Re-registration sparks fear in Kalma

Refugees suspicious that they will not be allotted new cards once they submit their original documents

The World Vision Organization (WVO) met with leaders of the Kalma refugee camp in South Darfur to convince them to re-register their ID cards.The re-registration is meant to provide new ID cards for the refugees which will facilitate access to food rations supplied by the World Food Program (WFP). The re-registration is meant to account for the exact number of people living in the camps.

The refugees in Kalma camp, however, expressed their doubts over the initiative’s objectives. The humanitarian coordinator for the camps told Radio Dabanga, “The process requires refugees to submit their old cards and then acquire new cards,” explaining the insecurity of the refugees with giving away their only proof of identity and access to food.

“There is also fear that the WFPO would stop giving rations to the camps and transfer the food rations to the villages owing to pressure from the government,” the coordinator added.

The government has issued statements that refugee camps would be dismantled in the near future. The refugees fear that this move to take away their identity cards could be used as a weapon to drive them away.

They demanded that the UN’s Office for Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) provide safeguards that no such pressures would be put on them.

“We are happy with the old cards and don’t want new cards,” the coordinator told Radio Dabanga from Kalma camp.

‘Traders shouldn’t be distributors’

Residents of Saraf Omra camps in North Darfur demanded the World Food Program (WFP) to take away distribution rights of food supplies from the local traders.

They said that the traders did not fulfill their commitments and obligations of food rationing to the refugees in the Al Jabal, Al Naseem and Dankoj, camps.

One of the camp leaders told Radio Dabanga that the traders didn’t even provide three food stuffs from the WFP list, which contains more than five food items. “The traders have misplaced nearly 140 ration cards of the refugees, so a lot of people aren’t receiving food rations at all. And the traders ask the refugees to pay money for the rations,” he said.