11 December 2008
DEMOCRATIC REPULBLIC OF THE CONGO:  Life Continues Amidst War
By Wendy Lehman

Goma is very quiet.  From the news, one might think that bullets are whizzing by our heads in this city in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo.  It is hard to imagine that militias and Congo’s army are conducting a war 30 miles from here, and that armed men are raping women, abducting children as soldiers, and shooting unarmed men.

Christophe Mutaka, from Groupe Martin Luther King, told us that visiting Goma is almost like being in North America—you can't really see the impact of the conflict without going to the villages and internally displaced persons (IDP) camps surrounding the city.  War has displaced 250,000 people since August 2008, due to the recent surge in the conflict among General Laurent Nkunda's militia, the national army, and other groups who struggle to control this resource-rich area.  

Although the day to day living, loving, laughing, and struggling continues in Goma, residents also feel a deeper pain.  “People are very tense,” a respected Congolese Quaker with the Friends’ “Healing and Rebuilding our Communities” (HROC) initiative told us.  People “are afraid the rebels will come into Goma” and commit the kinds of atrocities they have in villages near the city, he said.  “When they become rebels,” he added, “it’s like they are not like other human beings” in the way they behave.

Residents are frightened that Nkunda's militia, the National Congress for the Defense of the People (CNDP), could overwhelm the Congolese army, he continued.  When the CNDP got near Goma last month, the Congolese army began raping and pillaging the city. He said that, in Goma, criminals (including soldiers and rebels) act with impunity.  

Still, we found hope in the creative trauma healing and conflict transformation work that various Friends’ organizations are doing.  While we met with the HROC representative, trainers were leading a peace education workshop in the next room.  

On December 10, 2008, the sixtieth anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, we met with a representative of Synergie des Femmes pour les Victimes de Violence Sexuelle, a coalition of 35 organizations working to support survivors of rape and other sexual violence in the Congo.  She told us that sexual violence has increased since the conflict escalated in August 2008, although sexual assaults continue even during the calmer periods.  Soldiers and rebels rape women in Goma or take them as sexual slaves.  But even more so, armed men rape and sexually assault women, and even children, in the villages and IDP camps.

The Synergie representative said that their organization provides lawyers, medical access, and education, including public demonstrations.  She explained that people are increasingly aware of the problem, and are offering legal and medical services.

So, yes, Goma is calm.  But, no, the war is not forgotten.  Not by the survivors, not by the militias that struggle to control the mineral resources we rely on for our electronics, and certainly not by the multitude of local and international groups struggling every day to improve the situation, whether they make the news or not.