Bangui: The Cycle of Hatred

French Translation of the Week

Les militaires français en mission à Bangui ont écouté l'hommage de François Hollande aux deux soldats tués dans un échange de tirs alors qu'ils patrouillaient aux abords de l'aéroport. Malgré cette présence française, la situation est toujours chaotique dans la capitale centrafricaine. Les opérations de désarmement et de cantonnement, menées par les 1 600 hommes de l'opération Sangaris n'empêchent ni les affrontements sporadiques ni les lynchages, ni les pillages qui durent depuis la fin de semaine dernière. Bangui est encore loin d'être sécurisée.

The French military mission to Bangui listened to the tribute by François Hollande, to the two French soldiers killed in a firefight while on patrol in the vicinity of the airport. Despite this French presence, the situation is still chaotic in the Central African capital. The disarmament and confinement, led by 1,600 men of the Sangaris operation has not prevented sporadic clashes, lynching and looting, since the end of last week. Bangui is far from being secure.

This article has been translated from French. Click here to read the original version on Jeune Afrique.

It is in a context of violence and retaliation that François Hollande stopped in Bangui Tuesday, on his way back from Johannesburg. During his visit, the French President paid tribute to the two fallen soldiers of the 8th RPIMA who died during a dispute hours earlier, near M'Poko airport. "They gave their lives to save others," said the head of the French state. "It was time to take action. It would have been too late soon. For weeks, massacres were perpetrated. Frightful violence was committed against women and children. And clashes took religious dimension with the risk of leading to a civil war. There was no time to procrastinate on the opportunity or even the duration of this operation. An intervention was needed to save as many lives as possible and to prevent the bloodshed that lay ahead."

However, President Hollande did not only come to justify the French intervention once again. He also met with religious leaders and with the transitional authorities, including President Michel Djotodia, whom he had disavowed last Saturday. François Hollande had accused the former Seleka rebel leader to have allowed interfaith massacres to occur. Before this interview, the head of the French government reiterated that he was in favor of the rapid organization of elections, that is to say before 2015, in order to stabilize the country.

Muslims targeted

On the ground, it is clear that for now, French disarmament does not stem the spiral of violence that has been igniting Bangui since last week. Sometimes, once a French patrol disarms militiamen, they are lynched in the street by people seeking revenge for months of abuses by former Selekas .

"I assure you that in each neighborhood where cars of our French brothers arrive, crowds of fellow Christians come out. If a former Seleka is disarmed, they look for stones to throw at him," said Moussa , 23 , a Muslim who lives in Kilo 5 area, in the 3rd district of Bangui. "These ex- Selekas have their civilian families around. In the 3rd district, they have their dad, their mom. They are not mercenaries, they are Central African Muslims."

In this cycle of blind retaliation, the attackers are confusing the former Selekas, mostly Muslims, with the other community members, accused of supporting them and they hit indiscriminately. The shops run by Muslims are targeted. On Tuesday for example, shops were looted in the neighborhood of Combattant.

Two mosques were also attacked. One was burned in Ouhango. The other was ransacked in the district of Fouh.  "As soon as the Seleka entered on the 24th [of March 2013 Ed] , all the Muslims in Bangui became  accomplices in everything that happens in this country," a robber yells into the microphone of our special correspondent Laurent Correau . "Now we no longer want to hear of Muslims in Central Africa! We just want Christians. We will destroy everything that is Muslim, houses, everything." Such hate speeches obviously create fear and anger among Muslims, raising worries of a new cycle of revenge in return.

Calls for calm

This hatred is however covered by calls for peace by the legal authorities of the country. Civil society, Christian and Muslim religious leaders urge the Bangui population to stay calm and to lay down arms. "I Myself welcome the Imam at my place, he lives in the archdiocese," says the Archbishop of Bangui, Dieudonné Nzapalainga . "This is the kind of gesture that we want to see, where the Muslim welcomes the Muslim and the Christian to welcome the Muslim. This is how we will witness unity."

For now, these peace messages have produced little effect. For months, frightened families have been leaving their homes and gathering between relatives in places or neighborhoods deemed safer. In addition, there are thousands of people from Bangui gathered around the M'Poko airport, relying on French protection.

"In Bangui only, we are more than 300,000 displaced," explained Pastor Antoine Mbao Bogo, President of the Central African Red Cross. "That is to say, a family of a dozen people that is already in big distress receives about thirty other members who come to live with them. There are houses where there are almost sixty people." The pastor also emphasized the fact that the first priority for those families who lack everything , is to feed themselves.

On the field since the end of last week, 350 CAR Red Cross volunteers are assigned to carry the wounded to hospitals run by Doctors Without Borders. More importantly, they are hard at work to pick up the bodies and to bury them in two mass graves in the north and south of the city. There are more than 400 bodies so far, according to the Red Cross which must specify its assessment in the next hours or days.

Article translated by Raky Toure, Staff Intern for the Africa Program at the Wilson Center.

Photo Credit: Rebel camp in the north-eastern Central African Republic, by hdptcar on Flickr/Commons.