IRIN Webspecial: A Decent Burial

Personal account: Bulldozer driver

This account was given to IRIN by someone who was involved through the former Ministry of Public Works in digging mass graves and disposing of the bodies. This man believes anyone implicated in the killings should be prepared to take responsibility - including Somalilanders. IRIN has withheld the name of the interviewee.

Photo: IRIN The Milk Factory site - where bodies were buried.

"I used to drive the bulldozer that buried the people who had been killed. I worked for the Ministry of Public Works, and did it over a period of about six months, from 1988. It was in Hargeysa.

"The first time they came to get me from my home, it was about one o'clock at night. I lived in a compound near the Ministry of Public Works. There was a group of armed soldiers, and they took three of us.? I thought we were going to be killed. They took us to a warehouse where the tractors and bulldozers were, and told the others to leave. They asked me to take one of the bulldozers. After the others left, there were four soldiers with me -? two in front, two behind. They told me to pick the best bulldozer - one of those big military ones which can shift about 40 cubic metres of sand. That's when they told me it would be used to bury people they had killed. They said: We have to collect the bodies and bury them so that there is no disease. They talked of the people they had killed as being unclean, filthy.

"I followed their cars. They took me to a place near the old Hargeysa police station, where they asked me to dig up part of a playing field. It didn't take very long. Then they took me to another place, where the bodies were, at Birceex military camp. Inside the compound there, there is a building on the west side, at the entrance of Birceex east. That's where the bodies were lying. I saw men with military uniforms lying among the dead. Some were tied in pairs, or in threes. That time it included military men, including a high- ranking official, and some people in civilian clothes.

"I was sitting in the seat in the bulldozer, and they were carrying the bodies on to the bulldozer. One of the soldiers asked me if I knew the dead men, and I said no. More than 10 bodies were put on the bulldozer.

"I was frightened ? because I knew the dead men very well. When they asked me questions, I panicked. They told me to take the bodies back to the hole... that's where I buried them. I buried so many bodies, sometimes up to 50 at a time. Sometimes people were killed in the streets, and we just piled earth on top of them.

"There was another time I remember well. I was taken to the 26 Section [military barracks in Hargeysa], where there is a little mound nearby. Around 50 men and myself were taken there to be shot, late one afternoon. First, they brought me with the bulldozer to bury the people; but then they told me to join them. But the four bodyguards who had been assigned to watch me day and night spoke to a senior officer there, and I was cleared. I remember seeing a number of senior officials around... watching from an upstairs window, as we were all being collected...I've often thought about that time; I think my bodyguards intervened because they were taking a salary for watching over me. Guarding a bulldozer driver is a safe job: better to be a bodyguard than having to go to the front line. "It's very difficult to talk about this, for many reasons. One of the reasons is that those four guards are still in Hargeysa. I have met them on the street. But I can't retaliate or do anything, because I am afraid of being imprisoned. They are one of us [Somalilanders].

"What I did with all those bodies terrified me. I did not talk about it to anyone. It was hard for me to even go to the toilet, because I was so sick and scared. I always thought - every day - that they would come for me. Eventually, some doctors came to work at the military base, and said they needed someone to look after the generator, and they requested me. I was transferred.

"Now I feel very bitter, mostly about the commanders. How would you feel if someone told you to bury your brothers, your cousins, your sons? I even saw women and children among the dead. I felt like killing myself. But now there has been a pardon given to Somalilanders who took part in those events, so nothing can be done. I think I would be put in prison if I took the law into my own hands.

"The people who were responsible, who gave orders -? even gave the orders to the guards watching me -? should be brought to justice so we can settle the past. Anyway, I am one of those people. There are people who were worse off than me, who are witnesses to what happened. The only way we can really settle this is to get hold of the people responsible for it - whoever they are."

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? 2001, UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs. All rights reserved.