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Uganda after Kony: Christine Akello's story


April 20, 2012
By The IRC

Christine Akello is a member of an IRC Village Savings and Loans Association in northern Uganda that is helping families who were uprooted by the LRA conflict to recover and rebuild.

Photo: Celine Auma/IRC

This is the first in a series of stories shared by women who are rebuilding their lives after the long and brutal Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) conflict in northern Uganda. A 2006 cease-fire agreement between the Ugandan government and LRA rebel leader Joseph Kony brought relative peace to the region. Families who were displaced into camps, some for decades, have now returned home, but their communities are still recovering. The International Rescue Committee is helping them start anew.


Christine Akello, 58 
Lamwo district, northern Uganda  
Farmer, married with six children (ages 18 to 28)
 
The LRA destroyed my home, killed my sister-in-law and — most painful of all— they abducted my son. This has left a huge gap in my life.  Every day I live with the hope that he will come back. But now, it seems I have to face the reality that, since he has not been able to return for all this time, he might have been killed during the war. I am psychologically tortured — talking about the LRA experience brings tears to my eyes.
 
For the future, I continue to hope that one day my son will return home to join the family. I also hope to have a better life than what I am living today.
 
Women in our community face challenges in getting money and providing for their families since most of them are single. I am a member of the IRC’s Village Savings and Loans Association which helps me save money and also helps me meet my daily expenses and goals. The IRC has helped my family save and be in a position to use that money to meet our needs. 


Learn More about Uganda, Joseph Kony and the LRA

 

 

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