For years, Beatrice Aciro* and her four children slept under the cover of thick forest to avoid being captured or mutilated by the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA), a rebel group that has ravaged northern Uganda since 1986.
In October of 2002, in an effort to eradicate the rebel threat, the government of Uganda (GoU) ordered all civilians to vacate their homes and move to the Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps, leading to the displacement of more than 1.8 million people throughout northern Uganda.
“Government soldiers visited my home and told us that anyone who remained would be considered rebel collaborators and killed,” said Beatrice. “It was the growing season. I begged them to let us wait so we could harvest what we had planted. They refused and we lost everything.”
Having no other option, Beatrice and her children went with all they could carry and began to restart their lives amongst conditions once described by the UN Undersecretary General as “the worst humanitarian disaster in the world.”
In an area that at one time only housed one family, Beatrice erected her small grass thatched hut among thousands of other displaced persons facing a similar plight.
“We had no food and no clean water. We survived off of help from neighbors and food rations provided by the World Food Program. Each day people died all around us,” said Beatrice.
Today, northern Uganda is experiencing relative calm, allowing those such as Beatrice to rebuild their homes in either smaller, less congested satellite camps or in their original homesteads. However, resettlement has not been easy.
While the Peace, Recovery and Development Plan developed by the GoU has put forth a framework for addressing these needs, the implementation has been slow and ineffectual.
Despite the challenges, Beatrice is glad to have returned home and remains full of hope and optimism. With a smile on her face she said, “I have begun to cultivate my land and sell some of my produce in the market. . . I used to be dependent on others for help, but now I am able to support myself.”
Currently, just under 500,000 people remain in IDP camps throughout northern Uganda as the process of resettlement continues.
*Name changed for confidentiality purposes.
Wade Snowdon is an MCC service worker in Uganda.
