Thumbs up for an open society (Part 1)
During the recent weeks, we have contacted 150+ of our 226 kanthari graduates who are working in 40+ countries. Although everyone has to deal with the same crisis and experience similar restrictions such as more or less rigorous lockdowns and/or food shortages, it is astonishing how differently each individual reacts to the changes.
There are those who have slightly resigned and feel paralyzed by the daily disaster reports. When things get serious, they pull their heads into their shell in frustration and wait until everything is over. We call them “turtles”. The positive part about “turtles” is that they are patient and need only little to survive. The lack of toilet paper, pasta or flour would hardly be an issue for them.
🙂
Then there are the vigilant ones, who are often also anxious. The “chickens” who look around after each bite of food, to check again and again if there is anything that could endanger them. Despite their fears, “chickens” are also curious, they want to know everything and hence protect themselves better.
And then there are the hamsters who, in times of crisis, first run around and reflect very little or not at all. They don’t think long but immediately jump into action. The good thing about hamsters is they are great at getting something started, but they are not so good in planning.
Finally, there are the kites who get a good overview before they really get going. One of such kites is Samuel Odwar from northern Uganda. He is a kanthari graduate from 2014 and on upon his return home, founded the organization “Thumbs Up”, (thumbs up) an initiative that fights for an open, disabled friendly society.
We first saw Samuel as a thoughtful observer. We only knew parts of his personal history, which was affected by civil war in northern Uganda. At the beginning of the kanthari program, all participants present their project ideas. We expect a ten-minute speech in which they shed a light on the problem, the intervention they have in mind and the personal connection to the social issue they wish to address.
Samuel was one of the last speakers that day and I remember that we were all a little tired and overwhelmed by the many different ideas and life stories that we already heard and therefore we wanted to bring the day to an end. But then Samuel started his story. First soft spoken, as we all knew him. Then suddenly it exploded, his life story became a crescendo and the auditorium was filled with crackling tension.
To summarize the main points of his story, I would like to quote here again a small excerpt from my last book:
It was 1999, a year in which the already simmering war between the LRA, the Lord’s Resistance Army, and the state-run UPDF, the Uganda People’s Defense Force, reached a new, brutal level. Joseph Kony, leader of the rebel army LRA since 1994, raged with his troops in northern Uganda, especially in the Acholi tribe. He himself is an Acholi, and all Acholis who were not willing to be recruited for his purposes were considered traitors. They were raped, tortured, mutilated, killed. Those who resisted the rebels had their lips, hands or ears cut off. Kony’s main interest, however, was the mass abduction of children. Initially, mainly teenagers, boys and girls aged 12 to 16 who served as porters and sex slaves to the commanders in the camps. In raids or in battles with the government army, they were used as murderers, soldiers and cannon fodder. Later, they preferred even younger children, especially the 8 to 13-year olds, because children are malleable, can be easily influenced and incited to commit any act.
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Samuel was 17 years old when his region was invaded by the rebels. Most of the rebels came from the northern Ugandan provinces of Gulu, Kitgum and Pader. And 90 percent of Kony’s troops are said to be minor children. …
The rebels mostly came at night, overpowering the rural population in their sleep. They set fire to huts, forcing the families to get out. Then they took those who could be used for their army.
“I remember it was a Monday night. I had gone home over the weekend during my last semester of teaching. We, my brothers and I played football until it got dark. Then my mother called us to better get in. That night I shared a hut with seven of my younger brothers. It was already late when I woke up by an unfamiliar sound. We had been alarmed for some time by horror stories from neighboring villages and by warnings on the radio. And somehow, I knew exactly what was going on out there. With the thought that I could distract the strangers from us, I sneaked out and closed the door from the outside.
Then I went into cover. Although it was dark, I could see about five men quietly sneaking into our hut. When they tried to open the door, I approached them. I wanted to convince them that they had to make do with me, because there was no one else in the hut. At that moment, my siblings called for me. The rebels went wild. They forced me to unlock the hut, and then they captured us all. The whole action went fast and in silence. They ordered us not to make any noise, otherwise they would shoot us.
Since I was the eldest, my arms were tied. We were taken to a large group of other children. … And then we had to run. Three days and three nights, almost uninterrupted. The entire journey was through the bush. The target was the South Sudanese border. We ate what was looted from the villages or fields. We could only sleep if we had a meal break. Some simply fell over with tiredness and were then beaten up by the commanders.”
Samuel had little freedom of movement due to the shackles, so his brothers made sure that they stayed close to him during the day and especially at night. This allowed them to exchange ideas and make escape plans. There were so many children that the rebels struggled to keep everyone under control. Many escaped during the march. Samuel’s brothers were also able to escape early. At one time one disappeared while collecting firewood, another tricked the guards while fetching water. But most fled at night, under the cover of darkness.
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On the way, they passed through villages that had been looted, mostly burned down and abandoned by the inhabitants. Only the elderly and the disabled had been left behind. These people served the LRA as “training objects”. The kidnapped children were to be trained as “murder machines”. In order to lower the inhibition threshold, they should not simply “just” shoot the disabled, they should kill them with machetes and axes. Those who refused had to reckon with torture or their own death.
“I have watched children obey the orders out of naked fear and disgust at their own actions. At some point it was my turn. It was a paralyzed woman, very weak from hunger, who I was to kill with an axe. I couldn’t, and I refused. I knew it would mean the end of me. A commander gave one of the youths a rifle and an order to shoot me. He went with me into the forest. I was waiting for the shot. But nothing happened. He just said, ‘I know your father, I can’t do this… go, get out of here.’ Then I ran, and he shot. The gunshot injured me in the foot, so I lost a lot of blood along the way.”
Part 2 tomorrow…