I am currently in Kampala, the capital of Uganda, where the heads of state summit on refugees, returnees and internally displaced persons (IDPs) is taking place from October 19-23, 2009. The African Convention on the Protection and Assistance of Internally Displaced Persons aims to be the first legally binding instrument to address IDPs and international human rights standards. The Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC) and United Nations agencies estimate that Africa has 11 million of the world’s 25 million IDPs, most of whom have been forced out of their homes by conflict.
Sudan has the largest number of IDPs in Africa with an estimated 4.5 million in 2009. Most of these are from the western region of Darfur (where I was working in September). The Democratic Republic of Congo, since the start of the military operations against the militia in the east in January, has nearly 900,000 displaced persons. This brings the total number of displaced across North and South Kivu and Orientale Province to at least 2 million. Uganda has at least 1.8 million displaced, mainly in north Uganda where the Lord’s Resistance Army continues its stand-off with the government. Most of these IDPs have begun returning home over the past 2-3 years. About 494,300 are still in camps, which is a reduction from 710,000 in February 2009. Somalia has an estimated 1.3 million displaced mainly due to violence, including 700,000 that have fled the capital, Mogadishu since February 2009. Kenya ordered all IDP camps to close in October 2009. Most were victims of the 2008 post-election violence which forced an estimated 600,000 people out of their homes. Cote D’Ivoire has about 120,000 displaced forced from their homes in the west when conflict erupted in 2002, and about 45,000 are still in “transition situations”. The Central African Republic, due to a ceasefire between the government and the armed opposition in 2008, has allowed many IDPs to return home. However, an estimated 100,000 had not yet returned by the end of 2008. In Chad, at least 168,000 people were displaced (April 2009) due to fighting between the army and armed opposition groups, and spillover effects from the Darfur conflict in neighbouring Sudan.
Most IDP camps lack basic facilities such as schools, healthcare, water and sanitation, which lead to widespread acute malnutrition and diarrhea. Often access to IDPs is a major problem for aid agencies due to persistent and unpredictable conflict and violence. Forced displacement across Africa is mostly attributable to human rights violations, political marginalisation, conflicts over natural resources and other socio-economic conflicts. But not all IDPs have left home due to conflict. Natural disasters displaced 284,000 people in Mozambique in 2007, 150,000 in Benin, 73,000 in Ethiopia, and 59,000 in Algeria.
The Kampala summit was recommended by African Union government ministers in Burkino Faso in May 2009 and the African Union Executive Council meeting in The Gambia in July 2006. The current draft convention on IDPs, informed by international legal rules and standards, and approved by AU ministers in November 2008 is, however, non binding. It will only become legally binding once endorsed at the Kampala summit.
MARTINA NICOLLS is an international
aid and development consultant, and the author of:- The Shortness of
Life: A Mongolian Lament (2015), Liberia’s Deadest Ends (2012), Bardot’s Comet
(2011), Kashmir on a Knife-Edge (2010) and The Sudan Curse (2009).
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