“I married my spouse whereas I used to be preventing within the bush. As soon as we had a child, I believed that we’d not be secure, working from one place to a different with a household, so I made a decision to return to my house nation, Rwanda.”

26-year-old Jean-Nepo Mukeshimana is talking on the Munigi Transit Camp, close to northern Goma, the place he’s getting ready to depart for Rwanda, after some 10 years preventing within the ranks of Raiya Mutomboki, an armed group primarily based in Kibabi, a village within the DRC province of North Kivu.

Born to Rwandan mother and father who fled the 1994 genocide, Mr. Mukeshimana was born in DRC. When he was 16, his mother and father returned to Rwanda as a result of the struggle was over, however Mr. Mukeshimana stayed, and was later recruited by Raiya Mutomboki. 

“For 10 years I fought within the bush, life was onerous, and we couldn’t do something to earn earnings. It was sprinting from one place to a different each single day”, he says. 

His spouse, 20-year-old Mapenzi Uwineza, who says that Mr. Mukeshimana merely ordered her to comply with him into the bush after their marriage, agrees that life was powerful. “After we wanted meals, the combatants needed to go looting, what sort of life is that? We didn’t have sanitary towels, so I needed to improvise with outdated items of material. And whereas our husbands have been away, we’d be crushed by the rebels.” 

Preparations for civilian life

Together with 4 different male ex-combatants, and their dependents – two girls and 5 kids – Mr. Mukeshimana spent two weeks within the camp, as a part of MONUSCO’s Disarmament, Demobilization, and Reintegration (DDR) programme in DRC, which has been working since 2013.

The goal of the initiative is to assist in the repatriation of all international combatants and their dependents within the nation, gather and remove weapons and ammunition, and be certain that the ex-combatants perceive the significance of peace.

The Rwandans within the camp are anticipated to inform others who’re nonetheless preventing within the bush that it’s secure to give up and return house. 
John Bashali works for the MONUSCO DDR programme. He says {that a} lack of identification papers, required by authorities of their nation of origin, deters many combatants from pondering of returning house.

To make the method simpler for them, MONUSCO helps ex-fighters with the paperwork. “There’s a telephone quantity that they’ll attain us on, with the price of the decision paid by MONUSCO”, he says. “After figuring out them, they’re transferred to Munigi Transit Camp prepared for repatriation”.

Studying to reside peacefully

Established in 2014, the camp supplies fundamental requirements like clothes, meals, sanitary kits for ladies, and shelter. Ex-combatants have entry to information, and may participate in sporting actions.

The centre additionally supplies them with life abilities and a stipend to assist them after reaching house. As soon as they get to Rwanda, the boys spend two to 3 months on the Mutobo Demobilization Camp, the place they study vocational abilities, in order that they’ll make ends meet as soon as they return to their villages.

A brand new chapter

As they assist one another to pack their belongings, Mr. Mukeshimana and his fellow ex-fighters are clearly excited to be leaving for Rwanda.

“I’ve by no means had such a clear outfit as a result of within the bush, I had lice throughout my physique”, says a jovial Mr. Mukeshimana, who’s sporting a brand new set of garments supplied by the mission.

Previous to departing, a meal of rice and beans is served. Then, the expectant group boards a UN minibus, and their journey from Munigi to the border between DRC and Rwanda begins.

After a half-hour drive, it’s time to say goodbye to DRC, and begin a brand new, extra hopeful chapter of their lives.