Lost Boys and Girls of Sudan to hold USA conference
May 23, 2009 (WASHINGTON) — Members of the Sudanese refugee community in the United States of America plan to gather next month in San Diego at an event hosted by an organization called The Lost Boys and Girls of Sudan: The National Network.
The conference and reunion will be held June 19-21, 2009 at Point Loma Nazarene University in San Diego, California.
Between the years 2000 and 2005, approximately 5,000 Sudanese child refugees were granted asylum in the United States after fleeing their homes during Sudan’s civil war. They were resettled in cities across the country.
The community overwhelmingly consists of boys; girls were more likely to have been captured, killed or not chosen for relocation from refugee camps in Kenya. So the children came to be known as the “Lost Boys.” The resettlement program to the United States closed as the civil war subsided, but the resettled children continued to work or study in their new land, usually under the supervision of American mentors.
Some of the foreign-educated refugees have already returned to the Sudan and are working in the oil industry, business, medicine or education. Others are working in the USA to pay for education of siblings in Kenya, Uganda and other parts of Africa.
The National Network was devised in 2007 and officially formed in 2008 as a way to formalize activities of the widely scattered refugee population, as well as offer services particular to the needs of this community. The network hopes to build unity for advocacy efforts and build a bridge between Sudanese in the United States and Sudan.
A delegation from the US-based refugee network – seven Sudanese and six Americans – conducted an assessment in Southern Sudan in March 2009. The group was in Sudan for a little more than two weeks.
“During our assessment trip, three main issues surfaced in nearly every discussion and meeting we had in Southern Sudan,” said Randee Brady, board member of The National Network, highlighting issues of peace, elections, and development.
Planners say the upcoming conference in California aims to educate Sudanese about the 2010 elections, provide training on advocacy and leadership, and recount the findings of the assessment mission.
“This is happening at a critical time,” said Deng Chol, the founding director of The National Network.
He referenced upcoming elections and stressed the contributions that Lost Boys and Girls might make in civic education and the electoral process. “We have learned in classes and also very much within the American system, democracy and values of democracy, the importance of participation in democracy as well as civil engagement. So we are hoping that these individuals – the Lost Boys – are becoming, over time, democratic-minded individuals,” he said.
“And when they come back to Sudan they would share this knowledge and these values, especially from a reconciliatory aspect. So this is something we are hoping to do with our education while we are in the United States.”
Chol, who had helped organize a 2004 reunion in Phoenix, Arizona, said that the network has three primary areas of focus. One is to educate Americans about the Sudan and advocate for peace and reconciliation there, including advocacy on Darfur, where civil war is still ongoing. This effort includes engagement with members of the Sudan Caucus in the US Congress, other advocacy organizations, and the US Agency for International Development.
The second area of focus is education. “We hope that in the future one of our projects – tied in with advocacy – will be education of the Lost Boys at colleges,” said Chol.
At the upcoming conference, at least one expert in the field of post-traumatic stress disorder will be on hand as part of the National Network’s efforts in its third area of focus: health care and health education. The attendees will be briefed about post-traumatic stress disorder and follow up with a break-out session.
Chol envisions raising funds to hire counselors to tour the United States providing workshops and working with Sudanese on a one-to-one basis. A similar project is being initiated by the Arizona Lost Boys Centre.
Confirmed speakers for the event in San Diego are David Bowman, Founder of Partners in Compassionate Care; Randy Butler, Founder of the Institute for Sustainable Peace; Ezekiel Gatkuoth, Head of GOSS Mission to the US; Janessa Goldbeck, Director of Membership at Genocide Intervention Network; Dr. Cesar Guvele, Adjunct Assistant Professor of Agricultural Economics at Kansas State University; and Roger Winter, former Deputy Secretary of State’s Special Representative to Sudan.
(ST)