Location: Nyangatom Woreda, South Omo, and West Omo Zones. South Ethiopia Region
Team responsible of the Mission:
Fr. Angel Valdivia, MCSPA angel.valdivia@mcspa.org
Fr. David Escrich MCSPA david.escrich@mcspa.org
Our main goal is to establish the presence of the Catholic Church among Nyangatom of Ethiopia and South Sudan. For us, this means establishing the kingdom of God in a real and tangible way, through signs of the love of God for its people. It means reaching out to unattended pastoralists communities that live in the southern part of the Apostolic Vicariate of Jimma-Bonga (AVJB), i.e., the border with Kenya and South Sudan, such as the Nyangatom, Toposa, Surma and other ethnic groups. From there, contribute to living in peace and harmony of conflicting inter-ethnic communities, so that by sharing resources, communities can develop in a sustainable way.
To improve the lives of the targeted communities through the establishment of the first Catholic Mission around Nyangatom.
Specific Objectives
To promote first evangelization, development projects and peacebuilding activities.
To support and build the capacity of pastoral agents to carry out to establish a base from where to carry out socio-pastoral projects.
The Nyangatom people is one of the last indigenous peoples of Africa. They inhabit the Lower Omo Valley region, a river that flows into Kenya’s Turkana Lake, the world’s largest desert lake (UNEP, 2012). The great Lake Turkana basin, and the Lower Omo Valley, have been called ‘the cradle of the homo sapiens’ by some authors (McDougall, Brown, and Fleagle, 2005; Walker and Leakey, 1978). Likewise, the Lower Omo Valley has been considered a World Heritage Site by UNESCO since 1980, home to so much cultural diversity throughout many millennia, in such a small area of territory (Clack and Brittain, 2018). Today, it is home to different indigenous ethnic groups that still live ancestrally. In addition to the Nyangatom, there are also the Dassanech, Hamer, Kara, Bana, Arbore, Kwaegu, Mursi, Bodi and Suri of Ethiopia and the Turkana of Kenya. Development has come to the area in the last few years, however often, it is the negative aspects of development rather than the positive impacts.
The Nyangatom people inhabit the region or woreda of the same name, which is part of the Province of the South Omo Zone with its administrative capital in Jinka, which in turn is part of the Regional State of the Southern Nations and Nationalities of Peoples (SNNPR) of Ethiopia. Currently, the Ethiopian population of Nyangatom is about 30,000 inhabitants. Because of their nature as transhumant shepherds, the Nyangatom people also temporarily inhabit the mountainous areas of Kurath, Tirga and Longolemor. Many Nyangatom also inhabit the western slopes of Mount Tepes and the area around Mount Naita. These last two population strips are partly within what would be South Sudanese territory (CSA, s.f.; Tornay, 1981, 2001; Yntiso, 2014).
As for what is the official territory of the Ethiopian region of the Nyangatom, it has its administrative centre in Kangaten, population of about 6,000 inhabitants located on the western bank of the Omo River. This territory of about 4,400 km2makes international border with the South Sudanese territory of the Ilemi Triangle to the west, with the territory of the Dassanech ethnic group to the south, and to the northwest, following the course of the Nakua and Omo rivers, it borders what was formerly part of the Omo National Park, and which has now become government sugarcane plantations (Oakland Institute, 2011, 2019; Tornay, 1981).
In terms of the weather, it is hot, varying between 32º and 40º C throughout the year. It usually rains between 350 and 400 mm per year usually in the months of April-May-June and September-October-November. During the dry season, many inhabit the mountainous areas where there is abundant grass, while, in the rainy season, they move to the plains of Nakua, along the border with South Sudan, and to the bank of the river Omo, where they plant sorghum and corn, that is why the Nyangatom are considered an agro-pastoralist community.
The Nyangatom are of nilo-hamitic origin, and are part of the Karamoja or Ateker cluster, along with the Karamojong, Dodoth and Jie of Uganda, Jiye and and Toposa of South Sudan, and Turkana and Teso of Kenya. The Nyangatom say that their origins come from Uganda, and that they were formed from the Dodoth, probably in the mid-19th century. This migration to the northeast could have been caused by a great drought in the early 19th century, of which there are historical records, which affected much of East Africa. All these ethnicities that make up the Ateker cluster, share the same language (with different dialects), and similar modes of subsistence, social organization and culture, except for some special characteristics of each community (Tornay, 1981, 2001).
In January 2015 a bridge over the Omo River was inaugurated in Kangaten, and thus began a new era for Nyangatom and the Lower Omo Valley. The bridge and a road from Kangaten to the future Sugar Factory No. 5 are part of the agro-industrial development, which the Ethiopian government is carrying out throughout the Lower Omo Valley. This new development, while benefiting the population by opening up communications and offering some jobs to the local population, is beginning to have a very large social and environmental impact, not only in the Omo Valley, but also for Kenya’s Lake Turkana area and its population (Oakland Institute, 2019; UNEP, 2012).
Evangelization of the Nyangatom started in the 1970’s with the establishment of the evangelical missionaries from Sweden, Swedish Philadelphia Church Mission (SPCM). The mission served the Nyangatom for a period of 30 years, during which they built a school and a dispensary, and carried out many other development initiatives. After the phasing out of the SPCM project, the Nyangatom established several local Pentecostal churches, which makes most of learned Nyangatom followers of those churches. The Catholic Church’s presence among the Nyangatom was started by priests from the Missionary Community of St. Paul the Apostle (MCSPA) as early as 2010. Up to now, it has had very little impact in terms of number of conversions, having baptized only 157 people, most of them being refugees from South Sudan. In most cases, the Nyangatom view the Catholic Church as a foreign charitable organization rather than a church. However, in the long run and with a lot of struggles, it is slowly gaining recognition by the Nyangatom.
Background of the MCSPA and the Catholic Mission in Nyangatom
One of the dreams of Father Paco Andreo, founder of the Missionary Community of St. Paul the Apostle (MCSPA), was to create a rosary of missions “from Nariokotome to Alexandria”, which could be centres of life for the people of the surrounding area. Back in the year 2000 in Ethiopia there was an apostolic nuncio called Archbishop Silvano Tomasi. In one of our courtesy calls to the nuncio, he spoke to Father Paco and community members about the situation of the Catholic Church in Ethiopia. He explained that the Catholic Church in Ethiopia, despite being only a meagre 1% or less, it was the church that was carrying out more social projects in Ethiopia. And that the only growth opportunity for her in this country was only in its southern and western parts, as in the rest of the country the Orthodox Church was very much implanted. The large southern regions are very different from what we know as Ethiopia: areas below 1000 m altitude, very hot, arid, prone to malaria infections, tribes who still cling to their traditional ways of life, areas in which neither development nor civilization nor evangelization has yet arrived. They are very needy areas and peoples. The nuncio asked us that since we had a mission in Andode, in the Vicariate of Nekemte, and other missions in the north-western part of Kenya, Turkana, why not to open a mission halfway beetween those two, to connect them and do such a good to the Church and to the people of those places. This is how the mission of Mizan Teferi emerged, located in the main city of the region of Bench-Maji and forming part of the apostolic prefecture Jima-Bonga, while being the last place to the south with a presence of the Catholic Church. Mizan Teferi is 360 Km north of the Kenyan border. At that time Mizan Teferi was the stteping stone or springboard from where to start working with the people of the “south”. And hence our missionaries began to live and work for the people there. At that time, we realised that it was very difficult to go further south because there were no roads that would connect these areas with the rest. In fact, it was almost impossible to transit up to the border with Kenya, especially in the rainy season. Finally, in 2009 Bishop Markos Gebremedhin was ordained as the first bishop of the newly erected Apostolic Vicariate of Jima-Bonga. He was a friend of our community and invited our community to open a second presence in his Vicariate. It was then that we contemplated once again, the possibility of opening a mission in the south, but this time going up north from Kenya instead of coming down south from Ethiopia. This is because this southern part of Ethiopia is so like northern Kenya, i.e. similar geography, similar tribes that almost all share a same language and culture and fighting each other due to problems of lack of water resources, pasture for cattle, proliferation of weapons. Very similar problems to those that we have had to face in Turkana for all of these years. This is how we then accepted to send missionaries from Turkana who could start exploring the possibility of opening a mission in that area of the south of Ethiopia.
Beginning in November 2010, MCSPA members working in the Diocese of Lodwar, Kenya, began visiting the Nyangatom area, located south of the Vicariate of Jimma-Bonga, just across the Kenyan border. Thus, they were able to contact the local community and explore the possibility of establishing a mission in the future. In December 2012, the Bishop of Lodwar, Archbishop Dominic Kimengich, invited the bishops of the border region with Turkana to the Golden Jubilee of the Diocese of Lodwar. At the same time, he asked members of the MCSPA to organise the first “Conference of Peace and Trans-Border Evangelization of Catholic Dioceses in the Turkana Lake Basin”. This conference focused on establishing dialogue and practical collaboration between neighbouring Catholic dioceses, which shared the same reality of ethnic groups and armed conflicts, for evangelization and peace. Previously, these Catholic dioceses had been working each on their own, despite having so much in common. Currently, this initiative is coordinated by the new department created in the Diocese of Lodwar “Pacem in Terris”, and an executive committee made up of members of the different dioceses under the auspices of AMECEA (Episcopal Conference of East Africa).
As a result of this initiative, members of the Nyangatom community (Southern Omo Area, Ethiopia) invited the Catholic Church to establish a presence in its territory that is bordered by the disputed Ilemi triangle in Turkana, with the aim of evangelizing and promoting development and peace among the population of the area. Then, in 2012 the two neighbouring bishops, the Diocese of Lodwar and the Apostolic Vicariate of Jima-Bonga, Ethiopia, being aware of the enormous needs of the people of the area, decided to collaborate by inviting missionaries from the Diocese of Lodwar to settle in Nyangatom.
In 2013 a Turkana catechist was sent as a pioneer to the area and began to establish a first contact with the local population. In July 2014 two MCSPA priests settled in a tented camp in Kakuta and drilled a series of wells. They also conducted a population study to determine their needs and the challenges they faced in planning future projects. This initial stage was supported by several German Catholic organisations, especially Missio Aachen and Missio Munich. From November 2014 to May 2018, missionaries have been living together and supporting the Nyangatom population in a variety of ways, especially by focusing on the issue of water and global health. This time has allowed the mission to establish a relationship of acceptance and friendship between the missionaries and the local population.
Present Situation and Way forward
In May 2018, the missionaries moved eleven kilometres west of Kakuta to a hill called Naturomoe, establishing there what was to be the permanent and definitive basis of the Prince of Peace catholic mission. The mission is in a strategic place and is gradually becoming a point of reference for care and reconciliation for the population of the area. It is located at the confluence of the borders of three conflicting countries: Ethiopia, South Sudan, and Kenya. A region populated by different indigenous ethnic groups, trapped in a vicious cycle of poverty, marginalization, and violence, confronted with each other by competitiveness over the scarce resources that exist. In a way you could say that the mission is located at the centre of the conflict, and at the same time far away, being a very remote place, surrounded by savannah and scrub forest.
The first phase of buildings, access road, water supply, fencing and auxiliary buildings, workshops, staff houses, warehouses and multifunctional shade were completed in November 2019 being the main donors Missio Aachen and Nazareth Trust from the UK. By October 2021, we have managed to open the first nursery school for small children in Kakuta, which is serving 50 kids. We have also inaugurated the first provisional shade where we are teaching literacy to 70 kids, aged 5 to 15, laying the foundations of the future mission school in Naturomoe. Finally, by May 2022 we will finalize the building of the first Church in Naturomoe hill, and then continue with the building of the MCSPA community house and Peace training/retreat centre.
A good way to summarize the role that the members of the MCSPA are playing in Nyangatom would be by quoting Isaiah (Is 40:3) when he says that “A voice cries: in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our God.”
Below, we highlight some of the pastoral and development achievements:
- Establishment of a mission basecamp in Kakuta village in 2014.
- Pastoral care to 7 Nyangatom villages, the South Sudanese refugee camp of Tolay, and the South Sudanese soldiers of Naturomoe.
- First-aid care and regular mobile clinics to villages attending around 2000 people yearly. Support of patients referred to faraway hospitals.
- Drilling of 19 wells (12 of them successful) for the local population affected by drought and violence, having until then to dig into the bed of the dry river Nakua, bordering Kenya, to supply water.
- Dug 1 successful shallow well out of 6 trials.
- Vaccination and deworming campaigns of annual livestock (goats, sheep) the last carried out in November 2019 and reaching 25,000 animals.
- Construction of the new Prince of Peace mission on the hill of Naturomoe, with water installation, access ramp, housing for employees, workshop and warehouses, multipurpose rooms, and church.
- Construction of the first day-care centre for small children in Kakuta.
- Excavation of two water ponds to supply the herds for the transhumant population.
- Baptisms of 157 people and confirmations of 14 young people.
In summary, our lines of action for the next 10 years would be as follows:
- Continue supporting mother and childcare and education in Kakuta.
- Build a school in Naturomoe, and other KG’s in Lomuria and Tepes.
- Drill minimum of 7 wells and dig a minimum of 3 hand dug wells.
- Continue the excavation of at least 2-5 water ponds to harvest rainwater.
- Continue providing health services and education to the population of the area.
- Continue veterinary campaigns twice a year.
- Build a peace training centre in Naturomoe for community leaders, training for reconciliation and peace.
- Continue first evangelization and formation of catechists, lay leaders and catechumens.
- Build 3 chapels in Lomuria, Kakuta and Kangaten.
- Build facilities in Naturomoe for volunteers to collaborate in the projects.
- Build a community house in Naturomoe for MCSPA members.
- Finish road to Naita area and open new ones to other unreached communities.
- Continue providing support to refugees and to the vulnerable.
