27/11/12 United Nations World Food Programme (Rome) – Congo-Kinshasa: WFP Food Brings Lifeline to Thousands Fleeing Unrest in Eastern DRC

Just before insurgents gained control of North Kivu's provincial capital last week, Mujinya Kobua
fled here from a camp for displaced people just 10 kilometres away.
Now, she and her 10 children count among nearly 11,000 tired and hungry
Congolese packed in Don Bosco, a Catholic institution in Goma that now serves
as a makeshift refuge from the fighting that is raging in eastern DRC.

 

"We rushed out of the Kanyaruchinya camp on Monday
morning when the battle front moved from Kibumba down to Goma", said
Mujinya last week, naming another North Kivu
town. "We have been sheltering here in Don Bosco centre with next to no
potable water, nothing to eat and nowhere to lay one's head."

 

That changed a few hours later, when Mujinya and her
family received WFP food rations to tide them over for the next few days as
they decide whether to stay put in Goma, move on to somewhere else, or try to
return home.

 

Operations resumed

 

On Friday 23 November, WFP resumed its operations in
Goma, providing emergency food assistance to more than 81,000 people in a dozen
sites in and around the city.

 

They include people already displaced like Mujinya, who
fled the Kanyaruchinya camp as rebels advanced southwards towards Goma from
Rutshuru territory. Many have joined host families; others have sought shelter
in places like Don Bosco.

 

Still others have since left Goma to return to their
villages in Rutshuru.

 

"They had left their home some months ago when
Rutshuru territory was under a wave of violence. They came to Goma with
basically nothing and have left their fields unattended, most of them will
therefore need food assistance back in their home town", explained Martin
Ohlsen, WFP DRC country director.

 

"Food assistance is crucial as the displaced people
have absolutely no means to access food. Their situation is even harder as food
price are increasing dramatically on the local market", added Mr Ohlsen.

 

Deteriorating situation

 

With some 140,000 newly displaced people in the Goma
area, the humanitarian situation has deteriorated rapidly. Electricity supplies
have been cut off, leading to an interruption in clean water supplies.

 

Thousands of Congolese are also fleeing the Masisi area,
further south, and Kalehe, in South Kivu. But
the volatile security situation is limiting efforts by WFP and other agencies
to rapidly assess and respond to this humanitarian crisis.

 

Despite the tense situation in eastern DRC, WFP staff
remains on duty, ready to assist as quickly as possible. WFP has maintained its
assistance programmes in South Kivu and is about to resume operations in Bunia,
in neighbouring Orientale province, where angry protestors recently plundered
WFP offices and looted stocks form the warehouse and of our trucks. .

 

Since January 2012, WFP has delivered food assistance to
nearly one million people in five provinces of eastern DRC, including the two
Kivus, as part of its emergency operations.