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“My future is unclear, and I don't know what will happen to all of us from Wau Shilluk.”

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Francis Ronyo worked as a nurse in MSF’s Wau Shilluk hospital for two years. He was one of the national staff on duty when the order was given to evacuate and leave for Kodok.

On 3 February, we were on duty in the MSF hospital. The fighting was getting closer to the town, and the remaining civilian population had started to flee. We carried on working until it was too dangerous to stay.

We had patients who had been admitted that afternoon. My team didn´t want to leave our patients behind. It was a difficult decision to leave the hospital while we were still receiving patients in critical condition.

I was the supervisor of the nurses in the hospital, and we decided to load the patients onto a tractor and trailer and go with them to Kodok.

On the way, we saw people fleeing in the same direction with no water or means of transport We picked up some of the wounded and sick. Some of our staff jumped out to make space for them on the trailer. Unfortunately, one of our patients died on the way. By midnight, we arrived at the hospital in Kodok with 13 patients.

I had nowhere to stay in Kodok and ended up sleeping in the open with the people from Wau Shilluk. I decided to continue serving the sick and the wounded any way I could. Initially, I started helping at a hospital run by another organisation in Kodok that was overwhelmed by the number of patients it was receiving. Since 20 February, I have been working in this MSF clinic in Aburoch, providing medical assistance to the displaced people.

My future is unclear, and I don´t know what will happen to all of us from Wau Shilluk. I have my family in Yei, in the Greater Equatorian region. I took them away from here in 2014 because I was afraid for them and I wanted them to be safe.

At the moment, I’m having trouble communicating with them. Last week, I cycled 45 kilometres to make a phone call to my wife and children. The telephone network was shut down in January 2017, and I am worried about their security.

Currently, the situation here is incomparable to that of Wau Shilluk, where we lived just a few weeks ago. Here, there is hardly any water, shelter or food. We are suffering.