Posted by Oneka Richard, Gulu Uganda
In times of war, children suffer incredible loss of childhood, treasures as significant attachment, love, trust, hope and moral development! The Ayolli story has all the horrifying hallmarks of a child soldier’s tale, an eight year old boy ripped from home, starved, terrorized and forced to fight.

Twice before, the rebels came; Ayolli (not real name) was too young and small, the rebels came to his village when he was 3 and again when he was 6, but took other children. Then, one morning in 1995, he was weeding his family’s cassava field when he was surrounded by the rebels. At 8 years, he was big enough: they beat him, tied his hands with his T-shirt and marched him into the bush. His attackers were about his own age, dressed in rags and odd pieces of camouflage, their hair in Rasta braids. They carried machetes, food and weapons. Ayolli was held in the jungle for a few days, and then marched into Sudan with a 30 kilograms load balanced on his third-grader’s head.

The commander’s told Ayolli that they were fighting to bring peace to Acholi-land and to stop people from breaking the Ten Commandments. “Initially, I believed in [Mr. Kony], but then I saw his soldiers killing.”  I then became confused, Said Ayolli.

As an initiation into the rebel group, Ayolli was beaten 50 strokes on the buttock and sadly for him, some of the abducted children like him were spunk with a hot “Panga” or knife as initiation in to the rebel group. “What happens is that, you stand and bend down with the head down looking and hands holding your toes. They then spunk your back with the hot knife four times” Said Ayolli.

Ayolli started to forget what home was like – the classes at the primary school, the long games of soccer with other boys. But still remembers that they took/abducted him from his father’s cassava field. “They cost me my education, the care of my parents and above all, the love from my friends.”

Inside Sudan, at 8 years, Ayolli was taken for military training and during the training, you are told all the parts of the gun, as it’s being dismantled and assembled. When they are done with all the illustrations and demonstrations, you are given the gun to dismantle and assemble while naming the parts as you fix back the parts. If you fail to master or recall any parts, your neck is ‘brushed’ with the rough cassava stem until blood comes from neck. If you yell or scream extremely high, you are killed. “When you are trained and have a gun, you are a soldier. The rebels don’t consider anybody as young” Said Ayolli.

If you are given a gun to carry and accidentally it falls down from your hands, you are suppose to stand still and straight and fall backside like the gun that felt from your hands without bending. If you don’t do it well, you are ordered to stretch your legs over the burning fire in between the legs and stand still without moving until you are ordered to get away. Sometimes you are ordered to carry the food direct from the fire in any case there is an attack by Uganda People Defense Forces (UPDF). Hot as it is, you have to carry and run with it. If you pour or drop it, you will be beaten 50 or more strokes.

“There was no sharing of ideas with the others, about coming to Uganda,” he said. “If you raised the idea, you were killed immediately. Everybody behaved as if they were staying there. But each one made their own plan of escape.” For five years, he saw no way out. The Sudanese People Liberation Army stood between him and home. Ayolli wants desperately to go home to be a little boy who plays soccer again, but he walks with military bearing and carries his LRA years in harsh lines of his face. “People may think badly of me when I go back, “he said, his ancient composure cracking. “But I was forced. I didn’t do these things because I wanted to.”But one day, his detachment was raided near Attiak, about 75 kilometers north of Gulu town, and his line of marchers was straggling. “I saw a chance to escape and ran,” he said.

Ayolli hid in the bush for three days, without eating or drinking water before local people tracked his footprints, got him and persuaded him to turn himself for home. He was afraid of the UPDF, who had been his enemy; the troops held him in Gulu barracks for some few days, asking him on LRA tactics and weapons and was finally taken to the Reception Center for rehabilitation; later re-united with his family and started seeing the new world after 5 years in captivity!