South Sudan Bishop Eduardo Hiiboro Kussala: Our people ‘on brink of destitution, slowly perishing’

"THE country, South Sudan, seems to be going round in circles from one calamity to the next and back. The saddest reality is our inability to overcome the effects of these calamities and cushion our people against them." He [Bishop Kussala] said that unless these issues are addressed, he fears his people will not survive, “especially because the majority of the population (64%) are helpless youths who have no source of income, while most of the remaining 36% are elderly persons.” Read more.

From National Catholic Register
Dated Monday, 11 March 2024 - here is a copy in full:

South Sudan Bishop: Our People ‘on Brink of Destitution, Slowly Perishing’

Bishop Hiiboro Kussala painted a grim picture of the situation of women, girls, and children in the world’s newest and youngest country, which gained independence from Sudan in July 2011.

Photo: A camp for Internally Displaced Persons in Renk, South Sudan. (Credit:   Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development)

The people of God in South Sudan are in urgent need of external support, the president of the Integral Human Development Commission of the Sudan Catholic Bishops’ Conference (SCBC) has said.

In a March 8 letter addressed to “the head of Caritas network, people of goodwill, and the international community,” Bishop Eduardo Hiiboro Kussala described the desperate situation of his compatriots, who he says are “on the brink of destitution” and are “slowly perishing” amid challenges occasioned by violent conflicts and COVID-19.

“Our people continue to suffer the effects of complex emergencies, which are still being experienced in many parts of the country, including those parts that had previously been peaceful,” Bishop Hiiboro Kussala said in his three-page letter dated March 8.

The number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) “has increased tremendously across the country,” he said, adding that these are South Sudanese “living in deplorable conditions and are starving.”

The bishop, who leads South Sudan’s Diocese of Tombura-Yambia, highlighted the fact that “women, children, the aged, and people living with disabilities” are bearing the brunt of the conditions in the East-Central African nation.

Bishop Hiiboro Kussala painted a grim picture of the situation of women, girls, and children in the world’s newest and youngest country, which gained independence from Sudan in July 2011. 

“Consider the South Sudanese mother who watches her child die because of malnutrition caused by severe hunger; the young man who dies in the hospital because there is no medicine to treat him; the 9-year-old girl who, for a piece of ‘bambe’ [potato], is forced to sell her body; and the emaciated old woman who is lying inside her ramshackle hut awaiting death to take away her suffering,” he said.

“Those still living in their homesteads are equally facing starvation since most of them have had to, ironically, abandon their sources of livelihood in a bid to save their lives,” he said. “Most school children have had to drop out of school because of insecurity and fear of being forcefully recruited to serve as soldiers in the conflicts.”

These challenges are compounded by earlier negative effects of COVID-19 restrictions, Bishop Hiiboro Kussala further lamented, explaining that “South Sudan is also still struggling to overcome the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, which saw our already fragile economy come to a near collapse.”

“COVID-19 saw many people lose their jobs and livelihoods, causing those who were previously self-reliant to become dependent on well-wishers,” he said.

The challenges of the people of God in South Sudan have worsened by the country’s “skyrocketing inflation,” the bishop noted, adding that “many people can no longer afford to buy even the cheapest of foodstuff. As a result, the poverty levels in the country have increased, with the number of families going hungry escalating.”

“The state of calamities in the country has been worsened by floods in some areas and severe drought in others,” he lamented. “The country, South Sudan, seems to be going round in circles from one calamity to the next and back. The saddest reality is our inability to overcome the effects of these calamities and cushion our people against them.”

He said that unless these issues are addressed, he fears his people will not survive, “especially because the majority of the population (64%) are helpless youths who have no source of income, while most of the remaining 36% are elderly persons.”

As president of the Commission for Integral Human Development of SCBC, which brings together Catholic bishops in Sudan and South Sudan, Hiiboro Kussala appealed for external support, imploring them to “not get tired of our knocking on your doors once again and again … because you are our only hope and therefore light at the end of the tunnel.” 

“It is no longer about the country and its leadership but about the people of South Sudan, who are slowly perishing,” the bishop said. 

In his letter, the bishop acknowledged with appreciation the support of the international community over the years. “You have been our anchor amid troubled waters, and we can only say thank you and pray that the good God may reward you in ways that only he can,” he said.

View original: https://www.ncregister.com/cna/south-sudan-bishop-our-people-on-brink-of-destitution-slowly-perishing

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Sudan & South Sudan: UN struggles to cope with thousands of daily arrivals in transit centres in Renk

STAFF at the UN-run transit centres in Renk, South Sudan, help exhausted people to travel onwards to their final destinations in the hope of avoiding large numbers staying in this extremely remote, poorly resourced region. 

There’s hardly any water, food, sanitation, security or shelter. Many of the thousands who have crossed the border from Sudan are vulnerable and traumatised. They fled terrible violence and have spent weeks, in some cases months, trying to cross into South Sudan to reach safety. 

Since the outbreak of fighting in Sudan last April, the influx of people fleeing Sudan increased sharply at multiple border points. More than half a million have crossed the South Sudan border, according to UN estimates. 

Read more from UN News
Dated Friday, 23 February 2024 - here is a copy of the report in full:

Sudan: UN struggles to cope with thousands of daily arrivals in South Sudan transit camps

© IOM/Elijah Elaigwu. Sudanese refugees in the UN-run transit centre in Renk, South Sudan.

South Sudan, one of the world’s poorest countries, is dealing with the influx of hundreds of thousands of refugees from its northern neighbour, Sudan, which has been in the grip of a major conflict between the government and the Rapid Support Forces since April of last year.

Since the outbreak of fighting, the influx of people fleeing Sudan has increased sharply at multiple border points, and more than half a million individuals have crossed the South Sudan border, according to UN estimates.

At the UN-run transit centres in Renk, staff are helping exhausted individuals to travel onwards to their final destinations in the hope of avoiding large numbers staying in this extremely remote, poorly resourced part of the country.

Yvonne Ndege, a spokesperson with the UN migration agency, IOM, travelled to Renk to assess the conditions in the camp. 

She described the scene to Ben Malor from UN News.

Yvonne Ndege: This is one of the most remote parts of South Sudan. There’s hardly any water, food, sanitation, security or shelter. Many of the thousands of people who have crossed the border from Sudan are vulnerable and traumatized. They fled terrible violence and have spent weeks, in some cases months, trying to cross into South Sudan to reach safety.

UN News: How is the UN helping those arriving in Renk?

Yvonne Ndege: Hundreds of thousands of people have been assisted by the UN migration agency to continue moving to other destinations. This assistance is critical because what IOM and other UN agencies don’t want is for refugee camps to spring up in this location as it is so remote. There is no infrastructure, no medical facilities or resources of any kind for those vulnerable arrivals.

This has involved IOM putting on over 1,200 flights away from Renk to Malakal, the capital of Upper Nile state. It has also involved sea transportation, and we have helped over 100,000 to take boats to Malakal, which is a three-day journey overnight on the River Nile.

We have also assisted people with some road transportation to try to reach their communities of origin, but when you look at the volume of people arriving, this assistance is not enough, and the funds to continue to provide this onward transport assistance are dwindling and running out fast.

© IOM/Elijah Elaigwu. Sudanese refugees in the UN-run transit centre in Renk, South Sudan.

UN News: What have the displaced people been telling you about their experiences?

Yvonne Ndege: The conditions that they describe are completely horrific. Some say they fled violence and bullets, spending several days in the bush trying to reach the border. Others say they experienced sexual violence along the journey. We spoke to one family, a mother with her two daughters and her own mother, who travelled all the way from the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, to reach this border and cross into safety. She was very traumatized and upset. We spoke to another man, who said that his whole family, he and his sons, were being forced to actually join the fighting and take part in the violence. They didn’t want to, so they spent weeks trying to get here.

UN News: How serious are the risks of disease or hunger?

Yvonne Ndege: IOM staff have been providing medical checks and vaccinations to those arriving before they are transported to the main town of Renk for further assistance and care, but there are massive concerns about the risk of disease, hunger and further violence. There’s hardly any infrastructure in this remote area, no internet or mobile network of any kind and no food or water supplies. So, the risks are real.

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View original here: https://news.un.org/en/interview/2024/02/1146907

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South Sudan: Thanks to UNHCR a new extension site in Renk opened on Jan 2 and can receive up to 30,000

THIS good news post at X/Twitter by Marie-Helene Verney says: "A major breakthrough in the struggle to help thousands fleeing #Sudan conflict. A new extension site in Renk opened today [Jan 2]: it can receive up to 30,000. Thank you to all the partners that have been working throughout the festive season to make it happen. 470,00+ have arrived to [S. Sudan] since April...

A major breakthrough in the struggle to help thousands fleeing #Sudan conflict

A new extension site in Renk opened today: it can receive up to 30,000

Thank you to all the partners that have been working throughout the festive season to make it happen

470,000+ have arrived to… pic.twitter.com/cLbDGFEcNU

— Marie-Helene Verney (@MarieHVerney) January 2, 2024

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Related 

Sudan Watch - December 16, 2023

South Sudan: IOM, UNHCR concerned about risks relocating refugees & returnees from border areas

According to the UN, more than 438,000 people have arrived in South Sudan to escape the conflict in Sudan since April, of which 365,000 South Sudanese and 71,000 refugees. More than 24,000 refugees are stuck in Renk to the refugee camps in Maban County, Upper Nile State due to the current conditions. The road from Maban to Renk has been destroyed by the rains and while UNHCR is currently working on repairs, it has been requesting that the relevant ministries, as well as the private sector, take their share of the works.

Full story: https://sudanwatch.blogspot.com/2023/12/south-sudan-iom-unhcr-concerned-about.html

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Sudan Watch - December 13, 2023

Sudan & South Sudan: Cholera crosses the Sudanese border and bursts into South Sudan refugee camps

At the Renk Transit Center, which has a capacity of 3,000 people, there are more than 16,000 current residents, and the roads that connect this out-of-the-way corner to the rest of the country are waterlogged by floods caused by end-of-summer rains. Renk’s risk lies in the fact that this [Vibrio cholerae] bacillus is transmitted through contact with contaminated foods and liquids, in conditions of overcrowding and lack of safe access to water and sanitation. Read more in this report.

Full story: https://sudanwatch.blogspot.com/2023/12/sudan-south-sudan-cholera-crosses.html

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Sudan Watch - December 10, 2023

Sudan & S. Sudan: From faculties to refugee camps: War has displaced thousands of university students

"The Renk Transit Center [in South Sudan] does not qualify as a refugee camp. It’s a settlement designed as a transit point for about 3,000 people, but Renad, Nyamiji, Nosemba and Emam have been stuck here for several months. More than 18,000 souls are crowded together, due to the incessant flow of arrivals from the neighboring country [Sudan] and the impossibility of transferring refugees to more suitable places. Seasonal rains have flooded and cut off entire roads. Here, the living conditions are dire, because everything is lacking: shelters, clean water, enough food, adequate sanitation, health and educational services". Read more.

Full story: https://sudanwatch.blogspot.com/2023/12/sudan-s-sudan-from-faculties-to-refugee.html

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Sudan Watch - November 18, 2023

100 returnees in Unity State head back to transit camps near South Sudan-Sudan border citing hunger

A hundred South Sudanese who recently returned from Sudan to escape violence are now returning to Sudan due to a worsening humanitarian crisis and hunger in Unity State. Residents in Unity State reported to Radio Tamazuj that the returnees are heading back to Renk and Thuongor transit camps near the South Sudan-Sudan border and the road leading to the Unity oilfield.

Full story: https://sudanwatch.blogspot.com/2023/11/100-returnees-in-unity-state-head-back.html

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Sudan Watch - November 15, 2023

South Sudanese head home from war-torn Sudan

Many people displaced by Sudan's conflict arrive in Renk, South Sudan, where rains have turned the dusty land into mud. 

The majority of those fleeing Sudan arrive through a border crossing near Renk in South Sudan’s Upper Nile State - where the rainy season has turned the dusty land into a muddy mess. Many of the newcomers are hungry, sick and exhausted. One in five children and more than a quarter of pregnant and breastfeeding women screened at the border are malnourished. “It was a very hard journey. We didn’t have anything; no food, no water, no shelter, nothing. It was especially bad when it rained,” says South Sudanese mother Nyanchiu Pehok, who recently arrived in Renk with her eight children.

Full story: https://sudanwatch.blogspot.com/2023/11/south-sudanese-head-home-from-war-torn.html

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Sudan Watch - March 22, 2020

South Sudan: a country on its knees - millions of lives at stake as ‘unity government’ announced

It’s undoubtedly a country on its knees, aptly described by one commentator as a “kleptocracy gone insolvent”, but also a place full of youthful ambition, its average age just 18. In a tarpaulin-clad clinic run by Medair on the outskirts of Renk, a market town in the north of the country, dozens of pregnant young women queue for check ups.  Since the end of 2013, conflict has cost almost 400,000 lives and left six million people, of a population of 11 million, desperately hungry

Full story: https://sudanwatch.blogspot.com/2020/03/south-sudan-country-on-its-knees.html

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Sudan Watch - March 21, 2020

South Sudan: UN report finds all sides of conflict guilty of starving their citizens, govt embezzled funds. Govt struggles to merge soldiers under peace deal

On Thursday, the same day the rival leaders agreed to proceed with implementing the peace deal, the UN released a new report. It finds that all sides of the conflict were guilty of starving their citizens and that the government had embezzled funds that could have gone toward humanitarian support.

Full story:  https://sudanwatch.blogspot.com/2020/03/south-sudan-un-report-finds-all-sides.html

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ENDS

Sudan & South Sudan: Cholera crosses the Sudanese border and bursts into South Sudan refugee camps

THANKS to Lola Hierro (Hola Lola!) for informative reports and photos from Renk, South Sudan. At the Renk Transit Center, which has a capacity of 3,000 people, there are more than 16,000 current residents, and the roads that connect this out-of-the-way corner to the rest of the country are waterlogged by floods caused by end-of-summer rains. Renk’s risk lies in the fact that this [Vibrio cholerae] bacillus is transmitted through contact with contaminated foods and liquids, in conditions of overcrowding and lack of safe access to water and sanitation. Read more in this report.

From EL PLAIS

By LOLA HIERRO (Renk / Madrid)
Dated Tuesday, 12 December 2023 - 23:40 WET - full copy:

Cholera crosses the Sudanese border and bursts into South Sudan refugee camps

The Ministry of Health confirms a positive case in the Renk Transit Center, located in the north of the country, where thousands of displaced people are living shoulder to shoulder

Waiting room of the clinic located at the Renk Transit Center in northern South Sudan. ALA KHEIR (UNHCR)

South Sudan’s Ministry of Health has confirmed the first case of cholera in Renk, a city in the far north of the country that is suffering a humanitarian crisis amidst the thousands of people from Sudan who have been displaced since war broke out last April. Sudan has been struggling against an outbreak of the diarrheal disease since September 26 and to date has documented 4,000 cases and 130 deaths.

“The public is advised not to panic, as measures have been put in place to respond to this threat,” the ministry has announced. Nonetheless, in Renk, general sentiment is very different, as described via WhatsApp by Atsuhiko Ochiai, coordinator of a Doctors Without Borders (DWB) clinic located in the Zero settlement of Renk, which has more than 3,500 residents. “[The situation] is getting worse. More people come from Sudan all the time and the water, latrines, food, plastic sheets, hygiene kits, etcetera, are just not enough. Open-air defecation is common,” he warns.

Doctor Ochiai’s fears are due to a minimal health infrastructure. More than 400,000 people have crossed the border in the last eight months. They arrive in impoverished conditions, without money, without a home in which to stay, with no hope of feeding or cleaning themselves or accessing any service beyond what meager humanitarian aid they can obtain. That’s because all the most important United Nations agencies and nonprofits are present in Renk, but the funds available to help the population are not sufficient: only 32% of the more than 225 million euros required by the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) have been covered. At the Renk Transit Center, which has a capacity of 3,000 people, there are more than 16,000 current residents, and the roads that connect this out-of-the-way corner to the rest of the country are waterlogged by floods caused by end-of-summer rains.

A woman cares for her son, who has been admitted to the hospital in Renk, northern South Sudan. ALA KHEIR (UNHCR)

Cholera presents a public health problem in 47 of the world’s poorest countries, where between 1.3 and four million cases are registered annually. The illness is caused by the Vibrio cholerae bacteria, which provokesd intense diarrhea, up to 20 liters a day, which can kill a person within four hours. With adequate treatment — rehydration and antibiotics in the most severe of cases— the death rate does not rise above 1%, but without it, it can soar to 50%.

Renk’s risk lies in the fact that this bacillus is transmitted through contact with contaminated foods and liquids, in conditions of overcrowding and lack of safe access to water and sanitation. This is precisely the scenario in the far north of South Sudan. If the region was already living in poverty and had been punished by nearly a decade of violence caused by internal conflicts, with 74% of the population in need of humanitarian aid, the waves of Sudanese and South Sudanese returnees from the new war have only worsened the situation.

The cholera patient identified at the transit center, a 38-year-old man who had recently crossed the border between the two states, has recovered. For the time being, no other positive cases have been reported. But the fear of new cases is very present. “When community-wide transmission of cholera happens in Renk, it will be catastrophic,” Ochiai predicts.

Doctor Francisco Luquero is the head of the team responsible for high-risk epidemic programs at the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI) and was in South Sudan during the 2014-2017 outbreak that affected more than 28,000 people. The doctor explains that since 2019 there have been hardly any cases, and those that have appeared have been very mild thanks to the country’s efforts to control the previous outbreak and the prevention campaigns that have been orchestrated “We know that in these scenarios there is a high risk of transmission and that in these areas it is difficult to provide adequate treatment, so there is concern,” he says over the phone.

With Sudan’s outbreak in mind, World Health Organization (WHO) mechanisms have been activated to avoid cholera’s arrival. These mainly involve the promotion of personal hygiene, especially hand-washing, raising awareness in communities, and distributing hygiene supplies to 3,000 households, including domestic items for transporting water like disinfectants and purifiers. But such measures are nearly impossible to implement when there are thousands of people sleeping outdoors, on muddy ground where rainwater stagnates and forms putrid puddles, and where there is no sewage system or toilets.

Water stagnates between tents where thousands of refugees survive in Renk. ALA KHEIR

A month before cholera had its opening act, fears were already present. In Zero’s mobile clinic, doctor Ferida Manoah hardly had time for a break: many small patients required her attention. Patients like Nya, María’s daughter. The little girl, at just over a year old, was due for a medical check-up. Her mother brought her to the health center, accessible only by a long row of sandbags that had been placed over the stagnant water.

Since she was apparently healthy, María only received some tips on nutrition and hygiene. Above all, the latter. “We have a large number of diarrhea cases and we’ve suspected the presence of typhus, but we aren’t able to test,” said Mahoah. Before the cholera outbreak, diarrhea was the third leading cause of mortality in Renk, after malaria and pneumonia.

A simple, but elusive remedy

The plan to address cholera begins with giving specific information to all health staff and community workers on how to inform authorities if they detect a suspicious case. Until there is confirmation, an outbreak is not announced, but independent of test results, it’s very important to provide treatment to patients to avoid death by dehydration.

Blocking the entrance of the illness at the border would be ideal, but in practice that turns out to be nearly impossible. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) has health stations open from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m., which means that for 10 hours a day there is no one available to test. Not to mention, with 2,000 to 3,000 people crossing every day, even if the stations were open 24 hours, it would be very difficult to evaluate everyone who passes through.

Drinking water station in the field of Joda, where thousands of people wait weeks to be transported to the Renk Transit Center in South Sudan. 

LOLA HIERRO

Luquero thinks that prevention at the border is not realistic because similar to people affected by Covid-19, a patient can be contagious and also asymptomatic, something that occurs in 80% of cases. Nonetheless, for him it “is super necessary to replenish kits to treat the sick, because rehydration saves lives.”

The GAVI leader trusts in the skills South Sudan showed in the past thanks to its prevention strategy. “South Sudan has taken a lot of initiative in vaccination, reactive as well as preventative,” he says. They have implemented various campaigns and since 2019, received more than three million doses through the Global Task Force on Cholera Control. “It’s true that it’s a very fragile country, but it’s also a case in which they’ve been able to successfully control a national outbreak,” he says.

Immunization campaigns, however, have not yet arrived to Renk. Luquero thinks it would be best to solicit them as soon as possible from the International Coordinating Group (ICG) on Vaccine Provision, which is in charge of emergency requests. “It’s one method that can be used to access the doses more quickly, linked to the humanitarian crisis in the north, without having to make a global vaccination plan,” he says. “What we need to do is to make a good epidemiological assessment as quickly as possible and, based on that, send the vaccine request as quickly as possible. And I emphasize speed.”

View original: https://english.elpais.com/international/2023-12-12/cholera-crosses-the-sudanese-border-and-bursts-into-south-sudan-refugee-camps.html

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