Twice a month, West Chester University’s chapter of the group, Invisible Children, holds a bake sale in order to raise money to rebuild schools in Uganda for young children who were abducted to fight as soldiers.
Five years ago, three young adults set out to Uganda to contribute to the unveiling of the longest lasting conflict in Africa. The organization began in San Diego when three young filmmakers, and eventually many supporters at different universities and high schools across the nation, wanted to make people become aware of the extremities that Ugandan children faced in war effected countries in Africa. The organization’s non- profit approach reaches out to the public by documenting the lives of those living in injustice and conflict.
According to the article “Why Uganda has failed to defeat the Lord’s Resistance Army,” for over 23 years, the Lord’s Resistance Army and the government of Uganda have stirred a war which left civilians unprotected and young children the target victims. The LRA began when a woman named Alice Lakwena formed a group in opposition to the Ugandan government leader, Yoweri Museveni, who had seized power in Uganda in 1986.
After Lakwena was defeated several times, she fled to a refugee camp in Kenya in which her and Joseph Kony, one of Lakwena’s most influential protégés, upheld the force and formed the LRA. A certain spirit, known as the “Holy Spirit Battalion” prompted, both Lakwena and Kony to damage and terrorize the lives of thousands of innocent children. Together they launched raids across northeastern Uganda. They abducted many children along the way, and used the children as soldiers, servants and ‘wives.’
According to Robert L. Feldman’s article “Why Uganda Has Failed to Defeat the Lord’s Resistance Army,” the estimates vary on the strength of the present day LRA. Today the numbers are relatively small, but a resulting 1.5 million internally displaced people are estimated from the conflict, which destabilizes a significant portion of northern Uganda. The LRA’s primary source of strength depended upon the children whom were abducted and ultimately used as soldiers. These children enabled the LRA to replenish any losses or escapes during the battle.
In an African Journal from American Magazine.org, Justin Isa, a survivor of the LRA in South Sudan, told reporters about the abuse he experienced during his time with the LRA. He bore scars on his back from beatings with machetes, and internal wounds from enduring the orders from his commanders. Isa was forced to participate in the killing of other abducted children whom the LRA did not trust or wished to be punished. Isa, along with many other children, were petrified to escape the LRA and their orders. Today Isa still has nightmares about the LRA capturing him again, even after the terrorized countries have come to a level of peace.
Since the movie “Invisible Children: Rough Cut” was filmed in 2003, the abduction of these children in Uganda has ceased. In recent years, peace has become closer to reach. From June 2006 to March 2008 in the Juba and Sudan, the LRA and government of Uganda engaged in a series of peace talks in order to end the conflict.
In the last two years, an estimated 900,000 of the 1.5 million displaced have returned to their homes. Over one million people are still left displaced, due to lack of clean water, economic opportunities, lack of health centers, and inadequate education facilities and opportunities.
As for the Ugandan children, representatives from the organization Invisible Children on West Chester’s campus, are raising money to rebuild schools for these children to provide proper education and counseling for the children who were forced to fight and terrorize their country.
Dominique Perry is a fifth-year student majoring in professional studies and minoring in journalism and studio art. She can be reached at DP633925@wcupa.edu.