Sammy’s weekly column – 1st March 2010
On Tuesday morning as I drove into work I was listening to the Today programme on Radio 4. They did a moving and tragic story about a young boy who had been used as a child soldier in the Congo. He described how at the age of seven he had witnessed his mother being dragged from her car in Rwanda by Hutus, the soldiers cut off her breasts, pushed her against a tree, pinned her to it with knives driven through her shoulders and left her to die. He was forced to sit through this torture and was then taken to be killed himself.
Before the soldiers could kill him they were ambushed by another militia group and he was taken into captivity and for the next ten years wandered the jungle between Congo and Rwanda being used as a boy soldier. He witnessed beatings, rapes, killings and all the horrors which have visited that region of the world, where out of control, drug and hate crazed gangs have murdered 4 million civilians in a war that seems to have no end and which shamefully the West has ignored. He has now been freed and has been taken in by an aid organisation which tries to rehabilitate children who were abused in this way, give them back some of their childhood, educate them and help them overcome the nightmares which haunt their young minds.
The sad fact is that thousands of children across Africa have suffered in the same way leaving a generation traumatised, orphaned, mentally scarred and without hope for the future.
Coincidently my first meeting when I arrived at the office was to meet a man from Londonderry called Richard Moore. He runs a charity based in Londonderry and had a problem with my department which he hoped I could intervene to resolve. He is totally blind and although he told me nothing about his background I had been briefed about this remarkable man by Mark Durkan who had asked for the meeting.
Richard has been totally blind since he was ten after being hit by a rubber bullet fired at point blank range while playing in his school playground in 1972. Despite the fact that he was robbed of one of the most important faculties an individual can have he did not allow it to blight his life or make him embittered. While a teenager he refused to carry a white stick instead he used a fishing rod to identify obstacles. With typical N.I. black humour he claimed that of all the ways for a person to be made blind, living in the Bogside in the 1970s and 80s the best way to be blind was to be blinded by the Brits ! Indeed in later life he searched out the soldier who had fired the missile and they now both visit each other. Rather than allow himself to become bitter and stunted by the tragedy which befell him he simply says “I have learned to see life in a different way.”
Despite his disability and the suffering which he had experienced he still considered himself fortunate that having lived in N.I. he had choices and opportunities which many children elsewhere, caught in the crossfire of conflicts and the poverty and suffering which they produce, did not have.
He wanted to find ways of helping them and bringing what he had learned to their service. In 1996 he set up a charity called Children in Crossfire and over the last 14 years has in a whole range of ways helped children in Africa, Asia and South America who as a result of war, famine and corrupt regimes have been caught in the crossfire of poverty which has impacted on their health, education, and economic projects. Today the efforts of the charity are concentrated in Tanzania and Ethiopia. It also works with schools and young people in N.I. to, as he describes it, give them eyes to see the needs of children in some of the world’s poorest areas such as Tanzania where 58% of the population live on less than 80pence per day.
Millions of pounds have been raised to improve the lives of thousands of children. One of the latest projects is The Ocean Road Cancer Institute in Dar Es Salaam in Tanzania. It provides treatment free of charge the only one to do so in Eastern and Southern Africa, and the children who are often there for months at a time are also given educational support. Such is the demand, there are three times more patients than beds so children must share beds and family members come into the ward as carers because of staff shortages. The situation is compounded by shortages of equipment and medicine but despite these problems survival rates are 70%. The hospital relies heavily on funds raised by Children in Crossfire in N.I. There are other projects providing water, health, hygiene, food production, and education to children who can only dream of the lifestyle we enjoy.
All of this started with the vision of a blind man who instead of living a life of bitterness for the cruel deal which he had been dealt, decided that he would use his talents, skills and opportunities to improve the lot of others caught in the crossfire. His remarkable story is told in his biography “Can I give him my eyes?” the question asked by his devastated father when he heard his son had been blinded.
In my job I have the privilege to meet many famous people, Prime Ministers, footballers, film stars, motor bike champions but to meet a man who lost so much yet wants to give so much was a real privilege.
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Very moving stories we take so much for granted.