Returning to Stability? Refugee returns in the Great Lakes region
Returning to Stability? Refugee returns in the Great Lakes region
Published: 25 Sep 2019
Overview
A consortium including the International Refugee Rights Initiative (IRRI), the Conflict Research Group - Ghent University, Groupe d'études sur les Conflits et la Sécurité humaine (GEC-SH), Actions pour la Promotion Rurale (APRu) conducted research into refugee return dynamics in 3 zones—near Faradje (Haut-Uélé), in Kalehe (South-Kivu), both in DRC, and in South-Western Burundi.
The departure point of this research project was the need to be able to better understand the interactions between return migration and political processes and conflict dynamics in return zones. In other words, beyond the often-apolitical humanitarian approaches to return, we are interested in the political dimensions of return.
What does return mean – both for returnees and for communities in return zones – beyond the mere repatriation, resettlement and spontaneous return of people?
How does return migration affect, and is affected by, social relations, power landscapes, political processes and conflicts in zones of return?
And what is the role of interventions by international agencies and their local counterparts in these politics of return?
Despite high levels of displacement in the Great Lakes region, international actors have struggled to take into account the dynamics related to displacement and return in their human security interventions. Instead, they have tended to apply an apolitical humanitarian approach to return processes.
Likewise, interventions related to the promotion of political stability and legitimate governance have overlooked the inherent political nature of return dynamics, based on untested assumptions about links between return and legitimacy.
The research aims to showcase the varied ways in which different kind of return dynamics in diverse of socio-economic settings and political regime types play out, shape and are shaped by local and national power constellations and conflict dynamics.
This project was funded by NWO-WOTRO through its “Security and Rule of Law in Fragile and Conflict-Affected Settings” programme: applied research on the political dilemma of legitimate stability.
Displacement Factors
Faradje: In Faradje (Haut-Uélé province, DRC), approximately 12,000 Congolese from Faradje territory took flight to Nyori camp in South Sudan’s Central Equatoria region in 2009, following violent attacks and atrocities committed by the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). The LRA crossed over from northern Uganda, where the origins of the movement lie, to northeast DRC in 2005, after it had been severely weakened by the Ugandan military. The LRA initially settled in Garamba National Park but sparked off a series of violent attacks from Christmas eve 2008 onwards. Faradje was hit most severely in 2008-2009.
Kalehe: The presence in Kalehe territory of the Banyarwanda, a group comprised of both Hutu and Tutsi, is the result of different historical processes, including a colonial policy of mobility inspired by the need for labour force on plantations, and political unrest in Rwanda, which forced Rwandan Tutsi to leave their country in search of security. Many of these acquired the Congolese nationality. During Rwanda’s genocide in 1994, hundreds of thousands of Rwandan Hutu refugees arrived. In addition to these refugees also the former Rwandan army and the Interahamwe, a militia involved in the genocide, settled in eastern Congo and started to target Congolese Tutsi communities. It forced Tutsi communities living in Kalehe to leave their lands and flee to Rwanda, where many continue to live in refugee camps and towns.
Burundi: In Burundi, in April 2015, 15 years after the Arusha peace agreement prompted the end of the civil war, and ten years after the CNDD-FDD party came to power, a protest movement in Bujumbura against the ambitions of president Nkurunziza to vie for a third term, escalated into a major political crisis. Most of the violent escalations of the crisis were confined to specific neighbourhoods in Bujumbura. However, early in the crisis, large scale displacement movements also started from rural areas which saw no large scale violence, mostly from provinces bordering neighbouring countries. The majority of these refugees went to Tanzania, where they were dispatched to the UNHCR-managed refugee camps of Nyarugusu, Nduta and Mtendeli, while others proceeded to Rwanda, DRC and Uganda.
Return Drivers
Faradje: In late 2016, approximately 11,600 Congolese refugees returned from exile because of increased violence in South Sudan. As a result of clashes between government and opposition forces in the vicinity of Nyori Refugee Camp, the safety of many Congolese residing there had become compromised which forced them to return. The vast majority returned to DRC without an official framework of voluntary return supported by humanitarian actors, and authorities found themselves unprepared to assist and register them. These returnees were accompanied by some 34,000 South Sudanese refugees who also fled the upsurge in violence in the zone where Nyori camp was situated. A refugee settlement was opened in Meri, close to Aba, to receive these refugees.
Kalehe: There have been several waves of sporadic and spontaneous return from Congolese Tutsi to Kalehe. A first wave consisted of people who had fought alongside the Rwanda backed AFDL group which toppled the Mobutu regime. Around 2010, when the security situation was stable, another wave returned, this time with cattle, to settle on their former grazing lands. Moreover, several people return to exploit their lands, while not cutting ties with Rwanda, where their families live. Others have come back on exploratory visits. An anticipated larger scale return, assisted by the UNHCR, of Congolese Tutsi refugees sparks nervousness among different communities in the territoire of Kalehe.
Burundi: In August 2017, the governments of Tanzania, Burundi, and UNHCR held a tripartite meeting to discuss assistance to refugees who wished to voluntarily repatriate from Tanzania to Burundi. The Burundian and Tanzanian governments actively promote return of refugees, driven by their respective interests. UNHCR reports that it has assisted 72,000 refugees to return since September 2017. Others, including some interviewed for this research project, have returned ‘spontaneously’, without registering or receiving assistance. So far, returns from other host countries as Rwanda, Uganda and DRC have been limited. In August 2019, in a move not supported by UNHCR, the Burundian and Tanzanian governments announced they planned large scale repatriation in the coming months.
Click on an arrow on the map to find out more.
Kalehe
In Kalehe, we focused on the ‘groupements’ of Mbinga-Nord, Mbinga Sud, Mubugu, Buzi and central Kalehe, where we collected perspectives from both resident communities and sporadic Tutsi returnees from Rwanda. Rwanda currently hosts more than 75,000 Congolese refugees, mostly from the provinces of North Kivu and South Kivu. Kalehe is situated in the latter.
Rwandaphone (Tutsi) who previously lived in Kalehe moved to Rwanda after the Rwanda Patriotic Front (RPF) seized power in Rwanda in 1994, ending the genocide. Most Tutsi fled the mass influx of Rwandan Hutu refugees, including individuals involved in the genocide, in DRC, which created a security threat for them.
The first Congolese Tutsis returned with the successive rebellions in the nineties. Since then, there have been sporadic, informal returns of others, sometimes for short periods. Contrary to the other case studies, large-scale returns are rather a future expectation than an ongoing reality in Kalehe.
Our research has identified the following challenges:
Returnees attempt to reclaim their lands, which has often been sold, spoiled or occupied, resulting in disputes which created tensions with others communities that did not go into exile.
There are few problems in terms of social cohabitation between the communities who stayed and the refugees who already returned, but there is much distrust and subdued tension.
The citizenship and nationality of returnees from Rwanda is being contested by other communities and by armed groups, impacting on their possibility to reclaim land and reintegrate into society.
Local authorities and international actors are not able to provide reliable information and have little leverage on return movements and associated conflict dynamics, which feeds into speculation and rumours, which become part of the repertoire of armed actors aligned with other communities.
Burundi
We spoke to returnees and other interlocutors in the following Burundian communities (‘communes’ in French): Giharo, Nyanza-Lac, Kayogoro, Gisuru. These are all communes important zones of return for Burundians who fled to Tanzania (refugees also fled to Rwanda, DRC or Uganda and have also returned to other areas). They settled in the refugee camps of Nyarugusu, Nduta or Mtendeli.
Our respondents fled Burundi in 2015 and 2016, for a variety of reasons: because of abuses against political opponents, because of fear of more generalised violence sparked by the political crisis, because of socio-economic vulnerability, or because of a combination of those factors.
In August 2017, UNHCR started repatriating Burundian refugees from Tanzania, as both governments wanted refugees to go back. Refugees were transported back to Burundi. Not everybody settled back in the commune they departed from. So far more than 70,000 have already returned. In our research, they mainly cited the dire humanitarian conditions and the encampment policies in Tanzania as their reason to return.
Our research has identified the following challenges:
While there is solidarity and mutual assistance towards returnees, they also face mistrust and socio-political exclusion.
They returned to the same regime and the same precarious economic conditions as before they went into exile, but returnees are now more vulnerable as a social category.
External assistance is a driver of social tensions in return zones: returnees complain about corruption and discrimination, those who stayed in Burundi feel sidelined or ‘punished’ for staying.
While in the past, land was a serious source of conflict, this is less the case for the current return process. Many returnees, however, face difficult access to housing and land.
Faradje
This case study focuses on the situation of returnees in several localities located in the territoire of Faradje (Haut-Uélé province) in DRC. More specifically the case study looks at these dynamics in the town of Aba and its surrounding chefferies (Logo Ogambi, Logo Lolia, Mondo Missa, Kakwa, Logo Bagela), complemented with insights from Faradje town and Kurukwata.
Most of our respondents fled DRC in 2008-2009, because of attacks by the LRA and insufficient protection by the Congolese government. They fled to nearby South Sudan, where they settled in Nyori camp (located in Central Equatorial State between the DRC border and the town of Yei in South Sudan).
When fighting broke out between South Sudanese government forces and rebels, creating serious insecurity around Nyori camp, around 11,600 of the originally 12.000 who had fled, returned to DRC. Together with these returnees, more than 34,000 refugees from South Sudan arrived in Faradje, fleeing the same insecurity. They were settled in in Meri refugee settlement, close to Aba.
Our research has identified the following challenges:
Returnees are frustrated because of the little assistance provided to them, while refugees from South Sudan receive significant assistance from international organisations.
Contestation around preparation of an organised repatriation process (overtaken by the war in South Sudan) continue to impact on relations between returnees and authorities.
There is friction between traditional authorities and new authorities created during the return process, including representatives of the returnee community and humanitarian organisations.
Overall security challenges in the border area between DRC and South Sudan and the refugee presence impacts on the situation of returnees
