moinbene vittoria keelan
Nichele Seibel
When I was 11, I was suspended from primary school for lateness. One day, I set off with my three friends to help my mother in the fields. On the way, six members of an armed group captured us. One friend was allowed to go, but my two friends and myself were made to walk for three days to the base of the armed group. When we got to the camp, I was bad-tempered because I was tired from the long walk in the hills through the mud; I felt dirty and was in desperate need of sleep.
We wanted to continue our studies, and the armed group enrolled us at a local school. I attended the school for only four days. Four armed men accompanied me and my friends there and back. At the camp, I learned to handle a gun and was tattooed and initiated in taking care of the gris-gris. 1 I was annoyed that I wouldn't be able to continue my studies. A month later, I learned that my two friends had managed to escape and had told my parents where the armed group was keeping me. My parents came to negotiate my release with the armed group, offering a goat, but the commander demanded a cow and made fun of them by offering them food. I was furious about the way the commander was humiliating my parents, but there was nothing I could do.
In the last military operation in which I participated, I was shot in the mouth and lost four teeth. They took me to a local health facility, and I handed the gris-gris over to another fighter. The doctor refused to let the fighters take me back to their camp in the forest. I thought that that was it; I thought that I was going to die when the others left me at that health facility. The ICRC [International Committee of the Red Cross] evacuated me to Bukavu general hospital, where I was treated for two months. When I came out of hospital, the commander of the armed group came to take me back to the forest. When the armed group was attacked by government forces, I took the opportunity to escape. I returned to my family but had to remain in hiding from the armed group and was facing arrest by the army. My family talked to a Red Cross volunteer, who informed the ICRC of my situation. I was evacuated again and taken to a transit and orientation centre for former child soldiers in Bukavu 2 , where I could be protected and could obtain a demobilization certificate. Three months later, I was reunited with my family, but within weeks the armed group had managed to locate me and send me a letter inviting me to rejoin them, with the promise that I would be treated well. Fearful about what might happen, together with my family we contacted the ICRC, who immediately arranged for me to be evacuated again and taken back to the transit and orientation centre in Bukavu.
The only way I will ever be left in peace is if my former commander dies or surrenders to the government forces. I didn't like living with the armed group. I never laughed. There was nothing I liked about that life except for the food, and even that was tainted as it was obtained by stealing livestock or extorting local people, who were forced to make weekly contributions in exchange for being left alone by the group. I cannot go back home as long as the group remains active in the area. Thanks to the transit and orientation centre and the ICRC, I am doing a hairdressing apprenticeship, which I am about to finish. I want to open my own salon so that I can be independent. Although I don't yet have the equipment I will need and the rent for the salon, that is how I see my future.
I am the oldest of three children. Our father died, and our mother has been working in the fields to help our family get by. One day, when I was 15, I was coming home from school with my three friends who lived in the same village as me, and as we were crossing a fruit plantation I heard someone calling my name. I stopped to see who it was, and a boy, who was about 10 years old, suddenly appeared, coming out of the plantation. He kept me amused by telling me nonsensical stories and asking strange questions. I told my friends to go home, saying that I would follow them. A few minutes later, four armed men appeared and forced me to go with them, knocking me about and striking me with a whip. That is how I found myself recruited into an armed group.
During my time with the armed group, I was brainwashed with their ideology and received training in military intelligence, armed robbery, weapons, livestock theft and intimidation methods for robbing people on the road or in the fields, or abducting them. I started as a cook, was promoted to bodyguard of the camp commander and was eventually made responsible for leading operations on a national road. Sometimes, I was sent with other children to support joint operations with other armed groups. There were times when I cried, especially when I thought about my mother and my two brothers, but I couldn't leave the bush because all the paths out were watched by members of the armed group. They also kept a watch on me.
One day, during an operation to steal livestock, I took an opportunity to lay down my weapon and my military shirt. I left them on the roadside and reported to MONUSCO [the United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo], who took me to Uvira, where the ICRC tried to locate my family. I was very happy to be reunited with my mother and decided to stay in the city centre to avoid being forcibly recruited again. One day I received a visit from an NGO which offered me support to continue my studies. I didn't want to go back to school, though, because I was used to having money, so they helped me with equipment and materials to open a hairdressing salon. I now run my own salon which makes enough for me to get by and sometimes to pay labourers to help my mother farm her land. I am starting to think about having a family myself now.
I was living with my parents in South Kivu. I was not attending school because we couldn't afford it, but I was surrounded by love and had a peaceful life. I often played football with my friends on a piece of land near our house. At the age of 5, I started taking the village cows into the surrounding hills. I spent my days stuffing myself with milk and potatoes and would return home in the evening as happy as I could be. I stopped herding cows when I was 9 and my parents started teaching me about farming. At 13, I followed the young men from my village to the mines. I wanted to earn some money to buy myself a pair of trousers and change my life, just like all the other young people in the village. When I had been working there for three years, several diggers were crushed in a rock fall. The incident scared me, and I decided to go back home and focus on farming. I was happy.
One Sunday in April 2017, when I was 16, the armed group came to our village because the soldiers stationed there had left to halt the advance of another well-known armed group. When fighters arrived, they forced the villagers to give them food. My friend and I were made to transport the food, but when we got to their camp in the hills, they did not let us go back home. They told us that we were men and that we should stay with them and protect our village. We refused and were beaten. At night, we were forced to guard the camp with just a machete as a weapon. I was horrified to belong to an armed group that didn't even have enough weapons to protect itself. Luckily, a week later, my friend and I managed to escape. We told our family we couldn't stay in the area, and left for another village. On the way, some young people who had seen us with the armed group recognized us and informed the government forces. We were arrested and held in a local lockup for four months, and then in a cell in Bukavu for three weeks. We were brought before a military court and sentenced to one year and five months at the Bukavu prison. My friend fell ill and was transferred to Bukavu general hospital, where he died. I was totally overwhelmed by the situation and lost all hope of ever returning home. However, the ICRC visited us and started monitoring my case. They eventually succeeded in having my case handed over to a juvenile judge. I was released and transferred to the transit and orientation centre, where I waited to be issued with a document certifying that I had left an armed group and for the ICRC to find my family. In March 2019, I was reunited with my family. It was an indescribably joyous moment, and all the villagers came to the house to welcome me back. They all thought I was dead.
I was born in Kasai-Central Province in 2002, the fifth of seven siblings. My mother is a farmer, and my father a builder. Before I was recruited into the militia, I was a third-year student in building at a vocational training college.
After the initiation, we went to the front to fight the governmental forces. In the militia, I served as platoon leader in many operations. I fought in Kasai Province, where we slaughtered over fifty soldiers. Then there was the hunt for the FARDC [Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo] in the Kasais, the bloodiest clash yet, where the governmental forces were supported by another militia. Facing this resistance, we realized that the gris-gris in our possession were no longer working. I was racked with disappointment, my hopes of becoming a territorial administrator now dashed. The governmental forces, supported by the militia, were becoming stronger and stronger, and we suffered huge losses. My six friends were killed.
I have to admit that life in the militia was good until the gris-gris stopped working. We had gone from victory to victory and were free to do what we wanted. It really was a good life for me. The reason why I left the militia was the round-up carried out by the governmental forces after our attempted hunt for the FARDC, when they arrested all the boys they could find, and would kill everybody on whose body they found a tattoo. 4 We fled to Angola, but the Congolese were expelled and I found myself back in my country. That was when the ICRC found me, contacted my family and took me back to them. Now, I just want to go back to a normal life, resume my training and become a builder one day, like my father.
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