Today we visited Jomba, a town that was attacked by rebel soldiers about a month ago. A local priest was killed during the attacks, and the villagers left and recently returned.
We talked to a teacher at the religious school. There were children running around outside the school, and as usual, once they saw the “muzungus” (white people), especially muzungus with lots of camera equipment, they came flocking over. “How do you feel about the future?” I asked him, leaving the question deliberately vague. “Il n’y a pas d’espoir,” he responded (there is no hope). “I do not have hope for these children. We don’t even know when is the next time we will be attacked. We do not know if we will be living tomorrow. How can we think about the future?”
It was striking that many villagers we’ve spoken to have said that life was better before. A 21-year-old father of three told us that he thought his grandfather’s life is better than his life now. A principal of a school told us that he liked life better under the despotic rule of Mobutu than now, “At least there was security then, and people were not always worrying about being raped and killed.”
Aya Shneerson, the World Food Program provincial director who accompanied us to Jomba, related another story that illustrated to her just how bad the situation in the Congo was getting.
When she was visiting a village with a foreign dignitary, an elderly woman came up to them and begged. “Please colonize us,” she said. Both Aya and her visitor were aghast that someone could think that the colonial days were better, especially since the Belgians had such an atrocious history in the Congo. Yet, this is how bad things had become.
How is it possible that the situation has gotten so bad that people wish for the past, and not for idyllic good times, but for pasts dominated by corrupt leaders who exploit the local population, and neglect heir people while amassing treasure troves of billions? Right now, the people’s needs are not just neglected—their everyday life is threatened. Recall Maslow’s hierarchy. A person needs to have the most basic needs fulfilled, like food and shelter, before they can think about other needs. In this case, a basic level of security needs to be in place before people can even start thinking about health and education. Without the security, daily existence is tenuous. Il n’y a pas d’espoir. There is no hope.
