Starving Somalis make new life in war-torn Mogadishu

Somali women. By Tony Karumba (AFP)

MOGADISHU (AFP) - Exhausted and hungry in Somalia's famine-struck capital after fleeing drought and conflict, Fadumo Shamon is determined not to leave until she gets food for her starving children.

"I will stay here until I get some food and I can take care of my family," the 34-year-old said wearily, dressed in a simple orange head scarf.

Fadumo left her village in the Qoryoley district of famine-hit Middle Shabelle five months ago, an area controlled by Islamist Shebab rebels, whose draconian aid restrictions exacerbated the impact of harsh drought.

She left after her husband -- the main breadwinner for the family -- died of malaria, and, like over 100,000 others in the past two months, trekked into war-torn Mogadishu in hope of finding the help she heard was available here.

"I'll stay here, and if people move to another camp, I'll follow them," she added.

The situation is grim in the makeshift Maajo camp, where she has found basic shelter with three of her children, leaving two others back in the village with their grandmother.

Home to 850 families, the camp is a crowded collection of rag and plastic huts squeezed into a vacant lot on loan from a businessman, alongside the runway of Mogadishu's airport, with the deafening roar of airplanes overhead.

Emergency aid from the United Nations has recently been handed out, including plastic sheeting, cooking utensils and blankets -- aid that Shebab militiamen had blocked in the people's home areas.

"The Shebab prevented us getting help," said 25-year-old Madina, who fled southern Somalia's Bay region, despite threats from the Al-Qaeda linked rebels not to leave.

"I won't go back there," she added, working to drape sheeting over her simple stick shelter.

Aid workers are struggling to cope with the massive influx of people into a city already ravaged by over two decades of conflict, with many saying they want to remain in the city, and not return home.

"It is a big problem right now, but in the short term we have to accept it as a fact," said Bruno Geddo, head of the UN refugee agency in Somalia.

"But if the situation changes in their home area, I hope they will not be so determined to stay," he added.

The UN has described Somalia, where a civil war has been going on since 1991, as facing the most severe humanitarian crisis in the world.

Last month, the UN declared famine in five regions of southern Somalia, including in Mogadishu and in the Afgoye corridor, the world's largest camp for displaced people.

Geddo said it was hoped that future support could encourage some to leave the overcrowded city, if circumstances allowed.

"Our hope is that if the international community manages to provide them with tools and seeds, then they will decide to go back," Geddo said, but also admitted the challenges.

"For farmers it could be possible, but for agro-pastoralists, it is very hard to replace the cattle," he added.

The owner of the land on which the camp sits will likely demand people leave when the rains expected in October begin, said Nadia Sufi, a human rights activist for the local Somali Women's Development Centre.

"When time comes for the rain, he will tell them to leave," she said.

Meanwhile, international humanitarian organisations and their partners try to access thousands of displaced people in nearly 190 camps, according to satellite images analysed by the UNHCR.

In this dangerous city, normal life and the struggle for survival sit side-by-side in striking contrast.

Roads are busy with minibuses, men sip tea on shady terraces, and vendors sell fresh fruit juice.

Nearby however, in the city's bombed out cathedral, people crowd into the crumbling and roofless ruins, the small camp stinking of excrement.

© 2011 AFP