Thousands of Congolese refugees are pouring into Burundi as intense fighting escalates between M23 rebels and the Armed Forces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and their allies in South Kivu.
The Rwanda-backed M23 rebels claimed control of the city of Uvira on Wednesday, triggering a mass exodus of terrified civilians.
New reception sites — including the Kansega transit centre in the Ndava zone of Bujumbura Province — have sprung up to manage the influx. Yet the conditions at these sites remain harsh and deeply troubling.
At Kansega, where hundreds continue to arrive by the hour, there is no water, no toilets and no proper shelter. Exhausted and traumatised families say they escaped unimaginable violence.
For 32-year-old Fidèle Edimbe, a father of three from Uvira, the journey to safety came at a devastating personal cost.
“Getting here was difficult. We went through heavy shelling and bullets, and I personally lost my younger brother who was killed by a bomb,” he said. “That’s when we realised how bad things had become, and we decided to cross the Rusizi River to reach this place.”
Between December 5 and 11, the United Nations refugee agency,UNHCR, recorded 40,000 new arrivals from the DRC. These refugees are now spread across three transit sites — Kansega, Cishemere and Gatumba — all of which are struggling to keep up with the pace of arrivals.
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During a visit to Kansega on December 11, UNHCR representative Brigitte Mukanga-Engo acknowledged the desperate state of the transit centres and highlighted the immense strain on available resources.
She said the agency is working with immigration services and Burundi’s National Office for the Protection of Refugees and Stateless Persons to manage the situation.
She also noted that among those crossing into Burundi are Burundian nationals who had previously sought refuge in the DRC and are now returning due to the violence.
Their presence adds another layer of complexity to an already overstretched humanitarian response.
In an effort to ease congestion, UNHCR has announced plans to open a new refugee camp in Bweru, in eastern Burundi.
As of mid-2024, Burundi was already hosting more than 71,000 Congolese refugees, including about 18,000 sheltered in the Musenyi camp.
With the surge of new arrivals, humanitarian agencies are now racing against time to prevent a worsening crisis in transit sites ill-equipped to house the rapidly growing population.
African News
