Every morning and night in rural Uganda, thousands of children walk great distances to avoid being raped, kidnapped or killed by rebel fighters.
On October 21, TU Delft student Mulo Emmanuel will set off on a charitable ‘GuluWalk’ in the hope of raising money for these children.
While the distance of the GuluWalk itself isn’t so important, the reason behind it couldn’t be more crucial. Mulo Emmanuel is walking for the children of Uganda: “Gulu is a district in the northern Uganda, where for the past 20 years the Lord’s Resistance Army rebels have been fighting against the Ugandan government.”
The Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) is a paramilitary group led by Joseph Kony that aims to overthrow current Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni. “But as a result,” Emmanuel says, “millions of people have been displaced from their homes, and thousands of children in the district must walk many kilometers every day from their rural villages into Gulu town, where they have relatively safer shelter and protection from the LRA rebels at night.”
The children walk these exhausting distances daily to avoid being raped, kidnapped or killed by the LRA. It’s estimated that 20,000 children have already been forced to join the LRA as child soldiers or sex slaves.
These Ugandan children, who range in age from 3-17, are known as “night commuters”, and the distance they walk every day to and from safety is the equivalent of walking from Delft Central Station to the Euromast in Rotterdam.
Emmanuel is walking to raise awareness and money for these children: “I’m walking to make others aware of the situation and to fundraise in support of children’s programs that focus on education, rehabilitation and youth outreach.”
The GuluWalk, scheduled for October 21, will involve tens of thousands of people in 80 different cities around the world. Emmanuel, who is being supported by fellow TU students Feng Hui, Karin Hoetner and Alex Dawotola, is also currently planning a GuluWalk to be held in Delft.
As a student from the northern Uganda, Emmanuel takes this mission very personally. He’s currently finishing his MSc Computer Science degree at TU Delft and will then return to Uganda to give back to this brutalized community: “I just turned 26, and I’m trying to get as much education as I can and then hopefully pass it on when I get home. My plan is to work as a lecturer.”
The GuluWalk was started by two Canadians: Adrian Bradbury and Kieran Hayward began walking 12.5 kilometers every night in July 2005. They would walk into downtown Toronto, sleep in front of City Hall, and then walk 12.5 kilometers home to shower before going to work. Their month-long GuluWalk helped spark international interest in the plight of these Ugandan children.
Jan Egeland, the UN Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs has called this situation in northern Uganda “the world’s most neglected humanitarian crisis” and “one of the biggest scandals of our generation.” The good news is that each of us now has the power to help. (RK)
You can support the Gulu children by donating money for Mulo Emmanuel’s walk, or by becoming a walker yourself. To sign up for a GuluWalk, go to: wwww.guluwalk.com/doaguluwalk. If you’d like to sponsor Mulo, go to: www.guluwalk.com, and search for ‘Mulo Emmanuel’.
Mulo Emmanuel (Photo: Sam Rentmeester/FMAX)
While the distance of the GuluWalk itself isn’t so important, the reason behind it couldn’t be more crucial. Mulo Emmanuel is walking for the children of Uganda: “Gulu is a district in the northern Uganda, where for the past 20 years the Lord’s Resistance Army rebels have been fighting against the Ugandan government.”
The Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) is a paramilitary group led by Joseph Kony that aims to overthrow current Ugandan president Yoweri Museveni. “But as a result,” Emmanuel says, “millions of people have been displaced from their homes, and thousands of children in the district must walk many kilometers every day from their rural villages into Gulu town, where they have relatively safer shelter and protection from the LRA rebels at night.”
The children walk these exhausting distances daily to avoid being raped, kidnapped or killed by the LRA. It’s estimated that 20,000 children have already been forced to join the LRA as child soldiers or sex slaves.
These Ugandan children, who range in age from 3-17, are known as “night commuters”, and the distance they walk every day to and from safety is the equivalent of walking from Delft Central Station to the Euromast in Rotterdam.
Emmanuel is walking to raise awareness and money for these children: “I’m walking to make others aware of the situation and to fundraise in support of children’s programs that focus on education, rehabilitation and youth outreach.”
The GuluWalk, scheduled for October 21, will involve tens of thousands of people in 80 different cities around the world. Emmanuel, who is being supported by fellow TU students Feng Hui, Karin Hoetner and Alex Dawotola, is also currently planning a GuluWalk to be held in Delft.
As a student from the northern Uganda, Emmanuel takes this mission very personally. He’s currently finishing his MSc Computer Science degree at TU Delft and will then return to Uganda to give back to this brutalized community: “I just turned 26, and I’m trying to get as much education as I can and then hopefully pass it on when I get home. My plan is to work as a lecturer.”
The GuluWalk was started by two Canadians: Adrian Bradbury and Kieran Hayward began walking 12.5 kilometers every night in July 2005. They would walk into downtown Toronto, sleep in front of City Hall, and then walk 12.5 kilometers home to shower before going to work. Their month-long GuluWalk helped spark international interest in the plight of these Ugandan children.
Jan Egeland, the UN Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs has called this situation in northern Uganda “the world’s most neglected humanitarian crisis” and “one of the biggest scandals of our generation.” The good news is that each of us now has the power to help. (RK)
You can support the Gulu children by donating money for Mulo Emmanuel’s walk, or by becoming a walker yourself. To sign up for a GuluWalk, go to: wwww.guluwalk.com/doaguluwalk. If you’d like to sponsor Mulo, go to: www.guluwalk.com, and search for ‘Mulo Emmanuel’.
Mulo Emmanuel (Photo: Sam Rentmeester/FMAX)
Comments are closed.