Mozambique: Terrorists cause panic in Mecufi town - AIM report
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Remígio Simão, 41, fled the invasion of Palma, in northern Mozambique, with eight children one year ago today. Now, he is trying unsuccessfully to flee hunger.
“We are many, and there is not enough food for everyone,” he tells Lusa, sitting under a tree in the Josina Machel neighbourhood in Pemba, the provincial capital that has served as a haven for thousands of displaced people fleeing the war.
Remígio digs into some scrap metal, while three children cry for lack of porridge, there having been no dinner the previous day.
Of the eight children, all of school age, only two attend classes: the other six do not study “due to lack of conditions”, he says, eyes brimming with tears that sum up the broken lives of thousands, a year after the attack on Palma.
Despite the hunger, Remígio has no plans to return to Cabo Delgado’s ‘gas town’, or of sowing the land. He still fears for the safety of his family.
“We will return,” he says, but no one knows when.
Also unknown is when the consortium led by French oil company Totalenergies will return, after, in April, 2021, ordering the evacuation of its entire work area on the Afungi peninsula.
The largest private investment in Africa, worth in the order of €20 billion, has been stalled since the March 24, 2021, attack on Palma, an invasion by insurgent groups which has plagued the area since 2017 and which lasted for several days, forcing residents and foreigners to flee, and costing an unknown number of lives.
“When we see life back to normal, with state services and the population back, then the project can resume,” said Patrick Pouyanné, leader of the oil major, on a visit to Mozambique in January, on which occasion he said he hoped that work would resume this year [2022].
A joint military force of Mozambican, Rwandan and the Southern African Development Community (SADC) forces has been fighting insurgent groups in the region since July, 2021, leaving Mocímboa da Praia and Palma free from attacks but still awaiting a full renaissance.
The displaced people who had taken refuge in the nearest towns, such as Quitunda, have been returning. People and informal trade are once again back on the streets of Palma, local sources tell Lusa.
Money circulates through mobile applications, because banks have not yet reopened, nor have other establishments. But some accommodation units have occupants, and renovations is in progress, a sign of hope in a recovery to come.
There is electricity and communications, which the armed groups destroyed a year ago, but access to Palma is under military control in order to deny the rebels access.
The resumption of commercial flights between Pemba and Palma is still under consideration, a source from the aviation company that used to carry out these flights told Lusa, adding that those it now operates require authorisation from the authorities.
Travelling by land can be achieved, at great cost, from Mueda, by joining military convoys in which priority is given to the transport of goods and humanitarian aid, such as food and other essentials.
The same sources and the authorities themselves report that civil servants will be called upon to return soon, while solutions are sought to re-equip schools and health units currently trying to function in Quitunda, a resettlement village within the perimeter of the gas project.
“What am I asking for? To reopen our roads, and for the attacks to cease,” says Alberto Nchonho, another displaced person from Palma who found refuge in Pemba’s Eduardo Mondlane neighbourhood a year ago.
National Road number 380 connects the northern and central districts of Cabo Delgado and is the axis of the province, but the cyclones have swept away bridges and the sporadic attacks by insurgents fleeing the joint military offensive still make some stretches unsafe.
Another displaced man, 37, prefers to keep his name to himself, a sign of an unhealed trauma.
He found three people beheaded in the woods while fleeing the 2021 attack, and was saved by a rescue operation mounted by TotalEnergies, but to this day doesn’t know what happened to a maternal cousin.
He asks for someone to take his plea to the authorities: to “make good again” a life turned upside down a year ago.
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