|
First Person: October 23, 1996
Counting heads and deciding fates in a camp for Rwandan refugees BY BETH ELISE WHITAKER '93 Our aim was to verify the numbers provided by refugee leaders and issue ration cards based on a physical count. The refugees lined up by commune, secteur, and cellule-progressively smaller subunits of the camp which corresponded to regions within Rwanda itself-and entered one of four huts, where "national staff" (Tanzanians) checked behind their left ears with a fluorescent light, looking for traces of an invisible dye. Refugees were marked with the dye to indicate they had been counted; the mark also meant that a refugee had received a ration card or was included on a card issued to his or her family. Next, each family proceeded through a chute to a tent, where the "international staff" (expatriates like myself) counted heads and issued the plastic ration cards, while a refugee clerk recorded the family's size and its card number. Finally, the refugees departed the center through a hut, where they were clicked off on a hand-held counter. The sick and elderly were assisted through the center by five Rwandan social workers, and the group as a whole was watched by 15 refugee guards with switches and five Tanzanian policemen armed with tear gas and clubs. More than 15,000 people went through this tedious process at our center that Sunday and Monday. Their faces and actions revealed much about the anguish of war and human nature in a time of crisis. Early on the first day, I realized that being a mzungu (white person) could be both a blessing and a curse. I moved freely around the center, going in and out of tents, huts, and enclosures without question. People listened to me when I had a problem or a request. Little children reached out just to touch me. People went wherever I asked them to go. I was also given control over the most valued asset in the whole operation: ration cards. I had a certain authority that seemed to come solely from the color of my skin, for it certainly did not come from my age, gender, or employment status. But along with my skin color came certain expectations about what I was able to provide. Countless children and a number of adults held out their cupped hands and demonstrated their newly acquired, if somewhat limited, knowledge of Kiswahili: "Nataka shilingi." When that request went unanswered, they asked for the nextbest thing: "Nataka biskuti." Few believed my claim that I had neither money nor cookies to give them. My ability to communicate in French was also a mixed blessing. It was easier to converse with the Rwandan clerks, guards, and social workers, thereby identifying potential problems and determining workable solutions more efficiently. But many of these very same refugee workers tried to foster special relationships with me in an effort to gain something extra for themselves. Each refugee worker received 200 Tanzanian shillings per day-about 40 cents, just enough for one soda in the market near the camp. At the end of the two days, I became flustered when five different people pulled me aside and asked me to give them extra ration cards for their families. I offered the typical bureaucratic response that I could not break the rules for one because it would not be fair to others. They asked for money instead. The explanation that I did not have a job and was not getting paid for my work at the camp did not get rid of them, either. From their perspective, I was there because I had money and wanted to help-not just the refugees as a group but each of them personally. Eventually, I often walked away from their problems, something which they themselves could not do. Throughout the registration, I was struck by a number of patterns among the refugees. More than once, I pulled out my camera to take a picture, only to decide that the lens was too intrusive. But the images in my head will remain with me for years to come. I remember the tiny twin babies, less than one week old, each held by one young parent. They looked so innocent and oblivious to the horrors of the world they had just entered. But they were just two newborns among hundreds, and representative of the high birth rates within the camps and in Rwanda itself. Families came into the center with five, six, or seven children, many under five years old. Rwanda has one of the highest population densities in Africa, and unemployment and land scarcity were among the causes of its recent civil war. The sight of all these children made me realize how difficult it will be to achieve political stability in the face of continued population pressure. I recall, too, a little girl who was probably only 10 years old, although she claimed to be 15. She sat in a tent, alone on a bench, waiting for someone to explain to her why unaccompanied minors without the proper paperwork could not receive ration cards. When told that we would write down her name and cellule and that someone would find and register her, she began to cry. "What will I do about food until then?" she asked. After a full day of waiting in the sun, she eventually left hungry, desperate, and cardless. When given the same information, others quickly found adoptive families-many people were willing to take on the responsibility of an additional child if it also meant receiving an additional ration on their cards. When one cellule leader wanted to take responsibility for two children and requested individual ration cards for each, the skeptical clerks told me it was common for refugees to sell individual cards on the black market. Although I presided over countless divorces in those two days, one stands out in my mind. U.N. officials had told us to make every effort to keep families together because we were running low on ration cards. But when this particular husband and wife began shouting at each other in front of me, such guidelines became irrelevant. The couple had decided to get a divorce before coming to the center but had not yet determined how to split up their five children. Insults flew as the two tried to secure the card with the higher number of rations. As the crowd looked on and many started to laugh, I punched one card for four people and another for three, then let the clerks decide who got which, without my further involvement. In another case, a woman did not want a divorce from the father of her nine children, but she did wish to be recognized as the head of the family by receiving a ration card, separate from her husband's, for herself and their children. The woman, carrying her two youngest children and surrounded by the other seven, cried as she explained to the clerks that her husband had sold previous ration cards to get money for beer. The accused stood apart from the family, embarrassed in front of the crowd but offering no defense. The woman received a separate card. I also remember the makeshift "prison" set aside for those caught attempting to acquire extra rations. On the first day it was virtually empty, because no one had yet had time to try removing the fluorescent dye from behind their ears. But by the middle of the second day the prison held so many that it became necessary to relocate it. Sadly, nearly half of those sitting in the bright sun, surrounded by guards and police, were children who had been caught with remnants of the invisible markings. The real offenders, of course, were the adults who had tried to erase them in order to gain extra ration cards. Three times I watched a big Russian Kamaz truck load up nearly 100 cheaters and cart them off to the police station. Many of the refugees were deathly afraid of boarding, for in Rwanda similar trucks had reportedly been used to transport people to mass executions. At one point a young woman approached me for help. A friend had told her that her two cousins, ages 18 months and four years, had wrongly been placed in the prison, along with their 24-year-old male guardian. While we talked, the Kamaz truck came to take away the prisoners. As they marched to the truck, the woman grabbed her three relatives. I carried the fouryearold while she carried the toddler. As the truck pulled away, we returned to the hut, where a Tanzanian inspector checked each one carefully behind the left ear and noted with surprise that none of the three had been previously marked. As I took them through registration again, it became obvious what had happened: in the entrance hut, a Tanzanian worker had claimed to recognize the three from the previous day and had sent them to prison without even checking behind their ears. He may have been right, but as the "judge" in this situation, I chose to trust the woman. If she was lying, it just meant that three refugees, including two children, would receive a little extra beans, grain, and oil. Finally, I remember an elderly man who stood in front of me at the registration table. Nearly toothless, he appeared about 70 years old. Two small children, both under the age of four, grasped his wrinkled hand. They stood very close to him, as if his proximity protected them from the daunting outside world. Their eyes were wide with bewilderment. One could only imagine what they had seen. This old man was just one of many elderly people caring for small children, and the sight of these old men and women with the very young moved me to the point of tears. Usually the orphans in tow were their grandchildren, but sometimes they weren't relatives at all.
In those brief two days, i registered births, arranged adoptions, performed divorces, facilitated marriages, and granted headoffamily status. I rewarded some and disappointed others. I decided which of the thousands of refugees would eat and how much. In principle, each refugee family was provided a precisely measured weekly allotment of grain and beans per person, along with some cooking oil. In practice, the ration amounts were determined by me because I had the authority to define a family. I decided if families could break up or stay together, if individuals constituted their own family or part of another, and if new members could join a family. Beth Whitaker '93, a graduate student in political science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, is completing her doctoral field research in Tanzania.
|