People who live in displacement in South Sudan want nothing but peace
People who live in displacement in South Sudan want nothing but peace
UNHCR, 09 Jul 2015
URL: http://on.fb.me/1J5NrXo
"I cannot stop comparing what life was before and what it has now become. Before the conflict, my biggest worry was studying and getting good marks. All of a sudden I found myself in a camp for displaced people queuing for water and food."
Our colleague Rocco recently met Rodha sitting with her mother in a tent at the UN House in Juba, South Sudan’s capital city, home for nearly 30,000 internally displaced South Sudanese. The small but neat room, filled only with a couple of mattresses and blankets and cooking pots and buckets, has been their shelter for the past 19 months. But it’s also a place where she’s let her mind run free. In no time, she opened up to Rocco, who was impressed by her willingness to share her deep feelings and thoughts. But more remarkable, he says, was her ability to analyze the challenges facing her fellow peers.
It’s hard to comprehend the scope of the conflict and crisis. Especially today: the 4th anniversary of South Sudan’s Independence.Before the conflict broke out in South South in December 2013, Rodha was an accounting and finance student at Makerere University in Kampala. She was on holiday, visiting her family in Juba on 15 December, when South Sudan slid into civil war amid a power struggle between the government and opposition.
"We heard rumours that many people were killed in Juba. It was chaos. My mum and I dropped everything and took off." Like many other South Sudanese, Rodha and her mother rushed to flee and found safety within the UN Base in Juba.
"I miss being just a young girl. I missing having the chance to pick out a dress in the morning, chat with my friends and going to class." This is the second time in Rodha’s short life that she’s been displaced as she was born a refugee in Ethiopia 21 years ago. "Only now I know the true meaning of being displaced and living in need. In the camp all seems to be about basic needs and how to get assistance.”
"People need more than rice and a soap bar," she says adding that many children are missing out on education and young educated people like her are wasting the best years of their lives. "I wish I could finish my studies. But it feels like an impossible dream now."
With few job opportunities inside the camp and a palpable fear of venturing into town for employment, displaced youth like Rodha find it very hard to keep themselves busy in the camp.
"I learned to knit out of boredom, but this is not the life I chose. Sometimes I spend all day in the tent dreaming of a better life and happy moments. But some thoughts are very painful when I realize that there is no peace in my country. Without peace how could I even think of a better future?"
Today is an unhappy 4th anniversary for the 2.25 million South Sudanese like Rodha who’ve been displaced: http://trib.al/IzYvVZW
Our colleague Rocco recently met Rodha sitting with her mother in a tent at the UN House in Juba, South Sudan’s capital city, home for nearly 30,000 internally displaced South Sudanese. The small but neat room, filled only with a couple of mattresses and blankets and cooking pots and buckets, has been their shelter for the past 19 months. But it’s also a place where she’s let her mind run free. In no time, she opened up to Rocco, who was impressed by her willingness to share her deep feelings and thoughts. But more remarkable, he says, was her ability to analyze the challenges facing her fellow peers.
It’s hard to comprehend the scope of the conflict and crisis. Especially today: the 4th anniversary of South Sudan’s Independence.Before the conflict broke out in South South in December 2013, Rodha was an accounting and finance student at Makerere University in Kampala. She was on holiday, visiting her family in Juba on 15 December, when South Sudan slid into civil war amid a power struggle between the government and opposition.
"We heard rumours that many people were killed in Juba. It was chaos. My mum and I dropped everything and took off." Like many other South Sudanese, Rodha and her mother rushed to flee and found safety within the UN Base in Juba.
"I miss being just a young girl. I missing having the chance to pick out a dress in the morning, chat with my friends and going to class." This is the second time in Rodha’s short life that she’s been displaced as she was born a refugee in Ethiopia 21 years ago. "Only now I know the true meaning of being displaced and living in need. In the camp all seems to be about basic needs and how to get assistance.”
"People need more than rice and a soap bar," she says adding that many children are missing out on education and young educated people like her are wasting the best years of their lives. "I wish I could finish my studies. But it feels like an impossible dream now."
With few job opportunities inside the camp and a palpable fear of venturing into town for employment, displaced youth like Rodha find it very hard to keep themselves busy in the camp.
"I learned to knit out of boredom, but this is not the life I chose. Sometimes I spend all day in the tent dreaming of a better life and happy moments. But some thoughts are very painful when I realize that there is no peace in my country. Without peace how could I even think of a better future?"
Today is an unhappy 4th anniversary for the 2.25 million South Sudanese like Rodha who’ve been displaced: http://trib.al/IzYvVZW