ブックタイトルThe Journal of Humanitarian Studies

概要

The Journal of Humanitarian Studies

Journal of Humanitarian Studies Vol. 4, 2015abroad…The mistrust among the parties was so high that reconciliation at state and personal levels wasstill very far from the negotiation table and the release of prisoners, instead of being a great feast for thosereturning to freedom and for families reunited with their loved ones, became the hostage of the politicalprocess, far from any humanitarian consideration: we were forced to negotiate figures, suspend meetings,exchange lists of names and argue for checks and controls for hours and days, meeting after meeting, heldat any time of the day or the night, on Sundays or holidays, any time the parties would suddenly feel anurge to talk.For hundreds of detainees, though, it worked and one of our national colleagues nearly had a heart attackwhen, suddenly, he recognized his father among the first batch of detainees repatriated by the ICRC fromBenguela, on the coast, to Huambo, on the“Planalto”. He had lost contact with his father since more than12 years and thought he had died in an ambush…His father, isolated in a high security penitentiary, hadno means to communicate with the outside world…Another family, not finding their son among the firstprisoners repatriated, thought he had died and proceeded with his funerals, building a monument on histomb in the cemetery of the village. Few days later, when the ICRC brought him back home on one of itsconvoys of released prisoners, nobody could believe he could still be alive, because they had just buriedhim few days before! They thought it must have been a ghost, his phantom, coming back to punish thevillage who had forgotten him during the whole conflict. Everybody in the village fled. Some familiesbarricaded themselves in their houses, others went hiding in the bush. In few seconds, the streets wereempty, nobody remaining outside. The“phantom”started shouting his name in the empty street, yelling tothe houses that he was alive, that the Red Cross had brought him back and that he was happy to be back. Hestarted calling the names of his relatives begging them to come and talk to him. The first person who daredto come out and touch him, to make sure he was indeed a human being, was a small boy, more curious thanafraid. Then an old lady came and also touched him and soon after the whole village came to him and ahuge party started, to celebrate the return home of the son of the village.Nelson Mandela: from the prison to the presidencyFrom Angola, I was directly transferred to South Africa, just on time to manage the ICRC delegationduring the crucial transition period between the end of the apartheid regime and the installation of thenew government led by Mr. Mandela. During the campaign preceding the national elections, the armedviolence, added to a high level of a particularly vicious criminality, exacerbated the situation. The ICRChad to extend its operations and, at the peak of the violent period, has to maintain five sub-delegations inSouth Africa (Bloemfontein, Cape Town, Port Elisabeth, Durban and Pretoria) and two mobile teams.To work with mixed teams of white delegates and black field-officers was a challenge, everywhere, inthe white suburbs surrounding the main cities and in the rural areas of the then Orange Free State, whereour black field-officers faced discrimination, or in the“Bantustans”of Bophutatswana, in the North, inTranskei or Ciskei, between the Cape and the Natal provinces, and in the black“townships”, where ourwhite delegates were sometimes attacked or verbally abused. Several times, our colleagues were physicallythreatened by one party or another. However, working every day in the middle of the violence helpedus create confidence within the parties and allowed the ICRC to operate freely in the country. Visitingdetainees in prisons also helped us get in touch with the leaders of the freedom movements, imprisonedby the apartheid regime, who could keep contact with the outside world through their family visits, thuspassing the message to their followers not to harm the Red Cross and let us do our job.In May 1994, to accompany the ICRC Vice-President, I was invited to the inauguration of PresidentMandela, among one of the most important gatherings of Heads of State or governments of the time, atUnion Building, the headquarters of the Government, in Pretoria.人道研究ジャーナルVol. 4, 201525