Return to Conflict: SAVE’s Country Director Speaks on Goma’s Crisis

SAVE’s Country Director in the Democratic Republic of Congo, Rémy Khakule, fled to Uganda after the M23 militia invaded eastern Congolese Goma. Now, after almost six months, he has returned to his homeland and the SAVE-DRC location. Various rebel groups are still fighting each other for control of the city and region, primarily the M23 and other fragmented groups.

In North Kivu province, SAVE operates four playgroups where more than 200 children find a safe environment for playful learning. The children learn about nature and their environment from eight teachers following SAVE’s own educational curriculum “Education 4 Conservation”. This approach also includes two community gardens where residents of surrounding villages work together with refugees on ecological agriculture primarily growing tomatoes and chillies.

We asked Rémy about the current situation in Goma and the SAVE projects.

SAVE: How do you experience Goma after being away for almost half a year?

Rémy Khakule: The security situation in the city is still very critical. This means that everyday life is very difficult for the people in Goma.

We experience a lot of violence here – murder, rape, forced recruitment, and robberies. Just recently, on July 27th, we received terrible news. Two young girls were shot in the village of Mutaho, north of Goma. Two children were also shot in the Mugunga district. These are just a few examples of many other terrible acts that we probably don’t even know about yet. Nyiragongo, which is also north of Goma, has become a hotspot of violence and crime, and the situation there is spilling over into the city of Goma. Besides the acute threat from ongoing fighting, many people cannot go to work and many children cannot attend school.

SAVE: What impact does the prolonged violence have on the SAVE projects?

Rémy Khakule: Both the security situation and the economic situation harm the SAVE projects here in the DR Congo. The playgroups are directly affected. Most families, who were already trying to make ends meet, now have to figure out even more desperately how to get hold of food. The financial hardship has grown. We have difficulties raising money for meals in the playgroups and providing for everyone. This naturally affects our early childhood education programs. Those who are hungry cannot concentrate and cannot learn.

Since attacks and kidnappings can occur repeatedly, our monitoring teams can barely reach the sometimes very remote areas of the playgroups. This makes it difficult for us to accurately assess the situation on the ground. This is also noticeable in our vegetable gardens. Although we are currently in harvest season, we can barely transport the harvested vegetables – the surplus we produce – to the city where we sell them at the market. Our food security and project profitability are thus severely limited.

SAVE: What do you urgently need on-site at the moment?

Rémy Khakule: So that we can adapt as best as possible to the current situation and continue to support the communities, we need basic things:

First, meals and snacks for our playgroups to alleviate the financial hardship of parents and encourage them to send their children to the playgroups despite the circumstances.

We also urgently need financial support for transporting our agricultural products as well as packaging materials, so that the farmers in our community gardens can sell their goods.

We would also like to enable people in the communities to receive training and courses in processing their vegetables, so they can produce and sell their products themselves. This is important when we have transportation bottlenecks. We would like to be able to process the goods locally because they would otherwise spoil. But we also lack money for such projects.

SAVE: This sounds like an extremely difficult time. What gives you hope?

Rémy Khakule: Despite the unstable situation and uncertain future, I believe in our projects. Through the “Education 4 Conservation” program, we have already established four playgroups in Rumangabo, Kabaya, Vitshumbi, and Kanyabayonga. They are well received by the children and their parents. The parents repeatedly emphasize that this gives them time to find work so they can have something to eat on the table at the end of the day, while their children learn in safety.

Our community gardens in Kishishe and Kanyabayonga meanwhile strengthen local farmers, and young people learn how to manage with organic fertilizer and without pesticides. Women in particular are very actively involved here. All of this helps us create new sources of income. In Virunga National Park, which is nearby, increasing cases of poaching have been observed since the beginning of the year. However, one must acknowledge that many act out of necessity. That’s why we work to show people alternatives for poaching. We at SAVE-DRC can only demonstrate that we remain resilient and continue our mission to preserve biodiversity and strengthen the sustainable development of local communities.

About SAVE:

We at SAVE Wildlife Conservation Fund have made it our goal to sustainably protect endangered species through strengthening local communities and holistic environmental education projects. 95 percent of our donations flow into the projects, meaning every donation arrives directly in the affected region. Our exclusively local teams in the DR Congo, Botswana, and Poland design the programs together with the communities. Because we believe that species conservation can only succeed with the people on the ground.

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