Riziki Saidi has plenty of reasons to never want to set foot in a refugee camp again.

Key points: Mr Saidi resettled in Australia after spending eight years in a refugee camp

Mr Saidi resettled in Australia after spending eight years in a refugee camp He witnessed violence and tragedy at close hand

He witnessed violence and tragedy at close hand He has provided counselling to trauma and torture victims on Nauru

Instead, he decided to return to work as a torture and trauma counsellor at the Australian Government's detention centre on Nauru.

He would like to go back there again after recently finishing a 12-month contract on the Pacific island.

Mr Saidi spent eight years raising six children in a camp with his wife, Mwajemi, after a harrowing journey fleeing their home in the warring Democratic Republic of the Congo.

On the way, he was separated from Mwajemi and his baby daughter, saw close friends shot in crossfire and buried his father.

The Tanzanian refugee camp where they lived was nearly as difficult.

Social unrest was rife — riots killed many and fatal diseases spread with ease.

So it would be understandable if, after resettling as a refugee in Australia in 2005, he would want nothing to do with his past life.

Instead, he learnt English, retrained as a social worker at university, and eventually worked on Nauru.

Until recently Mr Saidi, who lives in Adelaide, routinely went back to Nauru to work with detainees, spending about a month on the island each time.

Difficult time working on Nauru

The experience triggered unpleasant memories for him, and he recounted an instance when guards marched past his dorm as he slept.

"I heard boots and thought, 'Maybe it's the army' … and I just jumped and knocked my head on a cabinet above me," he said.

"People still have that sort of fear in their body.

"Being in detention surrounded by guards they are like, 'We're back in a situation we left behind'."

Tent accommodation for asylum seekers on Nauru. ( Department of Immigration and Citizenship )

He said the impact of the militarised environment on people who had already experienced war contributed to the mental health issues of many in detention.

"When I was there on the island, someone killed themselves by burning themselves, and after two weeks, another Somali girl burned herself," he said.

"People were coming crying — children, adults — it was really hard."

Mr Saidi said being scared to go back home, but also scared of what was ahead, made detention unbearable for many he was counselling.

"Some of my clients who were stopping eating, drinking, they wanted to take their life," he said.

'We need to hang onto that hope'

Riziki Saidi (left) at a Tanzanian refugee camp. ( Supplied )

Mr Saidi said another big challenge for the people he worked with was maintaining hope.

He believed the protracted uncertainty was "literally destroying the health" of asylum seekers.

"You are in a position where staying is hard, going back is hard. So people don't have that kind of hope — they're in the middle where they can't see a solution," he said.

Robyn Smythe, the director of Survivors of Torture and Trauma, where Mr Saidi now works, said he was able to offer that hope.

"Sometimes in this space clients lose hope and we need to hang onto that hope for them," Ms Smythe said.

"He is able to get alongside them and hold onto that hope and know that there are possibilities for the future."

Riziki Saidi and Bhutanese refugee and torture survivor Tom Gauri. ( ABC News: Gabriella Marchant )

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Tom Gauri is a torture survivor from Bhutan who recently began counselling with Mr Saidi in Adelaide.

When he was a young man, he was held captive by the then government and kicked for hours by people searching for information he did not have.

Although he has since resettled in Australia, the scars of that experience have lingered.

"I was crying all the time and didn't know what to do," Mr Gauri said.

"I couldn't go to the toilet, I couldn't sit for long."

He said he would often have nightmares about the army coming and torturing him.

"Riziki gave me some counselling, and I came back to this life again," Mr Gauri said.

When the ABC met with his interpreter, she said Mr Gauri looked unrecognisable compared to before he began treatment.

"I can never ever ever forget what I received," Mr Gauri said of the transformation.

Motivation to give back to community

Mr Saidi said it was the desire to serve a country which had given them refuge that often motivated refugees to give back in the way he had.

"We didn't have even a blanket or any sheet to use when we'd escaped," he said.

"Sometimes we were digging holes so we could take cover when fighting broke out."

The memory of living that way makes him grateful.

"Coming here was when I started my life. I counted zero. We have to do something to help us catch up to what we lost," he said.

"Most important is to pay back the Government who brought us here to live in peace."

His children are all completing various levels of education, with his two eldest about to complete masters degrees in counselling and biochemical sciences respectively.

"Now they are maybe better than me," he said.