The Voice of Witness series has just published Out of Exile, a collection of oral histories told by Sudanese forced migrants and former abductees. Millions of internally displaced people and refugees have fled from conflicts and persecution in all parts of Sudan, and many thousands more have been enslaved as human spoils of war. By recording and publishing some of these people's stories, we hope to offer a clearer, more personal sense of the sweeping, multi-dimensional oppression that has plagued every corner of Sudan for generations.
The following is the oral history of Gazafi Abdalla Elnour Mohamed, a Sudanese man born in Western Darfur to a family of the Massalit tribe. He recounts his flight from the Sudanese capital of Khartoum to Cairo, Egypt, and describes his life as a refugee in Cairo.
A significant episode in Gazafi's story centers on the protests that occurred in Moustafa Mahmoud Park, outside the offices of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Cairo, in the final months of 2005. For background on this incident, an excellent first source is a piece written by Negar Azimi in The Nation, available here.
Thanks. Please visit www.voiceofwitness.org for more information about Out of Exile and the Voice of Witness series.
GAZAFI ABDALLA ELNOUR MOHAMED
Excerpt from Out of Exile
THIS IS THE WAY.
I was born in Geneina, a large town in the west of Darfur. I am of the Massalit. It's a famous tribe. But my mother is from a different tribe. My mother is not Massalit, but Bargu. Geneina town is like a kingdom of the Massalit. My father is Massalit, and he told us many times about the king of Massalit and so on. Actually, I can't describe a unique thing about the Massalit. For me, regardless of tribe, or things like this, I am more concerned that we are Sudanese and we are human beings. It's better to look at people from this angle. I have no specific opinion about the opinions of others, but in my vision I treat people in this way.
We left Geneina when I was young. My parents brought us to Khartoum. Seven brothers and three sisters. I'm the oldest son, but there is an older sister named Maria. Now the youngest is about nineteen, eighteen. A brother lives in Kesala, in Eastern Sudan, but the rest are in Khartoum.
In Khartoum, my family worked as traders. It was my father's job. We had a clothes store and also a transportation office for shipping. The offices were in Omdurman, in souk-Libya, the large Libya market, full of shops and offices, full of people hawking goods on the streets. You can buy or sell or trade anything there. It's loud and dirty, with lots of life. People of all different ethnicities are there. I am Massalit but I was treated normally, like all others. My friends were people I knew from the market, and some people who used to live next to me, in the neighborhood. I played football with the local club.
It was a very happy childhood in Khartoum. [Omdurman is Khartoum's twin-city, located within the capital's metropolitan limits.] I finished primary school. I started working with my father, helping him in the store. We would bring the goods from other cities and distribute them to the other markets. Sometimes I used to measure the weight of the furniture to send it to the Western Sudan. This was the nature of our work and I enjoyed it. The business was successful. I took responsibility for many things. My father took the business seriously, and he found that I took it seriously. He was always very serious in his job. He encouraged all the family to follow the mandate, and to be accurate. He always told me "as my son, you should be serious at your work, at your study, at everything. You should take life seriously." And I did, and I still do. I respected my job and I ran the business in a good way.
When we weren't working, we would sit altogether as a family, have a nice discussion with each other. Social chats. Talk about the general life. We were happy.
I never served in the army. I had no desire to work in the army. The general environment at the time was not good, with the war in the South. It's a war between Sudanese, war without morality. Everyone fought in order to gain the power - always to gain the power - on both sides. It was a bad war, of course. I'm a simple man, with no power or ability to change anything. I'm not thinking about it too much. Yes, they called me to do the military service, and I paid someone a bribe to avoid it. It's common. You pay someone and he makes a fake medical report for you, and suddenly you are not able to do the military service due to your physical condition.
I have been married since 1999. Her name is Halima Alissa. My wife is of the Barno tribe. Her brother was my colleague in the market, and he would come and visit me and I used to visit him also. I used to visit him at home and he visited me at my home. I saw her. I discussed the issue with my friend. I told him, "I want to know your, your, your, your... sister." I sat with her to know her more. We sat outside, and we went to parks. I understand her and she understands me. We are Muslims. This is the way. After that, we wore the rings. And after that I married her. She seemed happy.
WE THOUGHT IT'S A SIMPLE THING AND IT'S FINISHED.
And then problems took hold in Darfur.
In the beginning of 2004, the security men came to search our store and the transportation office. My father was standing in the store. As they came and they showed us their identities, he didn't try to stop them, he let them do what they want. They searched all the documents, they searched and searched and they found nothing. They never told us what they were searching for. They just came to the office and started searching, and I thought, "They must think that we have prohibited stuff inside." They came and searched and found nothing. They accused us of helping someone in Darfur. They told us, "You are Darfurian, and the government suspects that you might support someone in Darfur." We said nothing. After they finished searching they got out; they just left.
I was scared, but thought that they were finished, because they didn't find anything they wanted - no charts, no receipts, nothing. And they had just left. My father was very upset. He said, "It's discrimination, because they just choose my store and search it and no one else's! No one else's store has been searched!"
We didn't connect it to the troubles in Darfur. We thought it was a simple thing and it was finished. Yes, we'd heard from the news that there are warring troubles inside Darfur, that some towns have been attacked and some bodies have been buried. That was what we knew. We had no contact with my family in Darfur at this time.
We found out that someone with a store next to us had been arrested. We asked if he was from Darfur also. They said yes, he's Darfurian. He died in detention.
Our friends who were not Darfurian felt sorry for us. But they couldn't do anything, they couldn't help us at all. This is the government. You can't do anything.
THEY HAD WEAPONS, AND THEY DIDN'T ASK QUESTIONS.
In April 2004, they took my father to the detention center. They came to our transportation office. I was not there. They closed the office and they took my father. I heard the news. I went to the office and saw that it was closed. We started searching for my father in the police station and all over. We didn't know where to find him. Nobody said anything for days.
A client of our business used to work as a nurse at the military hospital. He came one day to inform us that my father was in the hospital and in serious condition. I asked him if he could take me with him to go and see my father. He took the family. When we saw my father he was deteriorated. He said nothing. I don't know what they did to him. He couldn't speak. He stayed in the hospital for three days and died. My father died in 2004.
Nobody explained anything. The hospital didn't even allow us to take the body to our house to wash it and prepare it for burial. They just did everything themselves, and handed us the body. A security officer followed us when we went to bury my father.
After that I, too, had an experience with detention. Security men wearing civilian clothes came to my house at night. They knocked on the door. My wife opened the door. I was tired, lying down in the bed. They just asked me "Are you Gazafi?" "Yes I'm Gazafi." "Come with us." It was obvious they were security men because they had weapons, and they didn't ask any questions. The came directly toward me, and they attacked me in my home. They beat me and beat me - they just keep, they just kept beating. They took me with them to the detention center.
The first day at the detention center no one spoke with me at all. They just kept beating me. They kept on top of me: "You are, you are, you are, you are betraying Sudan and you are, you are, spying." They kept me in a cell. The next morning, someone started asking me questions. He told me, "You used to send goods to west of Sudan. Who works with you in this? And who do you send this stuff for? Who do you send this stuff to in the west of Sudan?" I only ask: "Send what?"
I denied all his accusations. He didn't believe me. He told me, "It's better to cooperate and tell me why are you saying this stuff and who cooperates with you." He asked me about my family, and about my family's friends. He wanted to know who receives these goods in the West, and who carries them to my office in Khartoum. I explained for him that it's just a general trade transportation office. "I have no idea what you're talking about."
I was telling him the truth. He didn't believe me. They had all my records from the shop. He still didn't believe me, and he asked the security men to start beating me again. Hard. After this hard beating I lost consciousness.
Eventually I found myself at the hospital. I stayed four days at the hospital. I got better and they sent me back again to the same place. The same person started asking me the same questions. I told him, "I have no any idea about what you are saying." I kept trying: "I have nothing to tell you."
I never learned the man's name. There was no relationship between us. He would just ask questions I should answer. When I first arrived, he offered a cigarette to me. I took it. That was the only cigarette.
I was very scared. I thought that if this man keeps accusing me like this, I will face the same end as my father. And I had a daughter at this time, one daughter. Maria. I thought of her.
The detention lasted eight days. They let me go, according to conditions: I had to cooperate with them. To give them information about the people who work with my father, and the people in Geneina. Every Saturday and Tuesday I would have to come to report to their office. I must not speak with anyone about what happened to me, about my experience in detention. If I wanted to go to anyplace I would have to get permission from security. I must cease any activities against the government. I said OK. After that they released me.
When I got out I feared for my life. They released me on the condition that I would have to give them information about the people who used to work with my father, but I didn't know what they wanted, I didn't know what the people did. I was only a transporter. I had no idea how to answer what the security would ask about. If I said, "I don't know anything," they would not believe me.
I did not go home. Secretly, I went to my uncle's house.
I stayed with my uncle in his house and he helped me to get a passport. He had some connections. He also used to work as a trader, so he knew officers and the people like this. Three or four days after I was released, my passport and visa were ready. I could not leave yet, though. People said that security is around, and it's not safe for me to leave. The visa expired. My uncle renewed the visa again. And the same thing happened, the same talk of the tight situation, the same advice that I couldn't leave peacefully.
I became scared and worried. I had to stay in one place, inside my uncle's house, the whole time. I couldn't move. I couldn't see my family, my wife, my child, my mother. Even my uncle didn't tell them that I was with him at his house. My uncle told me that if they, your wife or your mother know you are here, and the security men come and press them, they might confess under the force, might give them information about where I was. He told me, "Just keep it between me and you and don't worry."
Once more, my uncle got the same visa for me. I insisted on going this time. I told him that I would try and hopefully I would leave.
My uncle came with the car, and we drove to Wadi Halfa, the Sudanese port northwards. From Halfa I took a ferry to Aswan, to Egypt. At the border my uncle did everything for me - he used to know some people in Halfa. It was quiet. It was all quiet. I had no chance to say goodbye to my family.
I STAY. I JUST STAY.
In Egypt I still faced troubles.
I used a microbus to get to Cairo. Aswan to Cairo is about 15 hours. It's a very hard trip through the desert. All of us on the bus were Sudanese. We talked: "Have you been to Cairo before? Is this your first time?" They were all escaping in the same way as me.
I came to Cairo. I stayed in a hotel the first night. I knew nobody.
A man in the bus from Aswan told me that one of his relatives was staying in Cairo. I explained that I didn't know anyone there, and I had no idea about the city. He told me we should live together, and he called his brother. On the second day in Cairo, his brother came to us at the hotel. We went to his house and I stayed with them. The brother advised us to go to the UNHCR office to deal with the problems. I went to UNHCR and to tell them my problem.
The first day, UNHCR didn't allow us to submit our testimony, because they mentioned that we had arrived too late that day. This same thing happened all the first week: we would come every day and they would tell us, "We have already taken the number of cases we can take today, you must come back tomorrow." We would come the next day and it was the same thing. We were back and forth between home and UNHCR for a week. After this week, they allowed us to enter the office. They gave us a paper, asked us to write down our problem. They took a photocopy of my passport and they gave me this yellow card. I thought that if I faced any problem or anyone harassing me, I thought this yellow card could protect me. Soon I found out it's not useful at all, because I faced many troubles, I reported them to UNHCR, I reported them to police, and that doesn't make any difference.
They gave me this yellow card, a temporary protection card. Since that time I stay. I just stay.
I came to Cairo seeking peace and security. Just that.
I found a way to work as a vendor on the street, selling wallets, pencils, socks, and stuff like this. I buy things from stores that sell cheap, and then I sell it on the street. Walking the streets all day. Somehow it's enough and at the same time it's not quite enough. In a day, sometimes, it's 20 pounds or 25. Sometimes it's 15. [Fifteen Egyptian pounds equals about $2.75.]
I was living in the neighborhood of Ardeliwa, sharing an apartment with a group of Sudanese. I was not speaking to my family. I wrote a letter to my uncle in Sudan, and I gave him my contact number. My uncle used to call me from Sudan and give me the news. He gave my contacts to my mother, to my brothers and my family. And then they called me. I told my uncle to send my wife and my children to me.
My wife came to Cairo on the 26th of May, 2005. She came the same way as I did - my uncle facilitated the procedure and my wife went with my children to Aswan. Yes, children! When I left Sudan my wife was pregnant, and she had delivered a baby boy named Abdullah. She came to Cairo with Abdullah and Maria. I met my son for the first time here in Cairo. I had not known he had been born. I was very surprised. You can imagine.
Now with the family, 20, 25 pounds in a day is not enough. Sometimes my family sends us money from Sudan. We survive.
NO ONE CAN DO ANYTHING TO THEM.
I had a security problem with the Sudanese embassy. It started on the 25th of May 2005, just when my wife was set to arrive.
The Sudanese security came to my apartment at Ardeliwa. They asked me to go with them to the embassy for some paperwork procedure. I left Sudan because of a problem just like this - how could I go to the embassy now? It wasn't reasonable. So I refused to go.
I reported that to the Egyptian police, and I moved from Ardenliva to 6th of October City, on the edge of Cairo. I moved on the 26th of May, 2005, the day after the Sudanese embassy security came. I went to the police station and asked the police to make an agreement with the Sudanese embassy to stop following me. The police informed me that they have no ability to do that. Something about the embassy rules. I didn't understand.
I went to UNHCR for help, to try to find a solution with the police or do anything to stop the security of the Sudanese Embassy from following me. They sent my case to AMERA, the Africa and Middle East Refugee Assistance organization. At AMERA, a legal advisor named Muhammad informed me that he couldn't do anything because the problem belongs to the ministry of foreign affairs. He said the embassy has immunity. No one can do anything to them. They told me the best way to stay safe is to move from my home to another place. I told my lawyer that I'd already moved from my place to 6th of October City. That was all I could do, and that was all they did for me.
THEY HAVE DEMANDS AND I HAVE DEMANDS ALSO.
Months passed, and I did not feel safe at all. Eventually I decided to complain to UNHCR and to tell them about all my problems. When I went to the UNHCR's office, I found some Sudanese people protesting outside the office. A big number. At that time about 50 or 60. I asked, "What's going on?" and other refugees told me that all these people had troubles and had complaints and they were staying. They had demands I had demands also. I felt safe in this place, amongst the Sudanese refugees. I stayed with them. I stayed with the Sudanese outside of Moustafa Mahmoud Park, in front of UNHCR. We built shelters there, tents of sticks and rugs and plastic. We lived in the park outside the UNHCR office. It was October, 2005. Soon there were 1,500 of us, maybe 2,000! I stayed until the end.
After that first day, I went home and took my family to join the protest. All of us were there. We brought our clothes and things. We stayed three months, day and night. It was very hard, it was very cold, and the people slept down on the ground. People even died during those months of the protest. A woman delivered a baby inside the park. And it was very hard to find food - just a sandwich sometimes.
Disagreements took place inside the park. By December - the last days of the demonstration - the park was divided in two groups. One group wanted to accept the offer of the UNHCR: to meet with groups of ten refugees at a time and to reassess each case. UNHCR would pay us some money for rent and then we would have to leave the park. I was with the UNHCR on this. I agreed when the UNHCR offered to assist my case, to give me an interview, and then pay for my rent. I was ready to leave the park.
Unfortunately, most of the people - especially from southern Sudan - refused this offer. Officially, there was peace in southern Sudan, you know. It makes it a tough case for them. They asked the people to stay because they disagreed with UNHCR's offer. So everybody stayed.
THEY HAD A PLAN FOR US.
In late December, after months of all this, the policemen came and told us, "The Muslim Brotherhood want to make a demonstration in the park, and we want to protect you from the Muslim Brotherhood." At the same time they already had a plan. They surrounded the place. They had a plan for us.
They yelled at us with loudspeakers in the cold night: "You should leave this place! You should get inside the bus!" They had buses waiting for us. When we refused to get in they started scaring us by making sounds and doing all this military behavior. Stomping, marching, yelling. And still all the people refused to get out of the park.
After that they opened the water cannons. They sprayed us; it was so cold. We held up plastic sheets to try and protect ourselves. It seems that they sprayed us by water, but there was something that made me feel like I lost consciousness somewhat. Like I was numb. It was like the water was mixed with some chemical. They told us to leave again and our people insisted on staying. After that they surrounded the park from all the directions, came at us and started beating us. My wife lied down on the ground and started screaming. At that time I was holding my daughter in my left arm and holding Abdullah in my right arm, carrying him, carrying both of them.
When the policemen got inside the park, they beat us with sticks. One of them beat my son in the neck. They broke his neck, and I just fell down on the ground and I lost my daughter. I fell down on the ground and I lost both of my children. Two policemen came and dragged me along the ground and I saw my daughter fall down. I tried to grab her, to pick up and take her with me but one of the policeman beat me with the stick again. They dragged me inside the bus and they sent all of us in the bus to Toura prison. And it was over.
I expected that they would try to scare us. To break the demonstration in a different way. No one expected this end.
Many buses arrived at Toura prison, where I was, and after some time I saw my wife come in one of these buses. People were calling on their mobiles between the two prisons, and they told me that my daughter was in the other prison.
One of the people who was protesting with us, he had found my son in the park. He took my son's body with him. I found him in the prison. By that time my son was already dead. I asked the police to send away the body of my son, and to send me with my son, so I could bury him. I was very, very angry and very upset, and I insisted on going with the body to the morgue. The officer told me, "Okay, go. Get your wife and go." They let me leave the room and go find my wife where the women were. When I brought my wife back I found that the car had already taken my son to the morgue. They didn't wait for me.
Even then, the way that the police treated us was not humane at all. They promised to send us to the morgue. Me and my wife, and others with dead relatives - I think it was nine people all together. They just drove us to a parking lot somewhere near the morgue and asked us to wait for an official, someone meant to come help us. The police car drove away. Soon, security men came and asked us, "What are you doing here?" They just kicked us out, told us to leave.
My wife was completely, completely traumatized. Everyone who saw it was shocked and traumatized. Afterwards, I can only tell you this: no one could say anything.
After three days they released my daughter. It took three months to get back my son's body and bury it. Three months. We still are in pain. Our psychological state is very bad, but we try to go forward. We try, and the life goes on. We have a new child now. Born on the 26th of April 2006, thanks be to god.
BLUE CARD OR YELLOW CARD, THE SECURITY DOESN'T NOTICE.
To this day I continue to have trouble with Sudanese security in Cairo. They approach me in my neighborhood. They tell me to go back to Sudan. They threaten me and my family. They say that worse things are coming if I do not report to the embassy.
On the second day of April, 2007, my family visited the UNHCR to report the security problems I was still having in Cairo. I don't know what I was hoping for, just protection, just anything. I'd made an appointment the previous Wednesday, and on this Monday morning I wanted to meet with a protection officer.
I approached the garden outside of the UNHCR office, the place where the officers meet the refugees. Suddenly several Egyptian security officers approached, took hold of me and said they were taking us to prison. I asked, "Why, why?" The officers who arrested me did not tell me why. My wife, my four-year-old daughter, and my one-year-old son were also arrested with me. We were taken to the Dokki police station.
I was separated from my wife and my children at the police station, and I was placed in a room with nine other refugees who had been arrested at the same time as us. A police officer with an eagle and star emblem on his shoulder beat us with a stick. I was hit repeatedly in the middle of my back, over my kidney. After some hours, they told me my wife and children had been released.
In the evening, I was transferred to the prosecutor's office. The prosecutor wrote reports about why I was arrested, but he appeared to be making up his own information for the report. After the prosecutor wrote the report, I met with a lawyer. My lawyer requested to see the report and the prosecutor refused. My lawyer requested that I be examined by a doctor after this beating, but the officers refused again.
The prosecutor then sent me to the detention center in Giza. I was put in a crowded room with forty other people. There were criminals and gang members in the room, and they asked for money and belongings from me. When I told them I did not have anything, they told me to go sleep standing up in the toilet area. I was in this room for four days, during which I did not receive any food from the officers. The only food I received was the remains of food that other detainees' relatives brought. The only water I had was water from the toilet, and the water from the toilet ran dry at times and flooded at other times. I drank from the toilet of an Egyptian prison for four days.
While I was at the detention center, inspectors would come into the room every night. The inspector would insert his hands inside my pants, beat me in my chest, and yell at me to go back to Darfur. I could not go, though. I was still held in prison.
After four days of detention, I appeared in front of a judge. The judge asked where I was from in Sudan and extended my period of detention to an additional fifteen days. I spent the next fifteen days back in the detention center. I then went in front of the judge again. The judge commented that I looked like I had gained weight in detention, though I had certainly not. I was then sent back for another week at the detention center. After the week, I went before the judge again. He asked me to make a deal.
The judge told me that he would release me if I promised never to approach UNHCR again. He told me that if I did approach UNHCR again, I would be sentenced to six years in jail. Without waiting for a response, the judge said he released me. He told me that if I did not know his reputation, I should ask other people to find out. He assured me he is a very tough judge. Even after the judge told me I was released, I was forced to spend five more days in the detention center.
After those final five days, I was taken to the State Security center. In the car on the way to the State Security center, I was blindfolded. I was taken from the car inside a building. I could hear stretchers moving around me, and I was very frightened. I heard my name called, and I was asked why I was there. They asked me where I was from in Sudan and why I was at the Security Center. I was told to go outside and stand with a group. I was then taken to the car. After sitting in the car for one or two hours, I was taken back inside. I was taken into a room and the blindfold was removed. A security officer told me to write a statement saying I would never approach the UNHCR again. I was told that if I repeated this behavior again, it would be a violation of Egyptian law and I would be deported. After I wrote what he wanted, I was blindfolded again. I was put in a car and taken back to the detention center in Giza. I spent the night there and was then taken to Mogamma, the huge interior ministry building in downtown Cairo. At the Mogamma, the employees researched my criminal background. They found nothing, of course, and then released me.
On May 7, 2007, three officers in civilian clothes broke in to my house in the 6th of October neighborhood and took me in their car. It's called 6th of October in honor of the Egyptian War with Israel - everywhere in Cairo you have 6th of October, 6th of October city, 6th of October bridge, 6th of October Street, it's their proudest day. The officers took me, and I was blindfolded in the car and taken to an unknown place. They interrogated me about the group of people who were arrested on 2 April, the group of us that were taken from outside the UNHCR office. They asked me about where I was from in Sudan, and about why I was in Cairo. I explained to them the problem that brought me from Sudan to here. They advised me to go back to Sudan and threatened that if I did not, they would fabricate a crime and throw me in the jail. They took my UN card and released me then next day around 5:00 pm.
I am frightened and believe that the police could come back at anytime to fabricate a story to have me thrown in jail or be deported. Sometimes I'm so afraid that I move away from my family for days or weeks at a time, staying in friends' houses, locked inside. For weeks after the detention incident, I did not have my UNHCR card. The lawyers at the AMERA organization helped me get a blue card after some weeks. A blue card is supposed to be less temporary, is supposed to be a stronger protection for official refugees, but I don't know. Blue card or yellow card, same for me. The Sudanese security doesn't care about a blue card or a yellow card.
IT MAKES ME HATE EVERYTHING.
If you ask me what has changed, I say there is nothing new to mention. We do not feel comfortable, we are not relaxed. And for the future, I'm not sure about anything. Many Sudanese have a blue card and they don't find an opportunity for resettlement. I would go anywhere that I can live in peace, anywhere. But I might be killed if I return to Sudan. And now, psychologically, I hate something called Sudan. They killed my father there, and what I have seen there is horrific. I think about the treatments that I faced in Sudan and it makes me hate everything.
I don't know if I will ever again see my family that is still in Sudan. Maybe if someday I live anyplace else, I can invite them to visit me. I do not think I will ever see my home in Sudan again.
My children, thank god, they are okay. My boy is a smart one, and my daughter, too, she's very smart. She goes to the nursery school with Egyptian children. I have no Egyptian friends, but she does.
The Egyptian society is difficult because when I walk down the street I hear words that are completely inhumane. 'Abid,' 'hunga bunga,' 'chokolata.' ['Abid' means 'slave' in Arabic.] I worry for my daughter, even though she does well now. When she grows, she will hear the same as me. She has my same color so she will be seen the same. Even in 15 years, it's difficult to think, but we will probably still be here, and she will probably hear the same words.
This book by Dave Eggers tells the life story of Valentino Achak Deng, from his pre-war life in southern Sudan to his resettlement in the United States.
