South Sudan refugees in Lamwo decry sexual abuse

South Sudan refugees in Palabek Refugee Settlement, Lamwo District, have accused the host communities and the authorities of mistreatment.

They allege that some of them have been forced to return to their home country due to violence meted out on them in form of sexual harassment, discrimination and assault within the settlements and by the host communities.

Mr Benedict Lokoro Nyemuget, the youth chairperson for Budi County in South Sudan, said: “We have been receiving the issues being raised by the returnees, that they are not being handled well in the refugee camp, some of them left because they are being mistreated. If they want to fetch firewood, they could be arrested and beaten.”

He explained that the inhumane treatment arises when the refugees try to utilise land allocated to them by relief agencies to cultivate and enhance their food rations.

“If you want to do any business on that land or you want to cut trees, they still beat you, so these are the mistreatment that most of them talk about; when they come to us, they report about it,” Mr Lokoro said in an interview last week.

Mr Ben Salfa, the coordinator of the Refugees Relief Commission (RRC) for Mawgi County in South Sudan, added that refugees have complained of mistreatment by the host communities.

Mr Salfa attributed the alleged mistreatment to the reduction of food rations by the government and partners, which has forced the refugees out of the settlement camps in search of means of survival.

Ms Margaret Nakong, the relief and rehabilitation commissioner for Budi County in the Eastern Equatorial, called for thorough investigation of the allegation.

D“I want to tell you that there is no smoke without fire, I think there is something small inside there; you should take these people (commissioners) to investigate our returnees there, we should be visiting them to hear from them,” he said.

Ms Nakong raised the matter last Wednesday when South Sudan and Uganda officials signed a pact in Kitgum District to enhance border security.

Ms Florence Amungo, the women’s representative in Palabek Refugee Settlement, said some of the female refugees are raped when they go out of the settlement to fetch firewood.

Mr William Komakech, the resident district commissioner of Lamwo, which hosts about 85,000 South Sudan refugees, pledged to investigate the issue.

“A criminal can never be spared, we cannot accept that. If the commissioners from South Sudan want to visit the camp, a protocol must be followed,” he said. 

“I am going to go zone by zone and meet the leaders. I want to get fully in touch with them so that immediately there is a situation, they report because we have the capacity,” he added.

However, Ms Fivi Akullu, the refugee desk officer for Palabek settlement, described the allegations as baseless and false.

“In the Refuge Act, this would be the violation of one’s right, and you are telling me my government is violating rights here and of course, it is not true. We need to be honest and humane enough,” she said.

She added: “Sometimes people in the settlement tell me that UNHCR has bought land, has UNHCR bought land for anyone in Uganda? That perspective of thinking that people (refugees) are being mistreated is not true.”

Ms Fivi accused the refugees of using illegal exit routes through the porous borders.

 REFUGEES IN UGANDA

According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Uganda hosts the highest number of refugees and asylum-seekers in Africa, with almost 1.7 million people mainly from South Sudan and the DRC