Aside from torture of the war, Rising insecurity in presupposed peaceful zones communities and countries for the displaced Ambazonians:
This is really heartbreaking. As you can see our people are really suffering. But does it end there? Most of the IPDs and Refugees flee from the war zones into territories in search of safety and end up in even other forms of cruelty. Aside from torture of the war, the traumatic situation, there is rising insecurity in presupposed peaceful zones communities and countries for the displaced Ambazonians.
Amid fierce competition for affordable housing units particularly in French Cameroun, landlords have been wielding significant power to decide who gets them. Most refugees in the cities of Yaounde, Douala, Kribi, Nkongsamba and Bafoussam of neighbouring La République du Cameroun are reportedly not only being judged more or less worthy based on their cultural and linguistic backgrounds, but more grimly, on their gender. Because of this, some female refugees enter into informal rental arrangements.
''It is worse when you can only get a house on the outskirts of town or suburban areas infested with drug addicts who can harass you or your children at any time," Irene Tumasang, a refugee living in Mvan, Yaounde says. "The bad thing is that it's difficult to find any good school for your children in some neighbourhoods where lodging is affordable.
"You find yourself sending your children to a francophone school," she lamented.
Most female refugees confessed finding themselves in undesirable neighbourhoods against their wish-Areas which harbour thugs and pickpockets thereby exposing their children to increased trauma, mental health and physical symptoms.
One refugee in Kribi described how once housed, her trauma symptoms intensified at the exact time her right to be housed in that compound was being withdrawn.
Besides being victimized anew by sexually harassing landlords, female IDPs' and refugees' efforts at stabilising themselves in their new environments are hampered by pervasive impoverishment since their support networks of family and friends also struggle with economic and housing insecurity.
"It's so so traumatizing telling the same story over and over to the same friends and family about the need for assistance, when you also know what they are going through where they are,'' said Eunice Futelah, a female refugee from Fundong, now living in Nkongsamba.
Female IDPs and Refugees bare the brunt
Unlike their male counterparts who are increasingly accepting the situation and taking the bull by the horns and graduating from renting to acquiring land and constructing their own apartments in other cities and towns of the Cameroons, female IDPs and refugees often find themselves in the position of losing housing they have been renting. Evictions happen frequently when female IDPs and refugees default on rental payment or are not yielding to the demands of their sexually-starved landlords.
Consequently, they usually end up in more unstable housing situations, sometimes going homeless and more vulnerable.
Not just female IDP and/or Refugee, but LGBTQ+
Frida Fien, who lost the opportunity to continue to live in Bamenda because of sexual advances from her landlord and had to relocate to Foumbot, West Region of La République du Cameroun, identifies as a lesbian.
Unlike Tasang, who could manoeuvre her way through in Douala with men before settling down in her own apartment, Frida's sexual identity distances her from men, and no offer from a male Landlord, however attractive it might be, would be an incentive.
Refugees like Frida, fleeing the conflict in Ambazonia end up facing triple tragedy: socially and structurally excluded from society for being 'les Anglos', they are today being marginalised and excluded from the housing system for being female and belonging to the LGTBQ+(Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, And Transgender) community. This intersectionality further complicates matters for IDPs and Refugees in general and female IDPs and Refugees, in particular.
Disturbingly, Colonial Ministries of Social Affairs, Women Affairs, and more importantly, Housing and Urban Development are headed by women, who should do a better job of proposing incentives to landlords to be more receptive to female IDPs and Refugees, in the short-run, and initiating sustainable housing unit policies for Cameroon, in the long-run.
The past five years of conflict have seen female IDPs and Refugees in the Cameroons experience unhealthy physical environments, strained household resources, social network impoverishment, sexual exploitation, stigma and discrimination, scarce affordable housing units, eviction, and above all, rape and trauma, instead of healing and empowerment.
With the war ongoing, it is challenging for the Interim Government of the Federal Republic of Ambazonia to propose a housing program. It is now eminent the Cameroon needs housing programmes that adopt IDP-centred care, Refugee-centered care and comprehensive trauma-informed services that are non-discriminatory, and embrace a gender-equity lens to ensure housing services are accessible to all IDPs and Refugees, regardless of identity and statuses.
It is the basic human rights of every city of the war to be protected and sustained during such times. What is happening in the Cameroons? Where are all the globalisation-enabling frameworks? Where is the UN peace-keeping? Why is the international community dragging its legs?
