Restore Hope in Climate-Affected communities

Muhokya camp for internally displaced persons is located along the Kasese- Mbarara highway in Kasese District, Western Uganda; it neighbors Queen Elizabeth National park and Lake George basin. It’s a hot place consisting of scattered makeshift houses covered with dry grasses and old torn pieces of cloth.  It is home for about 289 households who were displaced by disastrous floods that hit the area in May 2020. The few tents that are visible in the camp are also worn out.  

For most of us, homelessness is unimaginable; Life in the camp is complex and worrisome as households live on fate.

Ben,69 year old  sits under one of the trees in  a hopeless manner as if trying to  get answers to difficult questions. Next to him is a semi-permanent structure that shelters the family of seven, two adults and five Grand Children. The shelter is not much more than a meter high made in local style of bent bamboo sticks stuck into the ground and covered in a mixture of tree branches, dry grass, torn clothing and discarded plastic bags.The day is windy and the plastic bags whisper insistently in the breeze.

Ben arrived at Muhokya with his wife Mary (not real name) who is 54 years old and their five grand Children from Kabukera Camp which his about 18km from where they are now. The covering of their shelter provides some respite from the sunshine of the early afternoon but there will be no guaranteed protection from the strong winds and rains in the wet season (May and October).

 The children are having their first meal of the day, left over millet bread and dry beans that Grandmother had prepared for the family the night before. She has left for Kasese town to look for work and fend for the Family. Another child from a different shelter tries to make way to Ben’s house and the Children pursue him to return to his home because the meal is not sufficient for all of them.

“Am chronically ill, the Doctors at Muhokya Health center tell me I have a disease in the bones. I cannot work, I cannot do anything. My daughter the mother to my grandchildren stays in Karusandara where the floods started and I came here with the children”.

The despair in his eyes as he narrates his ordeal gives a clear impression of what he is enduring.

“The doctors advised me to do an x-ray but up to now I have not got the money to go back to hospital, one time the camp members voluntarily  gathered 20,000UGX (approximately $7)and I bought pain killers but all of them are done now. My grand children are no longer in school.”

Like Ben, many other households in the camp were displaced in May 2020 when Kasese district was hit by flash floods that destroyed houses, gardens and caused of death of more than 10 people. Residents have since then not returned to settle on their land as the area is still prone to natural calamities. They are aware of the fact that whatever infrastructure of their home area that there was has been destroyed by the floods and landslides.

Ben’s story as a chronically ill old man and head of a household comprising of 6 members is not eccentric, before the floods, he was full of life, strong and hopeful. The Floods traumatized him.

There have been periodic food distributions in the camp from the Government and local Non Governmental Organizations. Joy for Children–Uganda, a child rights and advocacy organization visited the camp on 6^th May and delivered food items to the most vulnerable households currently residing in the camp. The Family lacks beddings and they are so much troubled about the rains that might continue to hit the area.

If the internally displaced persons are not reinstated this year, Ben and other 288 households will lack the opportunity to return to their land. Seasonal rains make the route from Kasese town council to Kilembe and the subsequent sub-counties impassable in the months of May and October. It is also another impediment to return home, but the flood survivors do not have a choice.