Where there’s hope – life after terror
It would be nice if there was a happy ending to every story we have to tell in our Christmas Appeal for the work of the children’s charity Unicef in the rescue and rehabilitation of boy soldiers and girl sex slaves from armed militias in Africa. But real life is not always like that.
Take the case of the girl who is, perhaps ironically, called Hope. When Unicef allows journalists access to rescued children it always gives them pseudonyms. That is because fitting them back into family and village life can be hard because many of the children were forced by marauding gunmen to commit atrocities in the places from which they were seized – either that or be killed themselves. It is best, on their return, if the full horror of their stories is not associated with rescued individuals.
Hope was just 11 years old when she was seized by drug-crazed gunmen from the quasi-religious Lord’s Resistance Army which rampages across the central of Africa from South Sudan to the Central African Republic – which is where Independent reader’s donations are currently funding the work of child rescue.
Some 64 children saved from rebel warlords are currently being cared for by Unicef in the CAR capital, Bangui. But it was from a village in South Sudan that Hope was abducted. “I cried for so long when my little girl was abducted,” her mother Mary said. Neighbours tried to console her and told her to pray, but there was nothing that would help.
Then one day Mary was listening to the radio and heard her little girl’s name being announced – FM radio announcements are one of the ways in which Unicef and its partners help reunite rescued child soldiers with their families. This was the last thing Mary had been expecting. Hope had been gone two long years and her mother feared that she would never see the child ever again.
Early the next morning the whole family gathered and went to the transit camp mentioned on the radio. But Hope was not at the transition centre. She had been shot in the leg during a gun battle with government troops, who eventually rescued her, and was now recovering in hospital.
Follow
Comments are closed.