The Perception of internally displaced Persons and the role of Social Actors in the Amelioration of their Living Conditions in Cameroon

Abstract

The controversy surrounding the concept “internally displaced persons” is old as the history of migration but the concept is relatively pronounced in Cameroon with multidimensional perceptions from host populations and social actors whose role vary from the provision of material assistance to psychosocial counseling. The perception of the displaced from the socio-political crisis in the North West and South West regions of Cameroon differs and their plight is partially neglected and not directly addressed by national and international instruments that Cameroon have had to ratify. With competition amongst themselves and with host communities over the use of scarce resources, this paper has as objective to investigate how these internally displaced persons are perceived in host communities and to provide an indebt analysis of the role that social actors play in the transformation of the living conditions of the displaced. To arrive at the required results, the qualitative research method was used with interviews, life stories, and observations. The data collected was transcribed and analyzed using the content analysis. After defining the population, a sample unit was selected with care and precision (Copi, & Cohen, 2011) using the purposive snowball sampling technique as opposed to stratified and cluster sampling techniques (Cohen and al., 2007). The results revealed that the affected population are in a transgression from conflicts to the reality of their lives confirmed by the mutual suspicion and conflictual relationships between them. An analysis of the perception of host communities by IDP’s, was characterized as a deceptive social perception and that of anti-sociality instilling in them the feelings of auto-marginalization. However, some members of the host community though lacking resources exhibited solidarity and assistance that helped improve their standards of living. The results also revealed the settlement challenges, with some family members and friends serving as “de factor NGO”, portraying the perception of partial neglect and inadequate treatment of IDP’s and the host communities by local state authorities, Non-Governmental Organizations and other social actors. Hence, necessitating an urgent politico-institutionalized response on the plight of the displaced and host communities in Cameroon.