Bunia — Food aid is running short for about 80,600 people displaced by insecurity in the northeastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), a local official of the UN World Food Programme in Ituri District said on Friday.

"We have only 40 to 60 tonnes in stock for the displaced in camps, and with 40 tonnes we can only serve pregnant women, nursing mothers and children," said François Djissou, the WFP official in charge of the agency's Ituri office in Bunia.

The agency does not yet know when food aid might resume, Djissou added. It is seeking donor assistance for its programme in Ituri.

WFP, he said, had planned to deliver food to internally displaced people in Bunia and Gety on Saturday but that was not possible. However, in Nairobi, the Kenyan capital, Stephanie Savariaud, the WFP Public Information Officer, East and Central Africa Office, said on Monday there would be food distribution in Gety "very soon".

Between 40,000 and 50,000 of Ituri's 150,000 to 200,000 IDPs are in Gety, according to humanitarian agencies.

The area some 30 km south of Gety is teeming with fighters of the Front résistance patriotique en Ituri (FRPI) and their Mouvement revolutionnaire congolais (MRC) allies. Their presence has made it impossible for many displaced persons to reach humanitarian organisations in Gety.

As a result, Djissou said, humanitarian NGOs were overwhelmed. The mobile hospital in Gety run by Médecins Sans Frontières Switzerland was overcrowded with malnourished and sick children. In addition, the 120-bed therapeutic nutritional centre run by the Italian NGO COOPI is now caring for 169 severely malnourished children.

"Infections will get worse since diseases are always related to food," Djissou said.

Savariaud said WFP's priority was to support the therapeutic and feeding centres for malnourished children and their families. "We are supporting 3,000 children through these centres and still have stock for these activities up to the end of August," she said.

Moreover, as a precautionary measure due to the security situation, the humanitarian community reduced its aid programme over the election period and did not plan to resume activity until Tuesday, OCHA Ituri said.

Meanwhile, the situation in Gety remained critical. OCHA's Ituri information officer, Idrissa Conteh, said on Friday: "The problem is not only in Gety. There are emergencies everywhere in Ituri and returnees have nearly the same needs as the displaced. They lost everything during the fighting and on their return must begin life from scratch."

A displaced woman, who declined to be named, said, "We have not returned because we are afraid of militiamen who have taken to raping us on the roads and in the fields."

The militiamen belong to the FRPI and the MRC. Brig-Gen Mbuayamba Nsiona, the Congolese army officer sent to secure Ituri for the elections against these militia, had ordered his troops to provide safe corridors to enable people to return to their homes. However, this had failed to allay the fears of residents in the area.

"These soldiers are no different from the militiamen. They suspect us of being militiamen and steal from us," Jean Androzo, a teacher at a camp in Katoni of 16,000 displaced people, said.

Gracien Djabero, a journalist in Bunia, said, "As long as militiamen remain in Ituri, there will always be displaced persons."

[ This report does not necessarily reflect the views of the United Nations ]