Woman opens her home to orphans of war
BENI, Congo — Thirteenyear-old Gloria Saambili said her mother was cooking when rebels entered her home in the Congolese village of MayiMoya, killed her with an ax and took Gloria’s father and two brothers into the forest. The teen escaped.
“I think every day about my family ... I am alone in the world,” Saambili said, through tears.
She is among hundreds of children in Congo’s northeastern Beni region who have lost family to attacks by Allied Democratic Forces rebels, who have killed more than 1,500 people since late 2014 in a region longscarred by militia violence.
More than 100 of the orphaned children, including Saambili, have found themselves in the care of 65-year-old Marie Charline Mutsuva, whose humble hut has become well-known as a haven from the unrest.
More than a dozen children, ranging from 6 months to 18 years old, currently live with Mutsuva, whom they often call “Mama.”
“I felt compelled to help them,” she said.
She feeds and clothes her makeshift family in her threeroom mud home.
She often finds it difficult to support them. Recently, she said, she had to sell the children’s mattresses to pay for medications. Now they all sleep on banana leaves. She manages to cook them rice and beans. At least six of the children attend school, which costs anywhere from $50 to $68 per year, she said.
At the age of 20, Mutsuva cared for her two younger brothers after her parents died. Her husband then left her, 40 years ago, because she couldn’t give him children. Later she began opening her home to orphans.
Josephine Kavira Mastaki called Mutsuva a guardian angel after she cared for her son in September 2017 following a rebel attack.
“I had already mourned my child, believing he was already dead,” Mastaki said. “But something amazing happened. I heard on the radio that a certain Joshua was at the orphanage and looking for his family. I drove 18 miles on a motorbike to Beni.” She found that he was indeed her son.
Mutsuva, despite the hardship, said her work will continue.
“I did not have a son and a daughter,” she said. “When they call me ‘Mama, mama, mama’ I feel comforted and I see that I have family again.”