IDPs continue to occupy schools

In Gisenyi, northwestern Rwanda, the government has urged the international community to assist in the resettlement of families who have occupied houses and schools - some for up to six years, immediately following the 1994 genocide. The total number of families occupying other people’s houses in Gisenyi is presently 11,752 out of more than 62,000 throughout the country, said an Inter-Agency Humanitarian Situation Report issued by the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA). Children have not been able to go to school since the school year officially started on 12 September. “Only temporary solutions have been found for the children while awaiting for the families to vacate the school,” said the report. Temporary classrooms under plastic sheeting have been set up, or lessons conducted in the few classrooms vacated so far.

The response by donors to the IDP crisis in Rwanda has been “very limited”, noted the Inter-Agency report. Over July and August, Rwanda National radio broadcast official messages directing illegal occupants to vacate houses by 10 September 2000; but by the end of September, 800 families had occupied three primary schools and a health centre in Gisenyi-ville in protest at the government ultimatum. By mid-October the figure had increased to 962, said Inter-Agency report.

Although many formerly displaced populations in the Northwest have been “resettled” in grouped sites (imidugudus) many of the sites still lack basic infrastructure, services and adequate shelter. More than 23,000 families in the Northwest have not yet been given final allocations of land. Over 280,000 families in Rwanda are living under plastic sheeting, over 65,000 in seriously damaged shelters, and nearly 63,000 in illegally acquired housing, said the report.