Children of war in Uganda

Gun-toting preacher
How are they to be protected against a man so maniacal as to claim to speak for god?

This American preacher believes god has given him the answer.  Reverend Sam Childers is the son of a Pennsylvania iron worker. Childers is a former biker who rode with the hell’s angels and he’s born again.

Now, supported by contributions from the American evangelical community, he goes on military-style rescue missions for abducted children.  He even joins with local African militias to hunt Kony down.

Childers: I always liked to fight. Still do. I’m a preacher but I still like to fight

Morrison: Is it fair to say that you’re a missionary? Or are you a mercenary?

Childers: A lot of people call me a Christian mercenary.  And I will accept it either way.

Seven years ago, Childers built an orphanage on the border of Uganda and Sudan, as it turns out the same region where children like Patrick are held captive.

He offers us a ride along the treacherous trip to his orphanage. We soon saw just how hard it would be for any child to escape the rebels in these rugged badlands.

We were joined by Childers’ personal militia —35 seasoned fighters from Sudan who join hands to pray for protection.

They pray together, but they also put their faith in a veritable weapons arsenal: rifles, AK-47s, and machine guns. The pastor drives with a pistol on his seat and—when he senses trouble—a rifle on his lap.

"If you see ‘em, you better shoot ‘em quick because they’ll shoot ya. Yeah, you don’t even play around with ‘em," he says.

His little army rides the truck behind him down a hot, dusty road, littered with remnants of battles past.  Along the way he stopped to show us a school attacked by rebels, where he says students were given a gruesome choice.

Childers: They came here, they took the teachers. Killed all the teachers. Took one and chopped ‘em up. Started cooking them. The children that would eat ‘em, they let the children go. And any of the other children they’d shoot ‘em in the head.  The bodies were stacked high of children.

Difficult to believe, but human rights groups have documented similar cases.

Though the rebel soldiers never far away from Childer's orphanage, children like Betty and Mary find refuge from the horrors they experienced beyond the orphanage fence.

Mary shows us a large scar from a severe lashing the rebels gave her. Betty, only 11, holds dark memories, but it's the loss of her parents that haunts her the most.

And so they are scarred and traumatized, but at the camp, somehow, at home. It is their oasis amid chaos where there is a semblance of routine and normalcy. It appears fear is held at bay, where night terrors are chased off by song.

But Kony’s terror is never far from Childers’ mind.

Morrison: What would you do with him if you could find him?

Childers: He needs to pay for the crimes that he’s done.

Morrison: But if you saw him—if you ran into him, what would you do?

Childers: We’re gonna fight. We’re gonna fight.  And I’m gonna win.

Morrison: Meaning what?  You’d kill him?

Childers: I’m gonna win. I’m gonna win.  Definitely.  Yeah. 

While it may make sense for some to use violence to fight Kony’s violence, there is something very unusual about this little country in the middle of Africa. Many people here choose an entirely different approach.

A mother fights war with peace
For Angelina Atyam, a peaceful strategy is the only answer. "The bullets have been flying for all these years. It is almost 20 years. Guns don’t solve problems," she argues.

That’s all the more surprising because of what happened to her own daughter, Charlotte.

Charlotte was one of more than a hundred abducted at gunpoint by Kony’s rebels from a girls boarding school. Charlotte became a so-called wife to one of Kony’s commanders.

Angelina Atyam: They were given out, you know, like, like things. Not like people.

And soon enough, Charlotte had two children in captivity. Parents of the stolen school girls decided to turn their pain into action. And Atyam, a humble midwife, soon began to speak for them. Going village to village, then across the world, she made a name for herself as she met with the prominent and powerful. She was even invited to speak at the United Nations.

Kony heard about Atyam’s crusade and did not like the attention she was bringing his way.  His rebels summoned Atyam to a secret meeting.

Morrison: You received an offer from them. What was that?

Atyam: It was giving me my daughter in exchange for silence.  Not to talk about them.

She could have her daughter back.  All she needed to do was keep quiet.  A kind of Sophie’s choice. The rebels waited for her answer. And Atyam said no.

Atyam:I told them that is unacceptable.

Morrison: How can you do that as the mother of Charlotte?

Atyam:  If I had asked for Charlotte and she came back—what about the rest?  What about the other parents?  What about this very many children?  What about their mothers?  The pain I feel is what also they feel.

And then years passed, until the day she got a phone call. Fateful news about Charlotte.  The caller didn’t mince words.

Atyam: He told me, “Your daughter is here.”

Charlotte had escaped.

Morrison: Were those the words?

Atyam: Yes. “Your daughter is here.” 

It was a joyous reunion. 

Atyam: And once she looked at me, she was carrying a child. She just put him down and she ran to meet me and I ran to meet her, and we couldn’t talk.  We just cried for a long, long, long time.

Today, Charlotte is 22 years old, is making up for lost time. She's back at a boarding school, this one in southern Uganda, far away from Kony’s rebels. Her children live with their grandmother, Angelina. And Charlotte still holds out hope for all the other children.

Charlotte: I never lose that hope. Because I know if there’s still life, there’s something that can still be done. 

So what can be done? Retribution? Her mother doesn’t ask for that. To end it all, she turns to a tribal tradition of forgiveness.

Atyam: Admitting guilt, asking to be forgiven is all you need from them.

It’s hard to fathom, but Atyam and many leaders here in northern Uganda say it’s time to actually forgive Kony and his rebels. The only way is amnesty or immunity from prosecution if they’ll just stop fighting and stop abducting children.

Atyam: Nobody can ever make a restitution for us. We are sacrificing justice for sustainable peace.

Is she right? Certainly, says the U.N.’s Jan Egeland, the rest of the world has yet to help win justice for the children of Uganda.

Egeland: This is an outrage we cannot tolerate.

And yet, he says, the world does tolerate it.

Egeland: I have a deep sense of frustration because I feel I'm failing... because we are all failing.

So they wait, like Patrick, the former child soldier. We asked him, what do you want Americans to know? 

Patrick: We, as the children of northern Uganda, we are so tired with that war.

But tonight and every night, tens of thousands of night commuters will stream into northern Ugandan towns, hoping to stay alive long enough to see the morning.

And somewhere among them is little Patrick, forced to kill his own mother, still trying to learn how to live without her.

And yet, they smile, they laugh, they sing. Just children, with nothing left but resilience and hope.

The U.S. government says it contributes tens of millions of dollars for humanitarian aid to Ugandans forced from their homes.

In Fall 2005, the International Criminal Court in the Hague issued arrest warrants for Kony and four of his top commanders on charges of war crimes.  These are the first warrants ever issued by the court.

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