Gambella families in need of support - Oxfam

Families forced to flee violence in western Ethiopia need more humanitarian support to help them rebuild their shattered lives, Oxfam America urged on Tuesday. Abera Tola, head of the organisation's office in Ethiopia, told IRIN that "fear and suspicion" still hampered attempts to help families hit by the violence. He said the region needed mosquito nets to prevent malaria, oxen for farmers who lost all their possessions, and tools so that people could rebuild their lives. Hundreds of people were reported killed in communal fighting that flared up in December in Gambella, western Ethiopia, and continued during the early part of this year, government officials said. As many as 15,000 were reported to have fled to neighbouring Sudan. The fighting, which was sparked by an attack on a vehicle in which eight government workers were killed, fuelled existing tensions between ethnic groups in the area. Without peace-building initiatives among local groups any attempts at development in the region would fail, Tola noted. "We strongly believe that there should be a peace-building initiative running side by side with development work," he said from his office in Addis Ababa. "The Gambella crisis is not a natural crisis," he added. "It is not something that happened as a result of the environment or natural calamity. It happened because of conflict – because of people, because of intolerance, because of a lack of democracy in that region. People have to come together and build peace for themselves." Oxfam has helped with the establishment of the Gambella Peace and Development Council that works with families hoping to return back to the remote region, some 800 km west of the capital, Addis Ababa. Relief workers estimate that about 9,000 people have returned to their homes while a further 6,000 are said to have remained at the town of Pochalla in southern Sudan. "People have lost their loved ones, their houses have been burnt down and they are living under trees," Tola said. "These people need support." According to the Norwegian Refugee Council, 51,000 people had been displaced by violence that has plagued Gambella in recent years. Oxfam said there had been "significant improvements" in the situation, but tensions still existed and had the potential to flare up again. The aid organisation said it had funded the reconstruction of 1,154 homes destroyed during fighting. These included traditional tukuls – mud or straw huts - and corrugated metal shacks.