by ABDURRAHMAN WARSAMEH
MOGADISHU, Dec 30, 2011 (IPS) – With vehicles and donkey carts packed with their belongings, Somalis are returning, four years after they fled, to their partially standing, bullet-scarred and mortar-shelled neighbourhoods in former Al-Shabaab controlled areas of Mogadishu.
With much of the Somali capital now under the control of government forces backed by African Union troops, most of the city’s residents have returned to their ruined homes after the surprise withdrawal of the extremists in August. Despite security incidents in the city, a semblance of normalcy has returned here.
Residents have now begun the slow process of rebuilding their homes and their lives. While most have been weary of returning to former Al-Shabaab controlled areas, a brave few have dared to return to their ruined neighborhoods intent on a new beginning. There are, however, no official figures of how many people have returned to date.
Many have had to endure years of hardship in squalid conditions in makeshift shelters on the outskirts of the city.
Maryan Guled, a mother of five, has lived with her husband and children in the Elasha camp on the outskirts of Mogadishu since 2008.
Inter Press Service for more