forest, thus barring all emergency assistance from humanitarian organisations.

"When they came, we just ran, and we lost everything," the widow says. "We spent eight months in the forest, living from leaves and fruit and a little bit of fish. The children were sick all the time, but by the grace of God they all survived."

When a cease-fire was signed in September 1999 and the siege lifted, the famished and sick refugees finally stumbled out of the forest in a quest to regain a normal life.

"But our village was totally gone. Every house had been burnt," she tells. In spite of the cease-fire, Ninjas and Cobras continued to clash in her area - "So we fled again."

Today the family is housed in a rural settlement 20 kilometres outside Brazzaville. All around her, the local inhabitants have taken in other villagers from Ngoma Tshetshe, filling up every vacant house or room.

"The chief and his people were very helpful," she says, explaining that they arrived with nothing. "Somebody lent me this axe. That is why we are still alive."

As the displaced emerged from the forest, local aid agencies were faced by a Herculean task: Not only had more than 800.000 of the country’s total population of 2,6 million been displaced, but the majority was sick and malnourished, their homes were destroyed, their property looted.

One year later, help is still badly needed
" The need for medicines, clothes and building material is overwhelming," explains Mr. Seraphin Bhalat, general secretary for the ecumenical aid organisation ACTA, the local partner of Action Churches Together (ACT).

As the war ravaged southern part of the country hosted most of its industrial and agricultural infrastructure, the bulk of its inhabitants lived in cities and relied on paid labour in the factories or service industry.

"But most businesses were destroyed during the fighting, and practically everybody is out of work," says Bhalat. "They desperately need help to rebuild their houses."

The aid agencies in the Republic of Congo feels abandoned, their plight overshadowed by the crisis and war in neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo. This nation five times larger than Mr. Bhalat’s Congo is constantly in the news for its seemingly never-ending war.

"But we, who managed to settle our differences, we get nothing. What lesson are you trying to teach us?" he wonders.

As ACTA first appealed for help in 1999, it emphasized the need for action during the short dry season of May-September 2000, ideal for rebuilding houses and transportation on the vulnerable roads. But no aid arrived, and now the rain has started falling again, as it will continue to do for eight more months.

Normally the rain will nourish hope and fruits, but this year they are mainly sowing disease and harvesting death, as the destitute population struggle to find shelter and food, says Dr. Barbe Mayam of ACTA. "Tuberculosis is spreading rapidly."

More sick children than ever
A visit at the local paediatric department of Brazzaville’s Centre Hospitalier et Universitaire confirms her claim: Out of 9 beds in one ward, 7 are occupied by children suffering from tuberculosis.

"Malaria used to be the worst scourge," says professor Samuel Nzingoula, head of the department. "Now TB has overtaken it. And please note," he adds: "Malaria is on the rise, too. Facts are, that we have more sick children than ever."

Asked what he needs the most, he stares into the bullet hole in the ceiling of his tiny office and rattles off a long list of medicines. "Medicines, medicines, medicines," he concludes. "We need every kind you can imagine, but mostly anti-TB and anti-malaria."

"Anyway, we were lucky," he adds with a wry smile, talking about the ferocious fighting that ravaged Brazzaville in December 1998. "Only our beds were stolen." Miraculously, many beds were recovered after the fighting had died down.

Walking through the wards with him, bullet holes or larger ones from rocket or artillery shells are visible at any time. "But we still have our hospital. Most of those in the South are completely gone."

Back at house of widow Malanda, 50-year old farmer Maurice Nzonzi has stopped by to say hello. He too used to live in Ngoma Tshetshe, but stayed for a full year in the forest before daring to return. His case is a graphic illustration of the loss endured and the dangers ahead:

"Our main problem has been to find something to plant," Mr. Nzonzi says. "Neighbours have lent me this old hoe, and I have planted some manioc. But what will we eat this coming season?" he wonders, knowing of course, that his manioc will need two years before being harvested.

One of ACTA’s most important programs is the distribution of farming kits, containing of a hoe along with some additional hand tools and, crucially: Seeds for maize, ground nuts and vegetables.

"All stored seeds for the next harvest have been either eaten or destroyed," explains Mr. Bhalat of ACTA. "If we don’t get agricultural production kick-started, we will be facing a new famine in six months’ time."

The ground of Congo is fertile, and its hands are eager to till it.

"Do you need any further indication to tell you, that aid will be put to its best use?" asks Dr. Bhalat. "We’re only waiting to distribute it."

ACT International issued an appeal for the Republic of Congo for US $ 700.000 in June this year. So far this appeal is only 7% (US $ 50.000) funded.

Peter Tygesen is a Danish free-lance journalist presently preparing a book on the crisis in the Great Lakes Region.

Photo: Peter Tygesen/ACT International