Despite being displaced from their home country, Liberian refugees are grouping together to fight HIV and gain a better education. Mareeni Raymond visits a Liberian refugee camp and talks to its inhabitants

Alfred Gizzie is an HIV/AIDS counsellor and educator in a village in Ghana, visiting schools, churches and traditional providers of medicine to educate on prevention of HIV transmission in his village. But he is not Ghanaian, and this is no ordinary village. Gizzie is a Liberian refugee. He lives and works in the Buduburam settlement, a refugee camp with a population of about 40 000, which was set up by United Nations High Commission for Refugees in 1989 to house people fleeing from war torn Liberia.

Fierce stigma

On the camp, HIV is a problem. No records exist to measure the true extent of its prevalence, but stigma is fierce. People do not want to admit that they have the disease, and families try to ensure that their loved ones are not stigmatised after they die. Gizzie is a volunteer counsellor and educator for LIBRUAHS (Liberian Refugees United Against HIV/AIDS and STDs)--one of three or four small projects trying to prevent the spread of HIV in the camp.

As part of the scheme, Gizzie tries to heighten awareness about the disease in schools and churches. He also acts as a peer educationalist, provides counselling, supports people infected with HIV, and distributes condoms. By night he takes to the streets as a volunteer with a neighbourhood watch scheme: "At night we walk around the village with torches and a wheelbarrow, pick up people found on the streets, and take them to the clinics hoping they can get emergency medical care," he says.

The counsellors can provide free counselling, but an actual HIV test costs too much money and cannot be done at the settlement. People have to travel to Apam hospital, which is a 45 minute drive away. The journey acts as a hindrance to people finding out their status and, coupled with the stigma of AIDS, it means that many people present to the medical services with full blown AIDS rather than getting treatment earlier.

Child in Buduburam settlement

In the camp, people must pay for their medical treatment, so many go to cheaper traditional healers, whose methods are often unhygienic. Educators visit the healers to explain that one mode of transmission occurs by using the same equipment for different patients. But the resources for education are almost non-existent.

Although HIV is a problem on the camp, garbage is strewn on every street, and in some places huge expanses of rubbish are piled next to people's homes. Running water and electricity are unavailable, even at the clinics, but all these difficulties are not exclusive to the camp--they occur in many rural villages in Ghana too. As well the poor sanitation, inhabitants endure malnourishment, malaria, typhoid, and other diseases, and the two poorly resourced clinics are over-run.

But despite these problems, the Liberian volunteers say that they are much better off here than in their home countries for now. Gizzie and his colleagues all have sad stories to tell. He fled Liberia after his brothers were killed in the first conflict, but he returned a few years later. He was forced to flee to return to the Buduburam settlement again after he was tortured in Liberia. He says that he has no way of getting in touch with his young son and wife, who he thinks are still in Liberia.

Another educator in the group is afraid to call his brother: "If they see him with a phone, they would kill him. Most phone lines don't work anyway," he says.

Market stalls and makeshift homes

In the settlement they make the most of their situation. Makeshift homes bustle with activity and are crammed with people. Small businesses and market vendors sell local dishes like fufu, baked corn, or bagged water. One man has built a games stall. Villagers pay a fee to try and throw the hoop over a packet of biscuits, and if they succeed they get to keep the biscuits.

But many refugees are frustrated at having to leave their education halfway through and start again in Ghana. Organisations, like the Liberian Welfare Council, help develop the village by monitoring activities, settling disputes, appealing externally for funding, and acting as the liaison point with the Ghanaian government. Several vocational schools have been set up with the help of the United Nations and other charities to teach the refugees skills such as construction, carpentry, baking, tie dye, soap making, sewing, and computer skills. Getting a job can be difficult in the neighbouring villages, even though Ghanaians have accepted the Liberian community. It is hard to get a job if your residential status is in limbo.

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