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Jean Tshomba, coordinator of the disaster management office in Eastern Congo, said survivors were living in exceedingly difficult conditions.
“Thousands of households were forced to leave their villages, fields, and livelihoods to flee the hostilities,” Tshomba said. “They are doubly victimized because in addition to fleeing the war, they were victims of two fires that completely ravaged their camps, leaving them once again empty-handed.”
Funding from UM Committee on Relief enabled the purchase of 74 tons of food and non-food items, including rice, corn flour, vegetable oil, salt, sugar, beans, soap, basins, empty fuel containers, toothbrushes, and more.
“The help provided by the UMC was an immediate relief for us,” said Asende Lumumba Milando. “We had lost everything we owned and were in a desperate situation.”
Mwanashamba Useni, who heads a family of eight, is also grateful.
“This is an extraordinary gesture from the UMC,” Useni said. “This aid is of great importance to us, as it enables us to provide for our family’s basic needs. We feel supported and accompanied in this difficult ordeal. The solidarity of the church gives us the courage to face the future.”
Fighting between the M23 rebels, who receive support from the Rwandan army, and the Congolese armed forces in the province of North Kivu has disrupted civilian life, wrenching people from their homes and leaving them nothing.
Photo: Women wait for vegetable oil at the Malicha internally displaced camp in Fizi, Congo. Photo courtesy of the East Congo Episcopal Area disaster management office.
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