UGANDA'S HAUNTED
CHILDREN: THE HARD ROAD HOME
February 23, 2006
 It's been called the Pearl of Africa. But more recently Uganda's
been known as the worst country in the world to be a child, where an entire
generation has been caught up in a bloody civil war for twenty years. The Lord's
Resistance Army – the LRA – known for its unspeakable brutality,
has been building its ranks abducting children. These children are trained
to kill, or forced into sexual slavery. Tens of thousands have lost their childhood.
Thanks to a government amnesty program to coax rebels out of the bush, twenty
thousand children have escaped and returned home - only to find there is no
escape from their troubles.
 Canadian Erin Baines, research director at the
Liu Centre for Global Issues at UBC, has spent part of the last 3 years with
the Acholi people of Northern Uganda, whose children are the target for abduction
by the LRA. She is looking at how Acholi traditional rituals can help to re-integrate
former child soldiers back into society, a challenge given the gravity of the
atrocities that have been committed. All this is against the backdrop of a
humanitarian crisis with 1.6 million Acholi people displaced in the north in
government run IDP camps.
This documentary interviews Uganda's president Yoweri Museveni and
asks him why he refuses to call in the UN when clearly he has not been able
to protect the civilians in the camps from rebel attacks. The president
takes us on a journey to the site of a historic massacre to justify his reason
for pursuing a military solution with the rebels.
| CBC reporter Natalie Clancy
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CREDITS
Correspondent: Natalie Clancy
Producer: Marijka Hurko
Camera: Glen Kugelstadt
Editor: James Ho Lim
Research: Layal El Abdallah
LINKS
Waiting for Museveni - essay by Natalie Clancy, Dispatches, CBC Radio, 23 February 2006 (real audio, runs 5:47)
Natalie Clancy interview - The Current, CBC Radio, 23 February 2006, interviewed by Anna Maria Tremonti (real audio; this links to Part 2 of The Current, which is the interview. Runs 23:45.)
Uganda elections: David McGuffin reports for CBC-TV, 23 February 2006 (video, runs 3:39)
RealVideo
Quicktime
Walking to end terror - Toronto Star, February 26, 2006. (Article by John Goddard about northern Uganda and the Guluwalk in Toronto.)
Justice and Reconciliation Project
Conflict and Development Programme
Act for Stolen Children
IRIN (United Nations Integrated Regional Information
Networks) Web Special on the crisis in Northern Uganda
LIU Institute for Global Issues
New
Vision - state-owned daily, in Kampala.
Daily Monitor - privately owned daily newspaper, in
Kampala.
Human
Rights Watch reports on Uganda
United
Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian
Affairs
Uganda government news releases
NEWSWORLD BROADCAST TIMES:
Thursday, February 23 at 10 PM ET
Friday, February 24 at 1 PM ET
Friday, February 24 at 4 AM ET
Thursday, March 2 at 4 AM ET
Saturday, March 4 at 4 PM ET
Sunday March 5 at 3 AM ET
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