SISTERS FOR FIVE DAYS. BY MOHAMEDSALEM WERAD

Sisters for five days

This is not a fiction movie title or a gloomy novel’s title aimed to provoke the readers’ tears. Unfortunately it’s a true story, a
tragic humanitarian story of the separation of two Saharawi sisters.This article will deal with their forceful separation, and all the moments that followed until their long awaited renuion, and finally their desperate hope for one permanent union.

Two walls divide Saharawi families in the occupied territories from those in the refugee camps. The first is the physical barrier the Moroccans have built, long berms of sand filled with land mines. The second, more excruciating wall is that of shame. Many people who live in the camps they have never met their family members on the other
side of the wall.

The two sisters’ separation started directly after the 1975 joint Moroccan-Mauritian invasion of Western Sahara. Fatama, the younger sister, fled Western Sahara to the barren Algerian desert. Her older sister Aichatu stayed in the occupied territories with their very old, frail father, half paralyzed from a hard life. 17 years old, Fatama was relived to reach the camps after a perilous journey. She had spent four days and four nights on foot laboring through the desert with
Moroccan fighters hovering in the sky above them, dropping bombs to demolish even the slightest blade of grass rustled by the wind. Any moving object was a target, so Fatama and the hundreds of other fleeing Saharawis traveled as secretly as possible.

Though safe from shells in the refugee camps, young and bright Fatama had to face the savage conditions of the scorched Sahara desert. The hammada showed no mercy to the young girl, and without her older sister, who had cared for her for the 10 years since their mother’s death, Fatama had to start over. With the help of some distant relatives, she managed to find a decent life in the camps, even getting married in her third year and bearing a son a year later.
Throughout the seventeen years of the war, neither of the sisters had any idea about the other’s destiny, or if she was even still alive. They had heard nothing of each other.

The Polisario Front and the Moroccan kingdom agreed to a ceasefire in 1991, brokered so that a referendum could take place on Western Sahara’s future. In preparation, Saharawi tribal leaders visited both sides of the berms to determine who is eligible to vote; a narrow ray of hope shone through the long winter of despair. Fatama would finally hear news of her sister and father. She was happy to learn of her family’s fate after sixteen years without learning anything, but
scared that the news would not be pleasant. She had never had the luxury of hearing about their day-to-day lives, so she wanted any news, good or bad.

As she expected, the news was bittersweet. Her sister was still alive and had five sons, but their father had died six years earlier. Her sister’s sons ask her about who he was, never able to meet their grandfather. Once or twice she told them who the man in the photo was, but it hurt to bad to explain why he was absent and why they had never
met him. Fatama fought the tears of hearing about her father’s death,  but in the end she lost. Sixteen years of grief and mourning engulfed her, and her simple hope to hug her father one last time was smothered forever. Before she heard the news, she had felt weak at times, and she had always re-energized herself with hope of seeing her father
again, but that source of strength was gone. In her hysteric sadness, she wondered why even the bad news had to be delayed so excruciatingly long.

In 2000, the first telephone landlines were installed in the camps. For the first time in 25 years, Fatama heard her sister’s
voice. They held a long and heartbreaking conversation, almost a full hour, but they wept together more than they talked. They wanted to talk every day, but of course, with lines of other equally anxious refugee families lining up to reforge long-lost connections with their occupied brothers and sisters, it was impossible for them to communicate very frequently. Normally selfless Fatama wished to be selfish and cut to the front of the long lines, and it was difficult for her to maintain patience for even one day in her life. Of course, only a moment peering at her companions’ worried faces made her feel
great shame from her impatience. 

In 2006, the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR) launched the Confidence Building Measures (CBM) program, which allowed the divided families to visit each other for five days. Immediately after hearing of the new program, Fatama registered her family on the list. That same day, she bought a new radio and began listening to

Saharawi national radio religiously, hoping to hear her and her sister’s names announced on air. For four years, she held her hope, and finally the UNCHR workers came to inform her that her sister would come on the next trip. It was the happiest news she had received in 21 years. However, three times the UNCHR workers came to her to with the
disappointing news of her sister’s delay. Fatama snapped, “No wonder you lie. You are part of the organization that told us to lay our weapons down, promising to organize a referendum and let us vote on our future. 15 years have passed and we are still waiting for you to do nothing!”

In 2010, her sister visit was finally confirmed. She was happy but of course skeptical about the UN’s word and habit of breaking promises. Even in her uncertain state, she started preparing for the most important event in her life. After 35 years of separation, she would finally meet her sister. Her frigid emotions moved, and scenes of their last time together flooded her mind. The next morning, with many family friends, Fatama stood, waiting for her sister’s arrival. Finally, the truck stooped to a halt. Fatama searched for her sister’s face for only a few seconds before she spotted her face. They held
each other and wept. Their embrace and was short-lived, disrupted by the crowd of her family, all there to welcome Aichatu.

The two sisters wished nothing but to have a family private reunion to huge each other again ,talk and enjoy being together after so many years of separation, but it was the costume to have the families friends and neighbors with you in the sad occasion as well as the happy ones, all that time Fatama kept staring and watching her sister in disbelief that they are in the same place but she have to wait for the visitors to be going so she can talk and fill their  hungry for seeing her sister.

Their five days together were busy, punctuated by dozens coming to say hello and ask about their family in the occupied territories. The only time that the two sisters had alone together was in late evening, after dinner and in the early morning. They tried to share everything that had occurred in each of their lives in the previous 35 years, since so much had changed in their lives. Fatama was now a mother of two girls and four boys. Two of the boys had finished their education,
the two girls were high school students, and one of her sons was a soldier. The youngest one was in fourth grade. They recalled most of the past too. They remembered their childhood and their many happy days with their father. After a while, they realized that though they  knew much of each others’ past and present, no mention of the future had been made.

The five days passed faster than light, the fastest in both of their lives. The temporary reunion was over and Aichatu had to depart. It was a sad moment for the two sisters and for everyone else there to say goodbye to Aichatu. Ali, Fatama’s son, was terribly sorry for his  mother. He had recognized the choked sorrow on his mother’s face for years and the joy her sister’s visit had brought. Ali’s friend was in disbelief to see his friend weeping has his aunt departed for the
occupied homeland. He asked if those five short days had been enough to make him cry like, a miracle in his mind. Ali cleared the grief from his throat and answered the provocative question.

“What makes me cry is my mother’s tears. I did not spend enough time with my aunt to be so attached to her. I was afraid to come to love her in these five days and then have to bear the agony of missing her forever, without the ability to see her again. This UN visit program is a bribe, a scheme to buy Saharawi patience. They think that
giving us the chance to see our families will cow us into bearing this miserable situation for years to come, no one knows how many.” 

This story is not unique. It is not even the worst in the camps. Fatama and Aichatu’s story is widely repeated in many Saharawi families. Likewise, Ali’s reaction is broadly shared by young people, a fact which should be easily understood, given that an entire generation comes to know their families through faded photos and crackling voices on the telephone. A few are lucky enough to meet their brothers, sisters, grandfathers, and grandmothers but never for
more than five days. This division of families is a huge source of anger in Saharawi youth, and it could be exploited to take up arms at anytime. This anger will only be defused when the Saharawi nation is offered the opportunity of self-determination and the ability to decide its destiny.
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