The hospital at the center of a MuslimChristian war in Africa

Pat
ients at Hpital Gnral in Bangui, Central African Republic, on Dec. 3. (William
Daniels/For The Washington Post)

By Kevin Sief-December 19

BANGUI, Central African Republic When he awoke after the surgery, the bullets
had been removed from his legs, and Saddam Abdul Rahman was lying in a
hospital bed, surrounded by men from the other side of the war.
He scanned the room and saw the faces of five Christian men in adjacent beds. For
a Muslim living in the center of a sectarian conflict, where your throat could be slit
if you were of the wrong religion, it was a startling sight.

It was early November, and Abdul Rahman had been taken to the Hpital Gnral
one of the last institutions in this city where Muslims and Christians could be
found in the same room. Since 2013, at least a fifth of the countrys half-million
Muslims had fled their homes. Tens of thousands of Christians had been forced out
of the remaining Muslim enclaves. It was one of the most dramatic explosions of
religious violence in recent African history, with the United Nations concluding
there was ethnic cleansing of the countrys Muslim minority.
Before the war began in 2013, Abdul Rahman had married a Christian and counted
many Christians as friends. Now, as he lay in Bed 3 of Room 206 in the hospital run
by an aid group, the 27-year-old feared that those around him could be
dangerous, as he later recalled.
There were Christian victims of gunshots and stabbings and car accidents. There
were Christian nurses who kept medical records in Justin Bieber binders. There
was a Christian patient who kept track of his surgeries on the back page of his Bible.
To an outsider, the traits often associated with Muslims in this country were nearly
imperceptible a slightly thinner face, slightly lighter skin.
But Abdul Rahman worried that everyone knew immediately who he was.
Two weeks earlier, in late October, a crowd of Christians had converged at the
hospitals front gate, cursing the doctors for treating their Muslim enemies.
Abdul Rahmans brothers promised to get him out of the hospital before he was
targeted in his bed.
[How the Central African Republics war started]

Saddam Abdul Rahman, 27, sits on his bed at Hpital Gnral in Bangui, Central African
Republic, on Dec. 2. (William Daniels/For The Washington Post)

To find Room 206, drive east through the capital of this country at the heart of
Africa, past the row of decaying ministries. Find the pale-yellow hospital at the foot
of a verdant hill, where visitors are asked to deposit their guns before entering.
Climb to the second floor, just below the emergency room, where the screams of
newly arrived gunshot victims can be heard through the peeling walls.
Since the Central African Republic declared its independence from France in 1960,
it has been plagued by coups and rebellions. Despite its vast mineral resources, it is
among the poorest countries in the world, its diamonds and gold plundered by
strongmen. Even before the war began, the International Crisis Group described
the country as worse than a failed state. But there was one solace: For centuries,
Muslims, Christians and animists lived in relative peace here.
Then, in 2013, a group of mostly Muslim rebels called the Seleka charged into

Bangui from the north, unseating President Franois Boziz. Within months, a
band of mostly Christian militias, called the anti-balaka, rose up to counter the
Seleka.
Those fighters quickly recast their strategy as a broader crusade against Muslims,
setting off a cycle of retaliatory killings that continues today. More than 450
mosques have been destroyed since the war broke out. Thousands of people have
been slain, despite the presence of 10,000 U.N. peacekeepers.
[The Central African Republic war, explained in the journey of a Muslim baby]
Abdul Rahman worked as a trader in the market. He believed in God, but he spent
more time at the basketball court than in the mosque. After the war broke out, he
found himself trapped with his wife in what became the last Muslim neighborhood
in Bangui, known as PK-5. On many days, just leaving the area was a death wish.
Every morning, though, Abdul Rahman sneaked out to meet Christian farmers. For
a small fee, he would help them smuggle their cows to sell in the PK-5 market. He
liked the idea of flouting the new policies of segregation, he said. Then, one
morning, as he approached the meeting point with the Christian farmers, a man in
a hooded sweatshirt approached him and pulled a gun from his belt.
You stop there, the man said.

Abdul Rahman ran. He heard a burst of bullets, and then he fell. When he looked
down, he saw blood flowing from his legs and a piece of bone exposed. Then he lost
consciousness.

Men
pray in
a

PK-5 is the Muslim neighborhood in Bangui.

(William Daniels/For The Washington Post)

A man gets his hair cut in PK-5. (William

Daniels/For The Washington Post)

mosque in PK-5. (William Daniels/For The Washington Post)

Men pray in a mosque in PK-5. (William Daniels/For The Washington Post)

By the time Abdul Rahman arrived, the Hpital Gnral already had been

enveloped in Banguis religious tensions. A rumor had spread that nurses were
injecting Muslim patients with poison. From their beds, patients sometimes
screamed threats at one another.
Doctors Without Borders, the aid group that runs the hospital, tried to explain that
it was a neutral institution, that free treatment would be offered to everyone
regardless of religion. It didnt always resonate.
The level of hate outside Bangui you can feel it in the hospital, said Jean

Vataux, a senior Doctors Without Borders official in the country.

In the hospital room, as his legs slowly healed, Abdul Rahman examined his
roommates from his white, iron-framed bed. He was afraid to say much, he later
recounted, and waited for them to volunteer their stories.
There was Ngamafei Marcellin, the thin 60-year-old musician who had been hung
from a tree and shot for sympathizing with Muslims, as he recounted. There was
Guy Patrick Gotoa, 28, the muscular former security guard who said he had been
shot because he was suspected of stealing money from a militia.

That was the first thing that surprised Abdul Rahman: His Christian roommates
had been shot by Christian militias. In Bangui, the closer you got to the carnage, the
harder it became to discern any clear lines. Even Abdul Rahmans own shooting
proved blurry. He thought the man who attacked him was a Christian seeking to
punish him for sneaking out of the Muslim neighborhood. But Abdul Rahmans
three brothers suspected the man was a Muslim who targeted him for fraternizing
with Christians.
Abdul Rahman grew more comfortable in the yellow-painted room.
We all have the same God, he said one day to Marcellin.
The fighting makes no sense, he said on another day.

To his astonishment, the other men mostly agreed with him.

We dont care that hes Muslim, Marcellin said. Here, we are all in the same

position of recovering from our wounds.

But when the men looked at Gotoa, the former security guard, they were sure he
was an anti-balaka fighter, despite his denials. He could be violent, punching the
wall when he got angry.
I can never tolerate a Muslim, he yelled one day, seemingly out of nowhere.
Only after vengeance can we have peace, he said another day.

Muslim

Guy Patrick Gotoa, a Christian patient wounded

Nicaise Konou, an educator for Doctors Without
in both legs by firearms, sits on his bed at Hpital
Borders at Hpital Gnral, works with some
Gnral. (William Daniels/For The Washington
injured people. (William Daniels/For The
Post)
Washington Post)
patients Sahed Zebreen, background, and Moussa Saidou, rest on their beds at Hpital
Gnral. (William Daniels/For The Washington Post)

Muslim patients Sahed Zebreen, background, and Moussa Saidou, rest on their beds at
Hpital Gnral. (William Daniels/For The Washington Post)

Room 206 was just miles away from the fighting, which kept creeping up to the
hospital gates. In late November, furious that the hospital was still admitting
Muslims, a group of Christians blocked the road. A patient died in an ambulance
that couldnt get through, said Mauricette Goddot, director of the hospital.
One day, the people outside shouted, Bring the Muslims out so we can kill them,

Goddot recalled in an interview. I dont know how its come to this.

Still, there were notable examples of people trying to overcome the sectarian divide,
and in a few cities, members of the two religions still coexisted in relative peace.
The capitals Catholic archbishop had given shelter to a prominent imam after his
house was burned down. In one Bangui neighborhood, Christians helped rebuild a
mosque that had been destroyed (though it was later destroyed again).
At the Hpital Gnral, there was finally a break in the terrorism.
On Nov. 29, Pope Francis arrived on a much-anticipated, two-day trip to promote
reconciliation. The men in Room 206 followed the reports of his activities on a
black radio. The pontiff drove through some of the most dangerous parts of Bangui
in an open-air truck, and he even spoke at a mosque in PK-5.
Outside the hospital, the city was euphoric. Inside, the men cheered over the static
of the radio, even Gotoa.
At one point, the men heard a roar near the hospital. It sounded like another angry
mob. But then they heard cheers. The pope had come to the cityspediatric hospital,
less than 100 yards from their room.
After Francis returned to Rome, the glow of his visit seemed to remain. The U.N.
high commissioner for human rights, Zeid Raad Al Hussein, spoke of how the
papal trip had created a momentum which could overturn the downward spiral of

the past months.

The mood in Room 206 was transformed.
We just want peace, Gotoa said, the day after Francis left. Its like the pope said.

The men didnt know that the violence would surge in a matter of days. They didnt
know that PK-5 would be targeted again by machine guns and rockets, this time as
its residents voted in a national election on a draft constitution. They didnt know
that a Muslim rebel leader would soon proclaim a breakaway state in the countrys
north.
They just reveled in a moment of solidarity.
I hope this changes everything, Abdul Rahman said.

Kevin Sief has been The Posts bureau chief in Nairobi since 2014. He served
previously as the bureau chief in Kabul and had covered the U.S. -Mexico border.
Posted by Thavam