The contradictions of peace

The painful history of Burundi is little known in the English speaking world.  Despite being Rwanda's twin, its equally tortured history is often over-shadowed by its northern neighbour.  Mandela and Nyerere's mediation in a lengthy but eventually successful peace process sees this small beautiful country now grappling with the realities of reconciliation, reconstruction and inevitable contradictions that peace building brings.  This is my second time in the country and every day I hear stories of the many remarkable peacemakers, activists, journalists and political and church leaders who are playing their part in moving this country forward.

I've been in Bujumbura for two days.  There are many changes since I was last here in 2008.  Dirt roads in the centre of the city have been replaced, there are many more cars and people around as rapid urbanisation takes place and cafe's with Wi-fi, even ifs painfully, painfully slow!  Two years ago I hardly saw a 'European' or 'Muzungu', as white people are known as by the locals, unless they were with the UN or NGO,  but this is changing. In contrast the price of development sees an increase in urban poverty, disputes over land rights as political patronage seems the powerless poor kicked of their land, and most obvious and evident to me there are a huge number of street children living on the streets.  The intensity I wrote of in my last post is much more acute as there continues to be a high military presence on the streets of Bujumbura and huge UN compounds continue to dominate space in the city. 

Our host Dieudonné Nahimana who is founder and director of Street Action's partner New Generation, is an example of one of those remarkable activists who at great sacrifice to himself and his family, is committed to those still searching for the dividends of peace and justice.  We were taken to some of the communities living in desperately poor conditions.  Many families being forced off their land to make way for the development of housing for the rich.  One women we met was living in a tiny tin shack, barely any shelter for when the rains come and five children to feed.  She may well be forced off the land to make way for a 'rich' investor who is building a house. Where she goes, no one knows. Without New Generation's support this is how her five young children could be forced onto the streets in order to survive.  We were told that just over £40 would enable her to start a small business and enable her children to go to school.  Small actions can really change lives.  We moved on to another community, where a group of people who were also questioning our presence, engaged in a long discussion with Dieudonné about the lack of opportunity to send their children to school.  Burundi is supposed to have universal free education, but as is the case so many African countries, the reality is very different and many children fall through the net.  We finished the days back on the streets to give food to the increasing population of children making the streets their home.  The contradictions of peace is often reflected by the most marginalised in society.  Bujumbura's street children are the forgotten victims of the country emerging from war into peace. They are the future and a new generation finding hope in Burundi.

These stories, however poorly articulated, I hope give a glimpse of the realities of the struggles for many in this complex country.  We leave a hot and humid Bujumbura and head north to Muyinga and then maybe over the border to Rwanda.

About

Joe is co-founder and director of Street Action ( www.streetaction.org ). Street Action was established in 2007 in the UK to support and work in partnership with pioneering street children organisations in Africa. Joe has worked alongside street children activists since 1996 when he first traveled to South Africa. Since then he has worked with a number of pioneering street children projects and activists in South Africa as well as traveling to other Southern and Eastern African countries. Studying a degree in Politics and obtaining a Masters in Development Studies and African Politics from the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), he has worked in the field of international development and also local community development in the UK. In 2010 he was made a research associate at the The University of London's Centre of African Studies, based at SOAS. Joe is co-author of Including Street Children (2011), a research report looking at the situation of street children in Durban, South Africa. His work has taken him to a number of countries in Southern and Eastern Africa, as well as India. He's also spent time in the United States traveling to San Francisco as well as New York and Washington DC to expand Street Action's advocacy, policy and research work. Joe currently lives in London, United Kingdom.

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