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File photo: Lusa
The last internally displaced persons who were staying in Paquitequete beach of Pemba city were on Thursday transferred to their destination, O País reports. They had been there for about a month.
These are families who left their areas of origin fleeing the terrorist attacks in Cabo Delgado and who did not have the means to continue their journey as far as they intended to go.
“Although having lost to the armed attacks almost everything I had in my life , I am happy to return to my homeland,” said Roque Colete, a young man born in Memba, Nampula province. He was a fisherman in Pangane, Macomia district, since 2008. He married and had four children there.
Despite losing his home, his assets and his main means of survival, Silva hopes to start over in Nampula province. “I’m going to Nacala and if I can’t go back to fishing, I could be a carpenter” or work on another activity “to support my family”.
Another internally displaced person who stayed for about three weeks in Paquitequete was Zaria Anli, a 30-year-old single mother who fled with her four children from Matemo Island, Ibo district.
“In Matemo, I left nothing. I fled the war, [first] fto Pangane, then to Macaloe and later we returned to Matemo ”. From Matemo they fled to Paquitequete., Pemba
“I left nothing, everything was burned”, repeats Zaria, adding that she and her children went through “a lot of suffering” as they were forced to “flee to the forest”, where they spent “days without water or food”.
“And we would only return to Matemo when they [the terrorists] left. Then we would take that time to eat what they left ,” explained Zaria Anli, who looks forward to starting a ‘machamba’ [ agricultural field] as a means to feed her children.
Deactivating some basic services at the beach
With the departure of this last group of internally displaced people who lived for about a month at the beach of Paquitequete, the government of Cabo Delgado is deactivating some basic services that it had installed for assistance purposes.
“We have already deactivated the public toilets / bathhouses that we had installed and, within two days, we will do the same with a health post, given that the movement of displaced people has reduced considerably. However, we will continue to be monitor the situation [arrival of displaced persons] because although the number has reduced, there are families who continue to arrive in Paquitequete, ” explained the Administrator of Pemba district Joaquina Nordine.
According to statistics, since 16 October, the date on which the massive disembarkation of persons displaced by terrorist attacks began, the city of Pemba received more than 10,000 persons, mostly women and children coming from Palma, Mocímboa da Praia, Macomia, Quissanga and Ibo Island.
Some of the internally displaced people were accommodated in the homes of family, friends and people of good will. Another group was moved to Metuge district, where IDP camps have been set up.
By Hizidine Achá
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