'No end in sight': Owen Pomana in Ukraine laments senseless loss of life

Wednesday, 14 June 2023

Kiwi Owen Pomana is helping with the humanitarian effort in Ukraine by raising money to evacuate civilians and provide food. (Video first published April 4, 2022.)

A Māori pastor on the ground in Ukraine says there seems to be no end in sight to the war after the destruction of a major dam.

Former gang member Owen Pomana (Ngāti Kahungunu) turned his life around after being deported from Australia and finding God.

He is now in Dnipro, Ukraine, helping with the humanitarian effort.

“Yeah it’s pretty challenging, at 12.45 outside my window there was the biggest, loudest bang I've ever heard for a while,” Pomana said.

'The missiles, bombs and drones that they've sent over the cities has intensified… it’s really senseless.'

A dam in Kalhovka, Ukraine, in an area controlled by the Russian military, was destroyed on June 6, causing widespread flooding, power cuts, and leaving people without access to drinking water.

Former gang member Owen Pomana, right, turned his life around after finding God and is now supporting humanitarian efforts in Ukraine.

Pomana called the flooding a huge catastrophe.

“You've got Russians that are shooting humanitarian workers as they are trying to get to people who are on the roofs of their houses because there's other no way for them to get out,” he said.

“The width of the river in a lot of the places is like really, really huge. [If] you can't swim, you're done. There's lots of people going missing because of the tidal current under the water is still quite vicious.'

Pomana has set up a respite home in Dnipro, where he hosts soldiers, humanitarian workers and anyone who needs a rest.

After a dam was destroyed in Kalhovka causing widespread flooding, Pomana says Russian soldiers attacked humanitarian workers as they tried to help people escape their homes.

'I've been housing six to seven people here at a time, and they come, and I cook them food, then they go out back to the war or back to wherever they're serving,” he said.

'I've been operating that now for about five months here and, when I can, I'll do runs of food and aid down to different places. The Kalhovka region disaster has taken priority, obviously, because there’s a lot of people affected.'

Pomana delivers supplies to NGOs across the region in his van, providing food and aid to people impacted by the war.

'I'm going down today actually, this afternoon, and so it’s about five hours, probably a lot longer now because of the traffic that's heading down those ways, especially trucks,” he said.

'But now you've got a real sense of urgency because of the cholera outbreak that they're expecting.'

The war in Ukraine has killed at least 62,295 people and displaced around 17 million since Russia invaded in February 2022.

“When you have a look at young people who are gamers, they play games online, and you see the average potato farmers have now become full-time soldiers. The reality of a video game becomes real in their lives,” Pomana said.

'There's so much mental trauma which is attached to war, displacement of people, uncertainty… are they going to live today, are they going to get bombed? There just seems to be no end in sight.'

Pomana said the aftermath of the war will be seen for generations and called it a “senseless loss of life”.

'War is something that has happened through the centuries and the generations, but if we don't come to these places and show some kindness and generosity and some support to help people struggling to live, we lose our way in life,” he said.

'The reason why I'm here is purely on a humanitarian basis, to find solutions, to say that there are people in the world that actually care and will respond.'