By Ben Carter

In 1994 Nyangoma Esperance and her six children fled their home near the Burundi capital. They feared murder at the hands of their own neighbours. For 15 years she has worked hard to build a new life for her family just 6km away but she still dreams of going back.

Burundi is one of the poorest countries in the world with some 80 percent of its population living on less than $1 a day. Like most Burundians, Nyangoma supported her family through farming. She lived with her six children and her father in a place called Gakunrwe, near the capital city, Bujumbura.

"Life was hard," said Nyangoma. "But the land was fertile and we were doing well. Looking back now it seems like paradise."

In fact Nyangoma was able not only to feed her family but also to earn a little money through selling extra produce. She built up their smallholding so that in addition to fruit and cereals they had goats, chickens and sheep. She even saved money.

In 1993 dark rumours reached the village of massacres, of neighbours rising up and killing each other in the night. The genocide in Rwanda has been well publicised in the west. Less well known, is that Burundi was also engulfed by the violence between the different ethnic groups, Hutu and Tutsi.

At first Nyangoma and her family felt safe. They were Tutsis in an area dominated by Hutus but they had known their neighbours a long time. But as the stories became more frequent and closer to home their fear grew stronger.

Then one night Nyangoma received warning that their village would be next and that her family was under threat. Her family left their home the next morning. They travelled during the day because militia filled the area at night.

Nyangoma and her family only fled 6km to Kanyosha. They were heading for a camp that had been set up for those uprooted by the conflict, but people had been arriving from across the country for over a year and it was already full.

Thankfully Nyangoma had her savings and was able to rent a basic home. It had no water, electricity or furniture and at $10 a month it was expensive but it provided shelter and in Bujumbura they were safe from harm.

Nyangoma thought the move was temporary but she and her family still live in the same area. They have had to move home seven times, forced into smaller and smaller homes by rent increases.

In 1996, with tensions easing, Nyangoma was able to visit her family land and home. She found the buildings destroyed; their possessions gone, but the land was still theirs. Although it remained unsafe at night, government troops escorted Nyangoma and other villagers during the day so that they could tend their fields and try to earn a living.

It is hard to farm when you cannot stay nearby. Nyangoma walked every day to her farm and walked back every night. She found she had to harvest before the food was ripe or it would be stolen. She could not keep any livestock either. Still, Nyangoma worked hard on her fields and also cultivated neighbours' land for pay.

Nyangoma has been doing the same ever since - walking every day, carrying produce home and living in basic housing. In recent years, some of the other Tutsi villagers have started to come back but Nyangoma and her family have not been able to. There is no house for them to go back to and they have no money to build another.

Nyangoma has found the last 15 years extremely hard but she is rightly proud of how well she has managed to support her family. Thanks to a government scheme that waived fees for families uprooted by the conflict, Nyangoma's children were able to attend school. Nyangoma's work meant that they did not have to join her in the fields and had money for pencils and exercise books. Nyangoma has one child at university and two at secondary school. She has four grandchildren now and helps to raise them.

"I know that I have been blessed because I have kept my family together," she said. "I hope that through going to school my children and grandchildren will be able to live a better life than I have had. But even though I am happy to have had such good fortune, still I wish that we could return to Gakunrwe and live as we did."

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