Displacement: losing your livelihood
Apr 22nd, 2009 by Louise Williams, OCHA
Caroline, pig breeder.
We realized that death was at hand. Everyone had to fend for themselves in order to escape death. We didn’t have time to think about the animals because they were sleeping outside. We fled into the bush, 32 kilometres away. We spent three months living in the bush like this.”
Next steps
“When we came back to the village there were fewer animals. Thieves had stolen some of them and people had killed them as well. So we gathered the animals that were left and we started breeding again. Then the second events happened, in January 2007. We had to flee again and this time all our animals were stolen.”
Livelihood
[pointing to each of the 4 pigs she is raising for breeding] “That one is called Dan, the male one there is George, that’s Madeleine, and this one is Simon. We’re raising them now with these names but in the future we’ll separate them and we’ll breed them – pig breeding is what I’ve always done.”
Caroline in her pigsty.
Living in the present
“Today we are here, tomorrow we could be somewhere else, we could be displaced all over again. I want peace and if there is peace the country can develop. There is no development now because there is no security or peace. In Central Africa, people are fighting for nothing. That’s why we are not rich. We are just going backwards. If they [the rebels and the government] were in front of me I would tell them I want peace, that’s all, peace. 
