Mozambique: Displaced people demand rapid return to homes

Login

Register

http://www.clubofmozambique.com/

Mozambique: Displaced people demand rapid return to homes

8:43 CAT | 27 Aug 2021

FILE - For illustration purposes only. [File photo: Lusa]

The thousands of internally displaced people who fled the terror attacks in the northern Mozambican province of Cabo Delgado, and are currently living in settlements in Metuge district, have expressed the desire to return to their places of origin, where they can rebuild their lives.

Metuge, which is about 40 kilometres from Pemba, the provincial capital, hosts 144,000 internally displaced people, scattered across 14 settlements and it is claimed that but they all want to go home.

Many of the displaced claim that daily life in Metuge is very hard. Almeida Namageiro fled from Bilibilza in Quissanga district with his wife and three children in September 2020, and the terror attacks have destroyed everything he once owned.

“We have faced so many difficulties in to building our huts”, he said. “I have no machete, no clothes and not even a bed to sleep in. We spend the night on the bare floor. When it rains, water pours in, because the canvas is worn-out,” he said, adding that the rice and beans his household received in food aid has now finished.

70 year old Jeronimo Yassine says he has seen the country face three conflicts and his will is to return to Macomia district. “We fled Macomia because the terrorists were slaughtering people as if they were chickens. My house was torched and now I live here depending on government handouts that are never enough. I want to go home.”

The Metuge district administrator, Antonio Valerio, has acknowledged the drama his district is facing.

“We have a very large number of people to take care of and feeding them is a great challenge”, he said. “We have a monthly distribution of a basic basket of consumer goods, but the displaced keep on coming and besides food they have other needs”. Valerio pointed out that, of all the Cabo Delgado districts, Metuge is the one that houses the largest number of displaced.

Source: AIM