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Congo in Conversation
  • Project
  • Congo (DRC)
  • Finbarr O’Reilly
  • Contributors
    • Arlette Bashizi
    • Bernadette Vivuya
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    • Guylain Balume
    • Justin Makangara
    • Ley Uwera
    • Moses Sawasawa
    • Pamela Tulizo
    • Raissa Karama Rwizibuka
  • Themes
    • Access to clean water
    • Economy
    • Electricity and Hydroelectric Plants
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Congo in Conversation
Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo, April 27-28, 2020. With schools closed during Congo's period of confinement, and the city implementing regular power cuts, my 13-year-old sister Marie studies at home by the light of a mobile phone. © Arlette Bashizi for Fondation Carmignac

Goma in the dark

byArlette Bashizi
April 30, 2020
in Electricity and Hydroelectric Plants
Reading Time: 4min read

Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo, April 27-28, 2020. With schools closed during Congo’s period of confinement, and the city implementing regular power cuts, my 13-year-old sister Marie studies at home by the light of a mobile phone. © Arlette Bashizi for Fondation Carmignac

We have a lot of power cuts in Goma. We’re used to it, but it still makes life difficult, especially at night, and even more now that we’re at home all day. No electricity means we can’t charge our phones or laptops, watch TV or use Internet. Goma is close to the equator so it’s dark from 6pm until 6am almost every day. It’s easy to get bored in the evenings.

The first two pictures here were taken on Monday and Tuesday nights this week while my 13-year-old sister Marie was studying during the power cuts. Marie loves mathematics and wants to be a businesswoman. While she’s waiting for schools to reopen she’s continuing to study at home, even when we have no electricity. Here she was working by the light of our mother’s mobile phone.

Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo, April 27-28 2020. With schools closed during Congo's period of confinement, and the city implementing regular power cuts, my 13-year-old sister Marie studies at home by the light of a mobile phone. © Arlette Bashizi for Fondation Carmignac
Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo, April 27-28 2020. With schools closed during Congo’s period of confinement, and the city implementing regular power cuts, my 13-year-old sister Marie studies at home by the light of a mobile phone. © Arlette Bashizi for Fondation Carmignac

At my house, we are nine people; my six siblings, my parents, and myself. Usually my father works as a carpenter and my mother sells shoes at the market, but with the confinement, everything has stopped. For a while, my mother was selling shoes in front of our house, but then her stock ran out and there are no more customers. Financially, things are more difficult now. We have to minimize our expenses.

When the first cases of coronavirus were confirmed in Goma in early April, people began to panic. Because of the Ebola epidemic here in eastern Congo, people got scared easily about a new deadly virus.

  • Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo, early April 2020. Three days after the first case of COVID-19 was confirmed in Congo's eastern city, disinfectant started being distributed. These women have wiped their hands with disinfectant and been given information on maintaining proper hygiene in the city's Katoyi neighborhood, where residents do not have easy access to water. © Arlette Bashizi for Fondation Carmignac
  • Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo, early April 2020. Three days after the first case of COVID-19 was confirmed in Congo's eastern city, disinfectant started being distributed. This woman lives in the Katoyi neighborhood, where residents do not have easy access to water. © Arlette Bashizi for Fondation Carmignac
  • Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo, early April 2020. Three days after the first case of COVID-19 was confirmed in Congo's eastern city, children wash their hands at an orphanage. © Arlette Bashizi for Fondation Carmignac
[1] Goma, Democratic Republic of Congo, early April 2020. Three days after the first case of COVID-19 was confirmed in Congo’s eastern city, disinfectant started being distributed. These women have wiped their hands with disinfectant and been given information on maintaining proper hygiene in the city’s Katoyi neighborhood, where residents do not have easy access to water. [2] This woman lives in the Katoyi neighborhood, where residents do not have easy access to water. [3] Children wash their hands at an orphanage. © Arlette Bashizi for Fondation Carmignac

Three days after the first locally confirmed case of COVID-19, I went out with a group of young activists from a radio show called Kazia Pale. The activists were visiting people who were especially vulnerable during confinement. We went to a neighborhood called Katoyi, an area that doesn’t have easy access to running water. We met some widows and the activists made sure they had information about the importance of hand washing. They explained that if water was scarce, they could use disinfectant gels instead to protect themselves. The women were grateful that younger people were looking out for them. We also visited an orphanage: there, the activists spent some time explaining the importance of washing hands for 20 seconds.

Now, it’s almost a month later and we are waiting to see what happens. There were five COVID-19 cases confirmed here in North Kivu Province, three of them in Goma. All have recovered. Government officials said they are waiting to lift the confinement, but we don’t know when that will happen or what things will look like when it does. When it comes to this, we’re like everyone else: a little bit in the dark.

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Arlette Bashizi

Arlette Bashizi

Arlette Bashizi is a freelance photographer based in Goma covering music, culture and daily life. She is a member of the Collectif Goma Oeil and the Congo Women’s Photographers Network.

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  • Schools and universities reopened this week in the Democratic Republic of Congo after a two-month hiatus due to the second wave of the coronavirus #pandemic, which now appears to be easing. Pupils returning to class flooded the streets of Congo’s main cities, such as #Kinshasa, #Goma, #Bukavu and #Lubumbashi, but widespread insecurity is hampering efforts to resume education in several of Congo’s restive eastern provinces. In some areas, armed groups are forcibly occupying schools and homes, prohibiting school activities, and attacking health centers, according to the UNHCR, the UN @refugees Agency.
 
🔗 Read full report by @mosessawasawa, “Students Return to School as Pandemic Second Wave Eases” online. Link in bio.
 
📸 Goma, DRC, February 2021. A student has her temperature checked at the entrance to Mwanga Institute © @mosessawasawa for @fondationcarmignac.
 
🇫🇷
 
Après une parenthèse de deux mois due à la seconde vague d’une épidémie de coronavirus en voie de régression, écoles et universités ont rouvert leurs portes cette semaine en RDC. Les élèves retournant en classe ont envahi les rues de Kinshasa, de Goma, de Bukavu et de Lubumbashi, mais dans les provinces agitées de l’est, l’insécurité généralisée entrave tous les efforts pour faire repartir le système éducatif. Dans certaines zones, des groupes armés occupent par la force écoles et maisons, interdisent les activités scolaires et prennent d’assaut les centres médicaux, selon le Haut-Commissariat des Nations Unis pour les réfugiés (@refugees).
 
📸 Goma, RDC, février 2021. On prend la température d’une étudiante à l’entrée de l’Institut Mangwa, collège catholique. © Moses Sawasawa pour la @fondationcarmignac.
 
 
🔗 Retrouvez l’article de @mosessawasawa, « La pandémie reflue, les écoles rouvrent » sur notre site internet. Lien en bio.
 
#CONGOINCONVERSATION
 
#PrixCarmignacCongo #DRC #RDC #RDCongo #Students #School #Coronavirus #Health #Politics #Insecurity #Photographie #PhotoReport #Reportage #photojournalism
  • 🎤 Next Tuesday, March 2nd, from 3 to 4 p.m (French time), @raissa_rkar, #CongoinConversation photographer, will dialogue with Gosette Lubondo (@gosettelubondo), a Congolese photographer, laureate of the @capprize 2020 and Yvon Langué (@flottements_) independent curator.
 
The discussion “Social Documentary” will be broadcast live, in French, on our Facebook page #PrixCarmignac !
 
📷 TALK TALK TALK x African Photographic Society
A series of talks and discussions around photography in African contexts with the aim of networking different initiatives and photographers from the continent and beyond. An initiative by @aphotographicsociety members, @fot.ea and CAP Association.⠀
 
🇫🇷
 
🎤 Mardi prochain, le 2 mars de 15 à 16h (heure française), @raissa_rkar photographe de #CongoinConversation, dialoguera avec Gosette Lubondo (@gosettelubondo) photographe congolaise, et Yvon Langué (@flottements_) commissaire d
  • The Italian ambassador to Congo, Luca Attanasio, was killed in an apparent kidnapping attempt on Monday. An Italian embassy official and a Congolese World Food Programme driver were also killed in the ambush which took place near Nyiragongo volcano. The region and in particular the Virunga Park has for years been the site of repeated attacks from rebels and militia groups, along with poachers and loggers, leading to the killing of hundreds of rangers and civilians. More than 2,000 civilians were killed in three eastern provinces last year in attacks mainly attributed to armed groups, the @unitednations reported this month. One of the worst massacres in Virunga Park’s recent history occurred last May when 12 rangers were among 17 people killed in an ambush on the same road the ambassador was travelling between Goma and Rutshuru. In January, six park rangers on a foot patrol were killed in another ambush.
 
Full report by @guerchomndebo & Austere Malivika online. Link in bio.
 
🇫🇷
 
L’ambassadeur d’Italie en RDC a été tué lundi, probablement au cours d’une tentative d’enlèvement. Un fonctionnaire de l’ambassade italienne et un chauffeur congolais du Programme alimentaire mondial (WPF) ont aussi péri dans l’embuscade, survenue près du volcan Nyiragongo. Depuis des années, la région et notamment le Parc des Virunga subit les attaques incessantes de rebelles, de milices, de braconniers et de bûcherons qui ont causé la mort de centaines de gardes forestiers et de civils. Selon les Nations unies, plus de 2 000 civils ont été tués dans trois de ces provinces l’an dernier, lors d’attaques attribuées à ces groupes armés. L’un des pires massacres dans l’histoire récente des Virunga s’est produit en mai 2020 : 17 personnes dont 12 gardes forestiers ont péri dans une embuscade sur la même route de Goma à Rutshuru empruntée par l’ambassadeur. En janvier, six gardes patrouillant à pied ont également succombé à une embuscade.
 
Article en intégralité accessible en ligne. Lien en bio.
 
#DRCongo #Congo #NorthKivu #EasternCongo #Photojournalism #Photojournalisme #PrixCarmignac #Journalism #journalisme
  • There has been a steep rise in violence across much of eastern #Congo during the past year, according to Kivu Security Tracker (KST), an initiative by @humanrightswatch and the #CongoResearchGroup that monitors such attacks. A new report published on Monday identified 122 distinct armed groups across four of Congo’s eastern provinces. Congo also has a record high of 5.5 million people displaced across the country. More than 2,000 civilians were killed in three eastern provinces last year in attacks mainly attributed to armed groups, the @unitednations reported this month.
 
📸 Goma, DRC, January 2021. Mourners in the eastern Congolese city of Goma attend the funeral of Eric Kibanja, one of six Virunga Park rangers killed in an ambush © @guerchomndebo for @FondationCarmignac
 
🇫🇷
 
Une flambée de violence affecte la plus grande partie de l’est du Congo, comme en atteste le Baromètre sécuritaire du Kivu (Kivu Security Tracker), un outil d’évaluation mis en place par l’ONG @humanrightswatch et le Groupe d’étude sur le Congo. Le rapport publié ce même lundi identifie pas moins de 122 groupes armés distincts dans les quatre provinces orientales de la RDC. Et il enregistre un record de 5,5 millions de personnes déplacées dans tout le pays. Selon les @unitednations, plus de 2 000 civils ont été tués dans trois de ces provinces l’an dernier, lors d’attaques attribuées à ces groupes armés.
 
📸 Goma, RDC, janvier 2021. Cérémonie des funérailles d’Éric Kibanja, l’un des six gardes forestiers des Virunga tués dans une embuscade © Guerchom Ndebo pour la Fondation Carmignac

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  • The escalating churn of deadly violence engulfing parts of eastern Congo gained international attention when the Italian ambassador to the country was killed in an ambush on Monday near the eastern city of Goma in North Kivu province. Armed attackers killed the ambassador, Luca Attanasio, 43, as his convoy was travelling from Goma to visit a feeding programme at a school 70 kilometers north in Rutshuru, according to a statement by the WFP. An Italian embassy official and a World Food Programme driver were also killed in the ambush which took place near Nyiragongo volcano in Virunga Park where mountain forests are home to dozens of armed groups, some of them linked to the 1994 Rwandan genocide.
 
Full report online. Link in bio.
 
Video © Austere Malivika for @fondationcarmignac
 
🇫🇷
 
Lundi 22 février, le maelstrom de violence qui s’abat sur des pans entiers de l’est de la RDC s’est révélé aux yeux du monde : l’ambassadeur d’Italie a été tué dans une embuscade près de Goma. Selon un rapport du Programme alimentaire mondial (WPF), les assaillants ont abattu le diplomate Luca Attanasio, 43 ans, alors que son convoi quittait le chef-lieu du Nord-Kivu pour aller visiter un programme alimentaire dans une école de Rutshuru, à 70 km au nord. Un représentant de l’ambassade d’Italie et un chauffeur du WPF ont également été tués dans l’attaque qui a eu lieu près du volcan Nyiragongo, dans le parc des Virunga. Ces forêts de montagne abritent des dizaines de groupes armés, dont certains sont associés au genocide rwandais de 1994.

#RDC #DRC #RDCongo #VirungaPark #Virunga #NordKivu #NorthKivu #Rutshuru #journalisme
  • A girl sings a song about Ebola prevention during an education campaign organised by Save the Children at a church in the town of Beni in Eastern Democratic Republic of Congo in 2019. Congo has made significant progress in reducing child mortality and access to education for children, but a majority of them remain deprived of many of their rights, according to UNICEF, which reports that 10% of children in Congo die before the age of five and 6 million children suffer from chronic malnutrition or stunting.

In February 2021, cases of Ebola have been reported in Guinea and in the North Kivu province in DRC, where a large outbreak was yet declared over in June 2020. 
 
📸 Beni, DRC, 2019 © Finbarr O
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