Dateline ACT

Angola 01/02

Angola: Displaced people have lost everything

Geneva, May 8, 2002

"Children were crying of hunger", reports Victor Balanquete, project officer of ACT member Igreja Evangelica Reformada de Angola (IERA) after his visit to the city of Sanza-Pombo in northern Angola. In a report to the ACT Coordinating Office he writes that about 4,000 displaced families (around 20,000 people) are living in and around the city in Uige Province. "The water-rich municipality with much agricultural potential is now considered a lost place", Balanquete writes. "There is no electricity and all the social infrastructure has been destroyed during 30 years of civil war."

"People are desperate", Balanquete says. A five year old boy told him: "I am hungry and I do not know where my parents are. Since we returned from the bush I am living with people of the same village where I was born." People say that they have lost everything. They had to flee their villages and had to live in the bush.

The situation is worse in the neighbouring towns of Milunga, Quimbele and Cangola, because people receive no assistance in this area. IERA recently started with the distribution of non-food items provided by ACT member Lutheran World Federation (LWF) – cooking sets, blankets, soap, buckets and plastic sheeting for 1,000 families to alleviate the situation of the IDPs. The items were donated by ECHO.

A needs assessment is underway to get an overall picture of the conditions people are living in. An estimated four million people are believed to be internally displaced in Angola. They need urgent assistance - primary health care, food- and non-food items, food security projects and programmes to help with the rehabilitation of the infrastructure.

The civil war that lasted 26 years came to an end in April with the signing of a ceasefire agreement between the Angolan army and Unita rebels. It brought a fragile peace to a country that has been at war since Angola became independent from Portugal in 1975. Previous peace efforts failed.

Many believe that Unita leader Jonas Savimbi was the principle driving force behind the war and that his death six weeks before the ceasefire increased the chances of peace in this war-torn country.

Hundreds of thousands of people were killed during the civil war. It left this resource-rich country littered with landmines and the ruins of war. The connection between the civil war and the unregulated diamond trade, the so-called blood diamonds, continues to be a source of international concern.

Now, for the first time in years, many areas have become accessible and for the first time, relief workers are assessing the situation. But the message is not a good one. Angola is a country desperately trying to survive. Food is scarce. Medical care is often not accessible. Millions of people are displaced. The challenge to rebuild this country is great.