H.S. is 32, but he looks worn, tired and far older than his years. His mother was an Ethiopian. His father, a Somali, came from the powerful Darod clan. He is currently living in Uganda. Many of his troubles stem from his mixed origins, and his story is one of endless flight from circumstances over which he has no control.
At 4pm on 5 April 1993, H.S. walked home from his school in Mogadishu. Years of civil war had disrupted his education, and at 23 he still had several years to run. Despite the growing turmoil in Somalia at the time, he and his family had been relatively unaffected by the war. His father, a businessman trading a variety of goods within and around the Horn of Africa, was prosperous, and the family import/export business in Mogadishu had not been touched. Recently, however, he had been ordered either to join or to give money to the Darod clan.
When I was close to my fathers house, I suddenly saw that something terrible had happened to it. It had been burnt down. There were bodies lying around. Our neighbours saw me and ran to me and held me. The bodies were those of my entire family. My father, mother, three brothers and one sister were all dead. They had been massacred by the Darod clan. Everything my father owned had been destroyed and burnt. I cannot remember anything of the week that followed. It was like being mad. Someone, I dont know who, took me away from there. For one lost week I was mad.
Between camps
H.S. was now looked after by members of the Habr Gedir clan and, very slowly, began to build a new life. After six months, pressure was put on him to become more involved with military matters. I didnt want to fight. As the only survivor in my family I wanted nothing to do with fighting. I had seen my family die for nothing.
He now decided to leave Somalia and fled to Kenya, where, having neither money nor documents, he lived on the streets. The police soon arrested him for not having documents, and imprisoned him in the expectation of a bribe. When it became clear that he had no money, the police let him go, but only after two days in a cell without food. A week later, he moved on again, to Uganda. He reached the border confused, exhausted and weak from lack of food, and managed to make it as far as the capital, Kampala.
According to UNHCR, there are approximately 180,000 refugees in Uganda. These are only the recognised refugees, for no one knows how many asylum seekers are waiting for their interviews to decide on refugee status, and how many people remain in Uganda after their applications have been turned down. There are also a small number again no one knows how many who have lost their refugee status because they were absent when the last census was conducted. In Uganda, Sudanese and Congolese refugees are granted refugee status almost automatically, whereas other nationalities have to undergo a rigorous status determination procedure conducted by UNHCR and the government.
The huge majority of the refugees come from Sudan and the Democratic Republic of Congo, but there are also significant numbers of Rwandans, Burundians and Somalis, as well as some fleeing political persecution in Ethiopia and Kenya. UNHCR and government policy dictates that refugees should be confined to overcrowded camps, situated for the most part in the remote border districts of Western and Northern Uganda. Yet there are also between 10,000 and 14,000 recognised refugees in Kampala itself, most of them there on account of security or medical matters, or still awaiting interview. Many of the problems arising in the refugee world of Uganda stem from rivalries and disputes that have travelled to Uganda with the refugees. From month to month, these reflect each and every conflict in the region.
When H.S. reached Kampala, he registered with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, and he began to feel that he might have found somewhere to rest. He had not, however, reckoned with the volatile and suspicious climate that rules the refugee world. Being half Ethiopian and half Somali made him deeply suspect in the eyes of both communities. Each assumed that he was spying for the other. One day he was stopped by some Ethiopians with knives. They slashed at his head and face, leaving cuts and gashes which needed stitching. That same day, they filed a report against him with the police, backing up their accusations with a bribe. The police sought him out and beat him with the butts of their guns.
UNHCR now came to his rescue, but they sent him to Nakivale refugee camp, in south-western Uganda. But there too he came under threat from both the Somali and Ethiopian communities. In the four days I spent there, twice at night people came with knives to my tent. I woke up to see myself surrounded by men with covered faces. I shouted out Help me! Help me! and some of the other refugees woke up. After some treatment for depression, the camp commandant said I should go back to Kampala, but when I got there they told me that I should return to the camp, if I wanted assistance. If I chose to stay in Kampala, I would receive no help.
The world in a Kampala compound
H.S. had in fact, initially at least, been in a fortunate position. He had been interviewed by UNHCR and granted refugee status. He was now awaiting news of possible resettlement in Australia. He decided to stay in Kampala while waiting to hear. The Ethiopian and Somali communities in Kampala continued to harass him.
In 1998, the day before he was due to go to Nairobi for an interview at the Australian High Commission, the sister of the man whose house he was sharing accused him of beating up her brother. H.S. was detained for three days, and consequently his resettlement to Australia fell through. Later, both the police and the man admitted they had made a mistake. A friend got him out on bail, but then demanded that H.S. marry his sister and take her with him if he should be resettled in the west. H.S. felt that he was not in a position to refuse. He married her, only to find out that she was HIV positive. With this news the prospect of resettlement fell through. Something of the nightmare of uncertainty most refugees constantly face, hopes endlessly deferred, is apparent in every twist of the story of H.S.
The position H.S. is now in is bleak. He cannot move freely around Kampala, since when he does he is regularly threatened by the Ethiopian and Somali communities. He lives in the compound of a small human rights organisation, as it is unsafe for him to live on his own. He cannot work because Uganda bars refugees from working here. His hopes of resettlement in a safe country have all but disappeared. The prejudices and threats that he fled from in the Horn of Africa have followed him wherever he has gone. He is extremely depressed, fearing that he has no possible future.
Not long ago he wrote this poem:
Where is my hope?
Our hopes are worn out
With pain of crimes committed against us.
Facing death, torture and slavery,
What hope do we have?
Like animals we are hunted.
Our homes are destroyed.
Parents, brothers and sisters killed.
Where then is our hope?
Refugee, my dear friend I do recall,
Was chopped to death as we watched,
For he was weak and tired,
We saw then no hope.
To the community where I was,
I have become an enemy,
Rebels, murderer, and robber are my names,
Daily my hope withers away!
Computer age the new meaning of life,
Yet reading and writing are our dreams,
But the continuing war is the substitute,
Who then can bring us hope?
