When the displaced return: challenges to ‘reintegration’ in Angola

The village lies 40 kilometres from the nearest peri-urban ‘town’ on a dirt path, one
which often becomes impassable during the rainy season. Like most villages in this
region of the country, it was heavily affected by the civil war. Its current residents
have experienced various tapestries of displacement. Some spent most of the twentyseven
year civil war in neighbouring Zambia, where they either integrated with local
communities or settled in one of the three UNHCR-run refugee camps. Others spent
shorter periods of time across the border, or became internally displaced. Still others
remained close to their homes, experiencing waves of internal displacement and
violence as troops from both sides of the conflict took control of the area. Prior to the
war, the village had a health post and school, the two pillars of community life, but
they were burned to the ground during one of the many attacks, along with houses and
farms. What remained was looted.
Peace arrived in 2002, and soon after the village saw a population influx as internallydisplaced
persons (IDPs) and refugees began to repatriate over the next two years.
Families reunited, neighbours reacquainted and even new faces appeared, as people
from other regions sought out new places in which to settle. Humanitarian agencies
appeared in the nearest town, offering returned refugees food and other assistance, but
excluding others. Their white land cruisers rarely stopped in the village and when they
did, the aid workers only spoke to the local chief and promised assistance, which they
never delivered. Today, most residents rely on subsistence agriculture, but the
returned refugees also have some education and skills training which they received in
the refugee camps. Despite this influx of human capital, language and the lack of
proper certification prevent them from making use of it. Hunger is a concern to
villagers, who are still waiting for their first cassava harvest, long after the official
cut-off period of World Food Programme (WFP) rations. To most in the village, postwar
reintegration has been a disappointment.