Feature - Mixed feelings about demobilisation

The queue stretches around the outside of a disused warehouse on the outskirts of the capital, Asmara. Hundreds of men, some playing cards, others dozing, eating or talking, wait patiently in the midday sun. Most have been there for two days, but no one complains. They have been anticipating this for years and are happy to wait a little longer. The men are among the first 5,000 soldiers to be demobilised from the Eritrean army, following the end of the country’s border war with Ethiopia. Many were conscripted when the fighting started four years ago, leaving their jobs and families behind. Now they are about to go home. The demobilisation, carried out over three days this week in Asmara, Keren and Massawa, is part of a pilot project, designed to test procedures for the release of a further 195,000 male and female fighters over the next two years. It will be a huge and expensive task. There are plans to offer each departing soldier food, money, medical and social advice, as well as help with finding jobs and learning new skills. Under its Demobilisation and Reintegration Process, (DRP), the Eritrean government recognises the problems soldiers will face returning to their communities, and aims to help them reintegrate into civilian life. But for many life can never be the same again. Takalit Maashow was a farmer before he was called up four years ago. Now aged 40, and with a bullet still lodged in his shoulder, he is about to return to his wife and four children who live near Asmara. “I do not want to be a farmer any more,” he told IRIN. “The work is too hard, I am tired after four years of the military. It was very difficult. I want to find a job in Asmara, I will do anything.” Takalit is typical. Many of the men milling around the makeshift demobilisation centre, chosen for early discharge because of their age or injuries, talk of trying to find work in the capital rather than returning to their lives in the countryside. They say they have seen too much to ever be satisfied with such a simple existence. For some there is little to return to, their homes have been destroyed by the fighting, their lands neglected by families forced to move to safer areas or contaminated by landmines. An estimated 19,000 people were killed in the war, with thousands more displaced from their homes. Many of these are still living in camps. Captain Desale, an army officer, is in charge of issuing identity papers and medical certificates to the departing soldiers at the centre. It is a slow, laborious process. Sitting under a banner which proclaims 'Demobilised soldiers must not forget the martyrs who died for their country', he explained: “It is a happy day for the men here, because they want to return to their families, but most of them are farmers and they have nothing to go back to, they have been away too long.” Solomon, 47, has spent most of the last 24 years in the army. “I was a driver before I joined,” he said. “Now I do not know what I am going to do. I will try to get a job as a driver again, but I am not sure that it will be easy. I have five children, and when I was in the army the rent was paid and we had enough money for food. Now I am not sure how I will afford to live. It will be very difficult.” The Eritrean government is anxious that demobilised soldiers return to their homes rather than stay in the capital looking for work. It is also aware that with a population of only 3.5 million, the successful reintegration of 200,000 soldiers is essential to the country’s future development. There is a shortage of skilled workers, especially in regions most badly damaged by the war - along the country’s southern border with Ethiopia. Food production also suffered during the war, and the government hopes that farmers will return to work their lands. But persuading them to do so may not be easy. Many of those waiting in line for their release papers have mixed feelings about their impending freedom. “It is a happy day for all of us,” said Ghide, a 42-year-old farmer. “I am happy because we have peace and I can return to my family, but now I must start to worry about the future.” No date has yet been set for the first phase of demobilisation, under which the first 80,000 soldiers are due to be discharged. The government estimates the total cost of the DRP to be nearly US $200 million. Some of this has already been pledged by international donors, including the World Bank. The World Food Programme is donating food to the returning soldiers.