Al-Shabaab Evicts 300 IDP Families
Lower Shabelle IDPs Denied Travel to Mogadishu for Help, Forced to Return Home
The al-Shabaab militant group has forcibly evicted at least 300 internally displaced families from an al-Shabaab sponsored IDP camp in Somalia's Lower Shabelle region, and forced them to return to their original residences.
“The families of peasants and herders were forcibly repatriated to their original residences in the villages of Tooratoorow, Qoryooley and Kurtunwaarey in Lower Shabelle,” said a resident in the KM50 area who spoke to Somalia Report on the condition of anonymity.
The move by al-Shabaab militants comes after the IDP families tried to inform the al-Shabaab administrators in the KM50 IDP camp that they were planning to migrate to Mogadishu for support.
“The families have malnourished children suffering from hunger, measles and dehydration and they wanted to travel to Mogadishu for help. The militants wouldn't let them go,” said Mohamed Sharif, an IDP in Afgoi.
Al-Shabaab has shown little attention to the IDP families’ concern by denying them access to Mogadishu and going so far as returning them back to residences of origin despite the fact that last month Al-Shabaab claimed they lifted their ban on aid agencies from operating in the areas they control in the southern parts of the country. Shortly thereafter, an al-Shabaab spokesman said specific agencies including the World Food Programme were 'not welcome'.
Al-Shabaab was not available for comments on the eviction.
Early last month the United Nations declared famine in Bakol and Lower Shabelle regions of southern Somalia and later in Middle Shabelle, Afgoi corridor and Banadir region.
The United Nations estimates that more than 11 million people in the Horn of Africa need humanitarian assistance, and it appears that the residents of Lower Shabelle aren't going to get it.
