Kampala – If your humanitarian mission dies when money is dry, then it was never a mission, it was a business.
Over the years, I have heard all the buzzwords – localization, refugee participation, decolonization: they sit proudly on international NGO websites like badges of honor.
But with me I stepped into the so-called refugee settlements in Uganda, such as Nakivare, Rwamwanja or Bidividi. Talk to refugees and witness the daily struggle. You will find that earthly reality is far from the eloquent words of the INGO (International Non-Governmental Organizations) strategic documents.
truth? Much of this aid work is fragmentary. cosmetics. Let’s say it is as is. The aid has become a well-dressed performance – carefully packaged, transactions, and self-service.
INGOs often operate a procurement loop that maintains bloated pay structures, recycling consultants and rarely involves those they claim to serve.
Meanwhile, the host government, like myself in Uganda, has completed what I call a refugee pursuit game. They host refugees that often divert us from deep domestic governance failures, not from pan-African solidarity or hospitality, but as a means of the dollar and soft power courts.
In this setup, refugees are not people with aspirations or potential. They are line items on proposals and demographics driving the next funding cycle. Their suffering becomes mere currency.
And the game is not just played by donors. Even refugees learned scripts. They speak the language that Ingos wants to hear: “Yes, your training helped me a lot.” “Yes, we’re practicing good farming methods now.”
From what I saw on the ground, they might follow a season or two seasons. However, as soon as the project is finished, you will be reverted to survival mode. why? Because they have learned that playing poor cards attracts the next intervention.
As the refugee elder told me with a laugh, reflecting on INGOS’s work in the Rwamwanja settlement in southwestern Uganda, “The loudest cows get salt.”
“The lizards in the palace are still lizards.”
This performance auxiliary model breeds dependencies. It undermines local innovation. Worse, it masks the decay beneath the surface.
So here is a fundamental idea. This is something I contemplated during many visits to refugee settlements. There, despite years of assistance projects, hopeless living conditions still dominate.
Yes – some will suffer. Some may die. But are you silently dying after any glossy report and donor site visit anyway? Perhaps without assistance, we would be forced to rethink our system.
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Refugee host governments may even be forced to open more land to refugees. Integration could stop it from becoming taboo. Refugees may be allowed to calm down freely, contribute to economic life, and heaven may be allowed to own their future.
Perhaps aid has become the very thing that blocks true empowerment.
Of course, this is not a call for cruelty. Instead, it is a call for courage. If Ingos were serious about changing power, they would fold their arms and not leave the moment the donor’s priorities changed.
They shrink. Work with a proximity leader. volunteer. innovation. They do what grassroots actors have been doing for decades. Stretch all your coins, lean on relationships, and change in collaboration with your community.
The offensive truth is: When your humanitarian mission dies when money drys, it was never a mission, it was a business.
As I say in my village, “The lizards in the palace are still lizards.” Stop misunderstanding traps as substances. Localization is not about hashtags or sheet warming at coordination meetings. It is about doing the messy, painful, deep human work of letting go. Let go of control, ego and institutional comfort.
The future of refugee responses is not found in donor-centered log frames and theory of change.
It involves walking humblely with those most affected, based on human connections and relationships, building partnerships with refugee leaders, working with them to mobilize resources internally and externally, trusting refugee leadership, doing their best to use such resources to lift the community, and ultimately turning rhetoric into reality.
