Monday, July 15, 2024
Dori, Burkina Faso
At 43 degrees, a few meager trees struggle to shade the tents and makeshift shelters in the camps near Dori. In northeastern Burkina Faso, thousands of displaced people have fled jihadist violence to these precarious shelters where their future seems hopeless.
In the Wendou 2 camp – an extension of the huge camp of the same name, which alone houses some 3,000 displaced people – Hawa Mama admits that she “doesn’t even have the strength to move anymore”.
“Even if it’s difficult here, over there (in the villages, editor’s note) it’s worse. We have no choice but to stay here. We have nothing left over there. We came here, and we’re forced to stay in these conditions,” says the fifty-year-old in Fulfulde, the language of the Peul ethnic group, red loincloth wrapped around her head.
Kirissi Sawadogo also fled her village of Lรฉlly, in the Sahel region, to save her life.
“It’s because of the situation the country is going through. They came to our village, they threatened us, they stole our cattle, they killed people. That’s why we had to flee and why we came here”, she explains to AFP, as she crumbles burnt tรด, a dough made from millet flour.
Rarely named by the displaced, these armed men are generally jihadist fighters, linked to al-Qaeda or the Islamic State, who have been terrorizing the population with bloody attacks for almost 10 years in Burkina Faso.
The Sahel region is paying a heavy price: a quarter of the two million internally displaced people in Burkina Faso come from there, according to official figures from March 2023, which have not been updated since.
The Wendou camp was even attacked in September 2023, killing at least 8 IDPs.
At the beginning of the year, 85% of schools and 69% of health facilities in the Sahel region were closed, according to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA).
– Relying on ourselves” –
According to a ranking by the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) published on Monday, June 03, 2024 , Burkina Faso is experiencing the world’s most neglected displacement crisis, for the second year running.
“The Sahel is a region that is systematically neglected,” stresses Jan Egeland, NRC Secretary General, on a visit to camps near Dori at the end of May.
“And now, on top of that, there is a diplomatic and political crisis between donors in Europe and the West, and new military governments, across the Sahel,” he continues.
Like its neighbors Mali and Niger, also plagued by jihadist violence, Burkina Faso is governed by a military regime that came to power in a coup in 2022, and whose relations with Western powers – particularly France – are tumultuous.
The authorities regularly claim victories over the jihadists, but attacks continue and part of the territory remains out of the army’s control.
“We’re just here, with nothing, we have to rely on ourselves to survive”, laments Amadou Dicko, who arrived 6 months ago with his family in Torodi, another camp near Dori, where the desolate landscape is the same as in Wendou.
To earn a few thousand CFA francs, some of the men work illegally in the surrounding area, despite the security risks.
Sitting on a mat on the ground, in a shelter of about 3 square meters made of secco (a plant fence), wood and tarpaulins, Aissetou Amadou arrived at the same time.
She and her family had to flee their village near Gorgadji, threatened by “armed men”.
“It’s the children who try to bring back food. Yesterday they were able to bring back 2 kilos of rice (bought in town). We cooked half of it in the evening and the rest this morning”, she says, without knowing when the next supply will be possible.
– Risky supply –
Dori is a large town in north-east Burkina Faso, close to the N3 road leading to Ouagadougou, and a nerve center for supplies to the region.
But while humanitarian aid for essential needs arrives by air via World Food Program (WFP) flights, the necessary food, petrol and agricultural inputs still travel by road, under army escort.
Along the RN 3, dozens of trucks are parked, waiting for the green light to leave in convoy, on this dangerous stretch of road regularly targeted by jihadists on the very outskirts of Dori.
“Before, you could load your vehicle at 7pm in Ouagadougou, and by 5 or 6am the next day at the latest, the vehicle would be in front of your store,” recounts Amadou Hamidou Dicko, president of the Dori traders.
“Nowadays, you have to wait 15, 30 or 45 days, depending on the day, because they never tell you exactly when the convoy will start,” he says.
As a result, the cost of transport has risen, and is reflected in selling prices.
“Two or three years ago, a 50 kg bag of rice sold for between 16,000 and 17,000 CFA francs (24-25 euros). Now it’s 27,000 CFA francs (41 euros)”, explains Mr. Dicko. Dicko.
So sometimes, traders opt for what they call “the bypass”, via other routes, unescorted, at the risk of having their goods and trucks stolen or destroyed.
At the Wendou camp, Kirissi Sawadogo finishes crumbling the tรด. That evening, she will add a little water and salt and feed it to her children.
Humaniterre with AFP
Photo AFP
