The Return

Now, twenty eight years on, I am once again visiting Khartoum. The place has changed, modern skyscrapers and wide congested roads are new but the wall of heat on stepping out of the plane was just the same.

Sudan was in turmoil in the eighties and now, nearly 30 years later, it is still in turmoil. I am heading for Darfur to see for myself the work that SCIAF’s supporters have financed; work that supports and brings hope to many of the two million internally displaced Darfurians living in scattered camps spread across an area the size of France. This is a difficult place to visit.

Our newspapers have stopped reporting on Darfur and we could be forgiven for thinking that the humanitarian crisis was over and that for the millions who live here, life has returned to normal. Sadly this is not the case. Many families are still not able to return to their homes. Security, or the lack of it, forces people to stay away from their villages, too afraid to return. Their land might be occupied by hostile armed groups or they may come from an area which is subject to banditry and arbitrary violence. Thirty years on and Africa’s largest nation is still bleeding, and peace and progress remain future dreams.