Central African Republic: No Longer Forgotten

 

Family of returnees from Chad living on a site for displaced people in Kabo [Photo: Pierre Holtz/OCHA]

The government and armed opposition have stepped back from the brink of civil war in the Central African Republic (CAR) with a peace process that started in early 2008, leading up to the Inclusive Political Dialogue held in CAR’s capital Bangui in late 2008.

But it’s an uneasy and uneven peace that has come to the country; clashes between government and rebel forces continue, banditry and increasingly fragmented armed groups are still spreading fear.

Tens of thousands of CAR’s displaced population – both within the country and beyond its borders – have started to return home, only to find their houses destroyed and their fields overgrown. Some are returning under duress, some of their own free will. And yet more displacements are still taking place in the country; this mixed pattern is expected to continue in 2009 and into 2010. As the political momentum for peace-building grows, it’s essential that the needs of those who have lost their homes due to the violence not be forgotten.

This IDP advocacy campaign ‘No Longer Forgotten’ was launched in Bangui in early 2009, when the Central African Republic was chosen as the first pilot country for OCHA’s global advocacy campaign on displacement.

Using radio programmes, workshops, cartoons, lobbying as well as media coverage, the advocacy campaign aims to mobilise greater services and coordination to help CAR’s displaced population. Reaching out to rebel groups, government, local and international media as well as CAR citizens who have been displaced by violence, the campaign’s principle tools for engaging on the issue of displacement are the ‘Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement’.

The campaign will further seek to mark a shift from humanitarian aid towards the quest for durable solutions, incorporating the key characteristics of return: that it be voluntary, carried out in safety and dignity as well as granting respect for those who choose resettlement over return.

The Representative of the Secretary-General on the Human Rights of Internally Displaced Persons, Mr. Walter Kaelin paid a second visit to the Central African Republic in early 2009. At the end of his trip, he called on peace building efforts to take into account the needs of the country’s displaced population in order to be sustainable.

For more details on CAR’s IDP Advocacy Campaign: http://hdptcar.net/idpcampaign

 

Next: Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement