SOUTHERN PROVINCE

HUYE — Residents in Ngoma Sector have dedicated community work commonly called Umuganda to build houses for the vulnerable groups without shelter.

Up to 332 residents largely Genocide survivors would benefit from the programme, partly to be facilitated by the government.

Others in this category include the poor, disabled and backward groups, according to the Sector executive secretary, Assumpta Ingabire.

Most of the survivors reportedly left their native villages fearing for their lives and they now live in urban areas around Butare town.

"They sell petty commodities like tomatoes and sweet potatoes and they think life is easier in town. But it would be better if they got shelter,” Ingabire said of the life of the homeless Genocide survivors in her area.

She said that many of them came from Nyaruguru district and sensitisation efforts to convince them to return have fallen on deaf ears.

"We are still contacting their leaders but their wish is to stay here [Butare town],” she said.

Sector authorities dedicated two days of community work to address the housing problem for the homeless group. Local residents make bricks, prepare plots, and build the houses.

During last Saturday’s community work close to 700 people met in Matyazo cell and made bricks. The national activity which attracts even high authorities was reassuring for Andrea Kabwana, who has been wandering since 1994.

"If everyone here takes a hoe and starts working, we can get those houses in one month,” he said.

Kabwana left his village of Munini in Nyaruguru district after reportedly losing all his family members in the Genocide. He is afraid to return there because he believes it is insecure.

"A bush has covered my plot,” he said. "No one can help me there since all my fellow survivors are just young people who moved to Kigali.”

What underlies his economic status is that he has never had Frw5000 in his pocket since 1994. He survives on cultivating in other people’s fields, he said.

Ingabire said the Ministry of Local Governance asked all Sector leaders to ensure that the vulnerable groups, especially the survivors, get shelter before the country commemorates this year’s mourning week.

She said the ministry would provide cement to build the houses while Genocide Survivors’ Fund (FARG) will provide iron sheets. The Southern is said to be the poorest Province in the country, and has the biggest number of Genocide survivors.

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