One of the major challenges is the influx of many returnees who had sought refuge in other parts of Sudan during the about a decade period of political turmoil in South Sudan.

Experts warn this influx [of returnees] is expected to cause dire shortages of food, water, health care and sanitation in Southern Sudan. The United Nations Humanitarian Coordinator in Sudan, Mr. Georg Charpentier says even when the referendum results are announced, the number of returnees could keep increasing.

The UN humanitarian coordinator in Sudan Mr. George Charpentier warns with South Sudan independence, the trend looks to the worst as many South Sudanese are coming back to South Sudan.

Over 500.000 returnees are now expected to come adding on the already numbers who have recently returned.

“The emotions around the referendum have pushed many Southerners to come back and some of them even perhaps from a rational point of view may be prematurely. May be they would have stayed longer in the North to keep their children in School or to keep a job or to have a more time to sell their properties and so on. That emotional aspect might eventually lower a little bit after the referendum results are out”, Mr. Charpentier warned in one of his address to the press when he visited the returnees at their temporally shelter at Port Juba.

When I visited this temporally “on transit camp”, I find a number of young children; ranging from 3-8 playing in one of the makeshift tents that have been constructed by UNICEF.

These children are playing like any other Children of the World. Unfortunately their mothers are not assured of their basic needs including daily meals let alone accommodation, with their parents, they have to sleep in the open for some days/weeks until the government or relief agencies take them to their final destinations.

Jemu Jima is a mother of one of these children; she has been under the care of her brothers since her husband left her seven months ago after delivering their second child. I asked her why she decided to come to Juba.

She came here because they were told that everyone has everyone had to come from. “We were told that everyone had to be where he/she is”, said a seemingly helpless Jemu Jima through an interpreter.

She claims it is the government of Sudan [Khartoum government] that told them to leave.

Narrator: It took them 20 days to travel from Khartoum to Port Juba where they are temporarily sheltered. Here they survive from aid from WFP, UNICEF and other aid agencies.

“She is saying when she was in Khartoum her brothers used to help the kids with giving food and catering for education and so on. The father of these kids left her and disappeared so his whereabouts, she doesn’t know where he is now. She decided that instead of suffering there she has to go home and see if see if she can get something to grow these children and put these children in school. The husband disappeared when she gave birth for this young child; life became very hard for her, depending on the elder brothers. The little there are giving her was not enough”, Ali an interpreter told me.

Jemu Jima hopes to go to her ancestry area in Torit. Torit is in Eastern Equatoria and borders Uganda and Kenya.

“I have no option, I have to engage myself in subsistence farming and be able to look after kids”, Jema says as she tries to control her emotions.

A mother of two sons Jemu Jima’s plea to government is to get education for her children.

Another returnee I speak to is Virginia who says she came because she expects separation.

“The reason is obvious of course you know we are expecting separation definitely that’s why we here”, Virginia who was a civil servant in Northern Sudan says.

Unlike Jema Jima, Virginia says she has had to come “voluntarily”.

Returnees sometimes have to take over a month on their journey to Juba from Port Khartoum.

They survive on handouts from relief agencies like WFP, UNICEF, which they say is not enough.

“You know beginning of everything is turf, for the meantime we are going to suffer but after sometimes everything is going to be all right I think”, says an optimistic Virginia.

Despite these optimisms, Virginia is worried she will have to suffer without accommodation and other basic need of life as she struggles to settle back in Juba where she was staying before going to Khartoum.

“When we first went to Khartoum, it was the same like this one but after sometimes things become okay and now we are going to face the same thing but we are sure God is there”, Virginia narrated.

Virginia also a single parent has a family that she has to provide for despite the challenges. She expects the government and relief agencies to help her as she finds a way to provide for them.

Some of the returnees have suffered attacks from the militias who waylay them as they come to Sudan but The UN Humanitarian Coordinator says security has to be beefed if the safety of returnees is to be achieved.

“I believe that if we do indeed step-up the security; military or police escorting of the convoys through those routes, we will indeed guarantee that safety”, says Charpentier.

Relief agencies have warned that the influx of returnees to Southern Sudan could lead to 2.7 million people food insecure in Southern Sudan. Many of these returnees did not participate in the last concluded referendum. The Government of Southern Sudan discouraged many Southerners living in the North from registering for the referendum citing what they expected could malpractices if they voted from the North