Behind "enemy" lines, February 2007

For those of you, that have been following African affairs, you will know that the Government of Chad (more specifically the President) is contested by a number of political opponents. Some of these have taken temporary shelter in Sudan from where they are organizing guerilla warfare with the obvious aim of toppling the Government/President. For many years, but particularly of late, Eastern Chad has witnessed many battles the "rebels" trying to dislodge the regular army from various towns. As the semi arid landscape lends itself to a "hit and run" tactic by armed men on Land-Cruisers, governmental and rebel forces have been playing a game of cat and mouse taking then fleeing one town after the other. Having an impact on the media might be the present cause of these battles as these little towns of Eastern Chad have hardly any economic and/or strategic value per se, but then having a larger and larger presence in Chad proper is also a current objective for these groups.

On November 25th 2006, Abéché was "captured" for 24 hours before being "liberated" the next day. This was the "highlight" of the last few months. Following this, a state of emergency had been called in many prefectures of Chad and more "action" followed.

Another ancestral feud in the south west of Chad opposes "Negroid" farmers to "Arabic" herders, this situation obviously complicating the situation with Sudan/Darfur's conflict spilling into Chad.

In the past few weeks, various battles were fought in this area with Abc & Xyz towns being taken over by rebel forces. Obviously this caused thousands of nearby villagers to abandon homes and move to relative safety, on one side or the other of the divide. As the ICRC mandate is to give assistance to all sides of a conflict, we are thus present on both sides of the no mans' land.

My current assignment is to coordinate the setting up of a base that will be located in Abc town, enabling us to be present with staff and hence to start the various aspects of our activities.

An expatriate engineer arrived a few weeks ago and his first task is to build this base which will have: a few rooms for offices, tents that will be put up on concrete slabs under a roof to provide housing for local and international staff, shower and kitchen blocs plus storage room. Once things are sufficiently built, he will lead our team of well diggers that are to create 4-6 wells in nearby villages.

But!!! Before driving or flying to Abc, one needs to get military clearance from governmental forces plus obtain the approval of the warring faction before showing up your pretty face in front of those machine guns mounted on the back of Land Cruiser pickups!

My "powers to be" make those contacts (mostly by satellite phones) and let us know when we can cross the line. After driving many hours, our convoy (2 Land Cruisers and 1 Renault Terex 6x6 truck) reach the last military detachment encamped and dug-in amongst the vegetation. We wave to them and put up our ICRC flags (not very thick armor, but it works!) as we continue to the no man's land. As we drive, we see burnt, destroyed, deserted villages for many kilometers before reaching our destination. The town is patrolled by rebels (with the very same military hardware) and we make contact with them to make sure they know we are in town. For the first couple of nights we'll camp in the same area of town where we were when we came to build wells nearby in 2005 and 2006.

The person responsible for land titles is not in town so we go to the area which we are entitled to have and put wooden sticks on the lot we want and are entitled to. As the tape measure is at the bottom of the truck with our equipment, we prepare a makeshift measuring tape with a string on which we tie knots every meter!

We organize (remember this is the bush!) people to go and cut thorny shrubs and wooden sticks, all this to be carried on horse or donkey carts to our plot!

Next day, as we want to get going, the officer in charge of land appears and obviously has to tell us that in the huge empty area were we had put our sticks, they were a couple of meters off! So we patiently tell him, that yes, these are temporary positions, that once we get our tape measure from the bottom of the truck sitting here we'll get this absolutely right.

Busy day, one crew unloads the truck, puts up a tent to store the tools and equipment. Another crew supervises the planting of those thorn bushes on the temporary fence line. A post is proudly put up with the ICRC flag indicating our presence and neutrality! A group puts up additional tents for staff; while others are driving around town to buy all the bricks we can get hold of (we have to build 230 meters of fencing wall, 3 meters high!). Daily workers help us to gather stones on a nearby hill, and when the truck is empty we send it to bring 2 loads to the plot. We set up a pit latrine and shower on one side, hook up the power generator and lay a few electrical cables; some people are raking the plot of trash and donkey dung! Later in the afternoon we organize our bedding before going to have tea at one of the nearby villages where the elders absolutely wanted to thank us for having put a well last year.

Before the sun set, I took a few pictures of our new camp and future base here. Sad to say, because of this conflict we needed to come here, happy to say that our presence will undoubtedly help many to endure this difficult situation.

Evening now, some of our technicians have become "cooks" and I've had a super dish of spaghetti with tasty chicken!

Before going to sleep, I wanted to jot these few lines. The generator has stopped long ago, all is quiet (thanks for batteries!), the moon is full...

As I look back at the last few days, I feel "good" about my presence here and whatever impact that I can have to relieve this tragic human suffering. I must say "thank you" to Denise, Saskia, Kathinka & Anoushka to let me live this life away from them.


Next day I shall fly back to Abéché, it is easier to fly in or out (after obtaining clearance from both sides!) than to drive overland!