boy I knew started calling “Santino, Santino!” and the others soon followed suit.
Much later, in Kakuma Refugee Camp in Kenya, I was to complete my catechism and be confirmed as a member of the Roman Catholic Church.
Chapter 7
It was in May 1991 that President Mengistu of Ethiopia was overthrown by rebels from northern Sudan. This made it very difficult for Sudanese refugees from the south to stay in Ethiopia as we were now at the mercy of the new Ethiopian government, one that was collaborating with the Sudanese rulers from whose tyranny we had originally fled.
So, when rumours of an imminent attack by government forces reached us, we were left no option but to run back to Sudan. On the night that we heard that fighting had broken out some hours from us, the children were ordered to leave first and to run for the border. We were reassured that the part of Sudan we were heading for was controlled by our own soldiers, the SPLA.
I was in one of the last groups of minors to leave. The road was crowded and it was dark, but the enemy was fast gaining on us, pushing our defenders back, and we had to press on. As we ran we could hear bombs exploding, just like when we had fled Sudan for Ethiopia. Now we were rushing back!
After walking all night and most of the following day, we reached the Gilo River. Little did I know that once we had crossed it, it would take us another night and another day of walking to get to the border town of Pochella.
The river bank was congested with people. The first minors’ groups had crossed to the other side, but the earth was parched and there was no food to be found. As most of the refugees had already consumed the little they had carried with them, and there was obviously no food on the other side of the river, some were talking about turning back. We were back in hell, just like in those early days in Panyido. Meanwhile, the level of the river was rising, and soon it was coming down in flood. It seemed impossible for those still on the Ethiopian side to cross it.
Our enemies were on their way to kill us and we were trapped!
That afternoon, when people were still milling around, wondering what to do, the soldiers we had relied on to protect us came running wildly from the front line, their shirts tied around their waists. The enemy had evidently destroyed everything behind us. The SPLA soldiers ordered us to jump into the river and swim for our lives, or, if we were unable to swim, to follow the river to where we would reach Sudanese territory controlled by the SPLA. They would cover us, they promised.
Then I recognised Salva Kiir Mayardit. He was the SPLA commander in charge of refugees, a man who had visited Panyido several times. Here he was, struggling with his own bodyguards, who were trying to drag him to safety. He would not cross the river and leave thousands of refugees to be slaughtered, he shouted, as his bodyguards pulled him towards a boat on the river bank. Commander Salva Kiir looked at the hundreds of youngsters who had gathered near the boat. “Please! Help the children!” he shouted. “They are innocent. Help them!”
He refused to get onto the boat until his bodyguards had tied a large sheet of plastic to it. They then urged some boys to grab hold of it, so that they might be pulled across the water. Commander Kiir then turned to me. “Can you swim, boy?” he wanted to know. “Do you think you can make it across on your own?”
“Yes, sir. I can swim,” I said. “I have already been on the other side, but there’s no food over there, so I came back before the water rose so high.” I told him this because I didn’t want him to think I wasn’t brave.
He understood. “Well,” he said, “let’s cross first, and then I’ll order my soldiers to go and collect some food for you.”
Young boys were swarming towards the river. “Those of you who are able to had better swim,” Commander Kiir said to those nearest him. “We’ll take your clothes for you.”
He then told his bodyguards to help some of the boys onto the boat with him and pull the rest across using the plastic sheet. We who remained on the river bank were overwhelmed with respect for our leader.
It was true that I could swim, I had learned to in the camp, but this river was terrifying – big and powerful! Water was rushing down, splashing up against the rocks. However, Commander Kiir had said that we were to swim, and had offered to take our clothes to the other side and to provide food for us. My heart told me that I could do it. I took off my clothes and handed them to one of the commander’s bodyguards. Then, before the boat’s engines had even started, I jumped in and swam, making for an island in the middle of the rushing water.
I had almost reached it when the shooting started, sub-machine-gun fire that left me in no doubt that the enemy had arrived. Hundreds, who were unable to swim, threw themselves into the water and drowned. Others were shot and killed. Infants came floating past me. Their mothers must have drowned, I thought, as I fought with the river.
It was on that day that I learned that a newborn child will not sink. I saw the little ones crying as the water swept them away, but there was nothing I could do.
There was a lull in the shooting when I reached the opposite bank and I attempted to grab hold of a branch that reached down to the water. I knew that I would have to climb up the steep bank, but after swimming the river I didn’t have the strength for it. I tried and fell back three times. At last I succeeded. Then, dragging myself to my feet, I ran.
“Lie down and roll!” a soldier shouted at me.
I could not. There were too many dead bodies. I bent my back and continued to run, but I didn’t get far before the shooting resumed. Bullets were coming from all directions. Our own soldiers were in front of me. “Don’t run!” they yelled. “Throw yourself down flat!”
This time I obeyed.
When the firefight had fizzled out someone shouted at me to get up and run towards the SPLA soldiers. One of them grabbed hold of me and pulled me down behind a fallen tree trunk.
In the meantime, many people who had managed to cross the river now used the lull to get up and run for the road. I quickly joined them.
A priest was standing by the roadside. When he saw that I was naked, he picked up a shirt and tossed it to me. But just as I was reaching out to catch it a bullet struck a tree that stood near us, splitting it in half. “Get away from the road!” a soldier shouted, as the priest and I dived down together. “You two are targets!”
The priest and I rolled in different directions.
There was a rubbish dump in the forest on the other side of the Gilo River. We had visited it once, crossing the river to collect some useful items for the camp, but on that day I ran right past it and continued running through the forest for an hour, smashing through the bush.
When at last I thought that I was out of reach of the bullets I sat down with a group of grown-ups. They were trying to determine in which direction the road lay. “It must be near the mountain,” one said.
“I’m not returning to that road,” replied his companion. “It’s too dangerous. They will see us and drop bombs on us.”
More people arrived. Some were looking for lost family members. Others, like me, who had no family to worry about, were thinking about where they could find clothes, how to survive the next crisis and how long it would be before the UNHCR would come to our rescue.
At last the elders reached agreement. We would walk in the direction of the
