As the civil war goes on in South Sudan, more and more refugees are coming into Uganda fleeing the fierce fighting. There are now nearly 680.000 South Sudanese refugees and asylum seekers in Uganda. I am the new Program Director for CARE in Uganda and I just visited our existing emergency response in Rhino refugee settlement. Rhino is in Arua District north western Uganda and borders South Sudan.
In order to get a better understanding of the situation, I also visited the reception center in Ocea where new refugees are registered. While there with my colleagues from CARE I witnessed two buses arrive with refugees within a span of forty minutes. Thirty minutes later, another bus brought even more people. The government camp commandant confirmed to us that, on average, 250-300 refugees had arrived each day that week at this center. The majority of the refugees disembarking the bus were elderly women, women in their middle ages, young girls and young boys. Most of the women had children or were expecting mothers. They carried few belongings ranging from mattresses to baskets, bags and plastic containers, the few items they managed to hastily bring along with them. Their faces told a story of torment, hardship, hunger, worry, fear, exhaustion and relief at the same time. Several of them had lost hope they could make it alive and were happy to have crossed the border and found refuge in Uganda.
However, there was a scramble to get registered. Without registration, the refugees cannot get any form of help or relief items from the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) and aid agencies like CARE. In order for them to also be allocated a temporary residence in Uganda they need to get all their personal details and fingerprints into a database. It was a hot sunny day and there were hardly any proper queues. People were pushing and shoving, sweating under the hot sun to get to the three women who were sitting behind the only three computers, entering the refugees’ information. It was chaotic. I felt for the pregnant women and lactating mothers who had babies on their backs and had to bear these conditions, after an already exhausting flight from South Sudan!
This kind of pushing and shoving is only for the strong and energetic. I questioned myself: “Is this what survival of the fittest means”? I wondered why a fast track system for these groups of people with special needs had not been created at the reception center? I wondered how long it would take for these mothers to reach the desk? Two or three days perhaps? In the meantime, how are their needs addressed? With my CARE gender lens on, it became obvious we needed to intervene and lobby to have an extra desk for people with special needs, including pregnant women, lactating mothers, children leading or caring for other children, the sick, the injured, the elderly. Yet in the mist of such pain and trauma it was hard to determine who is actually more vulnerable? Each individual showed signs of distress, pain, hopelessness, fatigue and so much more. Of course, I remained convinced that pregnant women and lactating mothers needed to be prioritized. They need enough and diverse food, water and rest to regain strength for themselves and their babies. It also became obvious from interactions with refugees that there is an urgent need to identify people suffering from trauma and to provide immediate psycho-social support. More people with empathy at the reception centers are needed and more computers to speed up the registration process. Sadly, as the conflict in South Sudan ravages on, we are expecting many more refugees to arrive in the coming weeks and months.
CARE is responding to this most recent refugee influx by scaling up emergency interventions for newly arrived refugees with support from UNFPA, the Czech Republic and CARE’s own funds. We are currently supporting the refugee community with maternal health services, water and sanitation facilities, programs against gender based violence as well as shelter and livelihood programs in Rhino Camp settlement.
By Delphine Mugisha, Program Director, CARE International in Uganda
Find out more about our work in Uganda here.