DRC refugees eager to vote

2005-09-21 14:18

Baraka - On a shaky blue barge crossing Lake Tanganyika, Mukato Selemani, 29, quietly watches the Democratic Republic of Congo's approaching shore, nine years after he fled pillaging gunmen swarming into his village.

Selemani didn't know if his village still existed. But over the weekend, he joined the thousands of refugees piling furniture, bicycles, pots and pans high onto barely seaworthy boats to head home in hopes of voting in elections next year - their country's first in nearly half a century.

Selemani said: "I want peace, I want to vote, and I want a good life for my children. A real citizen will not miss the elections."

He sat and tried to remove a thorn that lodged in his sandy toe as he waded onto the beach in Baraka with a mattress over his head.

Constitutional referendum

While the vote was not until next year, Congolese must register now if they wanted to participate.

Authorities had begun registering voters in June for a constitutional referendum later this year that would pave the way for the 2006 presidential vote.

The registration process staggered by region began in South Kivu last week. The government expected to register about half of the nation's 60 million people by the time it's over.

President Joseph Kabila's transitional government, based in the distant capital, Kinshasa, was hoping the long-awaited ballot would usher in a peaceful era after back-to-back wars that begun in 1996, ended in 2002.

Militia attacks 'commonplace'

Conflicts in neighbouring Burundi and Rwanda had also spilled over into the DRC. However, much of the east remained lawless and banditry and militia attacks were commonplace.

Jan Hesemann of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Congo said an estimated 380 000 refugees still lived in neighbouring countries.

On the other side of Lake Tanganyika, 150 000 of them were living in Tanzania, hoping to return to the toppled walls and roofless churches that had become symbols of Congo's conflict.

For the last month, about 4 000 refugees had boarded private boats and barges, crossing the lake and landing on a beach in Baraka, south of Uvira.

The UN was helping refugees to return to their villages from Baraka.

Refugee to rebuild home

Many of the refugees spent nearly a decade queuing up at camps waiting for food to be doled out in plastic sacks.

Selemani, who fled the DRC in 1996, said he was tired of eating UN maize and beans.

He hoped to find a few old friends in his village, perhaps even his tiny patch of land to cultivate once more.

He said he was determined to begin life anew, even if it meant rebuilding his home, brick by brick.

The villages near Baraka to which some refugees were returning resembled ancient ruins, their homes crumbling.

An 80-year-old grandfather, Alinoti Bukumba, pleaded: "Help me build my wall, I am too weak to do it alone."

- AP