IDP Camps

Gulu, Uganda; Wednesday, May 27






We woke up early to travel up country to Northern Uganda. We traded in our van for two Land Rovers. This stretch of road, from Kampala to Gulu, is one of the most dangerous. To give you an accurate picture, take away the pavement, yellow lines and all of the rules and add in people/biking on both sides of the road along with motorcycles seating two/three people and loaded down with merchandise and about a million crazy drivers. BUT we had the best driver in all of Uganda. His name is Hassan. He has been driving these roads for over 26 years, leading tour groups for people from all over the world.

I spent most of my time during that drive looking out the window, soaking in this country. As we got closer to Gulu, I began to notice a change. The villages on the sides of the road looked different. Hasan told me why…

When the war broke out in Northern Uganda, the villages in the Bush became extremely vulnerable because there was no protection from Kony. The LRA began attacking villages at night, killing the parents with machetes and forcing the children into the Bush, claming them as child soldiers. Once captured in the Bush, the children would be terrified into completing many horrendous acts against each other in order to break them. If they did not comply, they would be killed. But once they were broken, they were turned into killing machines. This is the tragic history of Northern Uganda that has received so much attention, explained further in the Documentary, Invisible Children.

In response to these night attacks, the government constructed camps for villagers to take refuge in that were protected by the UN. Terrified villagers flooded into these camps, known as IDP Camps {Internally Displaced People Camps}, and they soon became over crowded and poverty stricken. Diseases spread and hunger reigned. Looking back, the number of internally displaced persons is estimated at 1.4 million.

Now, the government is forcing the camps to be evacuated. Court rulings are determining where the people groups are to go. Some villages are receiving their old land back if there are still relatives from that tribe that can identify the location and prove its heritage. The villagers are hesitant to return to their demolished villages, because they are still embedded with the fear that the war will return.

What I saw out of my window was the remains of the IDP Camps, with the last of its displaced people, waiting for their verdict…