Relations between host and displaced communities are negative and seem to be deteriorating, both groups told a survey by UNHCR’s Cabo Delgado Protection Cluster, published 18 November. https://bit.ly/Moz-Palma-Protect The survey and focus group interviews were done in Quitunda, Maganja and Mondlane villages, just south of Palma, which have a mix of people having fled Palma and local people, many of who also fled but have now returned.
“Tensions between the host and IDP [internally displaced people] community … are linked to the lack of access to essential services, basic assistance, and limited natural resources. During the assessment, host community focus group participants openly stated that they want the IDP community to return to their place of origin.” The report adds: “For most, the intention of displaced communities is to return.”
Some community leaders were “said to be denying IDP children’s access to school and excluding IDP households from distribution lists. … Evidence of discrimination towards the IDP community was also mentioned in relation to service providers. IDP women recounted walking for five hours pregnant or having just delivered only to be turned away at the health centre when trying to access maternity services.”
“Both the host and IDP communities lack civil documentation. … Women in Mondlane reported being denied access to maternity services in health centres as they do not have documentation. Furthermore, since children are being delivered at home, births are not being registered, thus elevating child protection risks.”
“Access to machambas (traditional farmland for subsistence agriculture) is limited for the IDP population and thus a source of inter-community tension. Only in Mondlane had some machamba plots been provided for rural activities for IDPs with the agreement that these would be returned to the host community families once those displaced are able to return,” the report says.
“In Quitunda and Mondlane, some IDP families sleep in open air. There is tension as some shelters of the host community are unused because their owners have fled due to the conflict, however IDPs without shelter are not given permission to temporarily use these empty shelters. Construction materials are only available from the nearby forested areas, yet the quality of wood is often poor, and access limited due to checkpoints.” Six Mahindra pickup trucks have been donated to the Mozambican police by the UN International Organisation for Migration (IOM) to go to Ancuabe, Chiure, Metuge, Montepuez, Namuno, and Pemba districts of the Cabo Delgado, where many people have taken refuge from the fighting. Specifically, the vehicles will support the work of the Community Policing Department. An unstated aim appears to be reducing tensions between displaced and local people.