April 7, 2009
By Anna Ridout

When I arrived in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) five months ago, you couldn’t move for journalists, photographers and film crews. They’d come to report the mass displacement of 250,000 Congolese forced from their homes by clashes between Government troops and the CNDP, a predominantly Tutsi rebel group, led by renegade General Laurent Nkunda.

Eastern DRC in November: a crush of refugees and also journalists, photographers and film crews. Download

Donors and the international community are starting to refer to eastern Congo as a post-conflict crisis, while close to 300,000 people have already returned to their homes and farms, which they find mostly destroyed.

Now there are only a handful of reporters left in the east and the ongoing conflict between the government and extremist Hutu rebels gets few headlines – even this week when the UN coordination body, OCHA, reported that more than 250,000 people have been displaced from
their homes since January.

A more complicated story

There are many reasons why what made front pages six months ago is now failing to be listed in “news in brief”.

In 2008 Nkunda, a dancing, media-friendly rebel leader, was pushing his way to Goma, his men raping, looting and killing as they went. Families flooded into the provincial capital and formed new camps on the outskirts. Internationally, newly-elected American President Barack Obama was charming the world and everyone wondered what difference he would make to places such as the DRC.

This year the rebels are evasive and camera-shy. When Rwandan troops joined the DRC army in a surprise mission against a mainly-Hutu rebel group, the rebels disappeared. They mingled with communities or sought temporary cover in the dense forests of North Kivu. In the West, the financial crisis is dominating a domestic news agenda.

A whole range of armed groups continue to live among communities, making it their business to terrorize those around them. In a village a few hours’ drive from Goma, a local association, which helps women who have been raped, received 31 new cases of sexual violence in the first three weeks of March.

No peace

The bottom line, which should be making headlines, is there is no peace in eastern DRC. It makes me ask over and over again, why do repeated attempts at peace seem to fail to bring real, sustainable difference on the ground?

The big question has no easy answer. Read the peace agreement signed last month, though, and the problem starts to become clearer.

In recent years, several peace agreements for Eastern DRC have been signed — the Joint Communique in November 2007, the Actes d’Engagement in January 2008, and most recently, the Ihusi Accord.

Opinions of ordinary people affected by conflict have not been given the space they deserve. These are high-level deals made by the region’s power brokers. Grassroots recommendations were not included in the legally-binding agreements.

Unheard warnings

As another offensive begins, in South Kivu this time, more displacement is expected. Aid agencies, including World Vision, have been warning for months that the mission against the Hutu rebels will exact a high a price from civilians and bring little or no long-term security. Meanwhile, the war against women and children is bound to continue as soldiers go another month without pay.

I would like DRC to become a name rarely mentioned by the international news media because of its quiet, monotonous peace.

This is only going to happen once the people whose lives have been shattered by war for so long are given a stake in the peace process. Without their voices, the agreements will fail to address the root causes of the conflict and ultimately prove irrelevant on the battlefield.