06207
April 11, 2006

Young Liberians traumatized by war
find hope, and purpose, at the YMCA

Presbyterian disaster aid helps heal wounds —
mental and emotional — of former child soldiers

by Toya Richards Hill

        From the 10th grade on, Kadafi’s reality was rocket-propelled grenades, AK-47s, brutality and death. His life was war.

        He took to the “battlefield” as a teenage soldier after his brother was murdered.

        “I fought in the war for eight years,” says Kadafi, now in his early 20s. “We all fought the Ganta war brutally."

        Ganta, a town on Liberia’s northern border with Guinea, was a stronghold of the forces of former President Charles Taylor during Liberia’s 14-year-long civil war.

        Taylor, who has pleaded not guilty to 11 war-crime charges before a special tribunal in Sierra Leone, was a widely feared warlord in the civil fighting that left thousands dead and hundreds of thousands without homes.

         Taylor’s guerrilla army, which called itself the National Patriotic Front of Liberia, pillaged countless Liberian villages, killed thousands of combatants and civilians, raped scores of women and forced thousands of families to flee the violence, becoming refugees.

        Today, nearly three years after United Nations forces took control of the country, Liberia is rebuilding. Many of its citizens say the January election of President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf has restored their hope.

        Kadafi — who was given his name on the battlefield, in honor of Libyan dictator Moammar Kadafi — is hopeful, too, despite his physical and emotional wounds.

        The Liberian Kadafi, dressed neatly in khaki pants, a short-sleeve blue shirt and a black tie, also carries a smile, and a can-do spirit.

        The hope, the smile, the spirit — all are largely owed to his involvement with the YMCA of Liberia, and its branch in Ganta. That’s where Kadafi and other war-damaged youth are trying to reestablish their lives and move on.

        Kadafi, conceding that it hasn’t been easy, says confidently: “I’m a changed man.”

Reclaiming lost lives

        The vast majority of Liberians will say it was the country’s youth that suffered most in the civil war that raged from 1989 to 2003.

        Education was a sporadic luxury scheduled around the fighting. Or simply didn’t exist.

        Positive social development was rare. Young people got no leadership training — except in bush warfare.

        “Some of them were not even 12 years old, and they were living like men,” said Francis Kempeh, executive director of the Gbarnga YMCA.

        In the post-war period, one of the country’s biggest challenges is reclaiming these lost lives.

        “A lot of the young people are taking drugs,” especially marijuana, Kempeh said, and there’s a lot of sexual and gender-based violence.

        “We have young people still traumatized,” he explained.

        Kempeh’s mission, which he shares with YMCA leaders throughout Liberia, is to turn the tide for the country’s wounded youth. The Y never stopped its work with young people during the war, but officials say its mission is more critical now than ever.

        Presbyterian Disaster Assistance has long been a major supporter of the YMCA of Liberia, contributing money and manpower. Among other things, PDA has trained YMCA staff in psycho-social counseling, provided finance training, and helped the organization obtain grants from other sources.

        In the Y’s main

Monrovia, a steady stream of youth and young adults attend classes, use the gym or drop into an Internet café.

        The same is true in YMCA branches in more remote areas, including Ganta, Gbarnga and Kakata. Programs in adolescent reproductive health and malaria control are juxtaposed with traditional Y sports and recreation programs — everything from board games to table tennis.

        Some branches have amateur radio stations operated by youth, who also take the lead in other ways — including counseling sessions based on a peer-to-peer approach that is a traditional hallmark of the YMCA.

        The organization has also spearheaded apprenticeship training for ex-combatants. In a program also sponsored by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the National Commission for Disarmament, Demobilization, Rehabilitation and Reintegration (NCDDRR), former soldiers have been trained in fields ranging from tailoring to plumbing to auto mechanics.

        “It’s a gradual process,” said Kempeh, whose building was taken over by rebel forces during the war. “It’s matter of time.”

        “Some of them are getting back to their normal selves,” he said. “There is a change now taking place.”

Progress despite challenges

        Saba Cooper, 23, is one of the young people reclaiming their lives.

        Girls weren’t excused from the war. Cooper represents the hundreds of girls who were forced into service.

        It was “do or die,” she said, sitting among friends in the Ganta Y.

        She and her brother went to war after their grandfather and a sister were killed.

        After the peace, Cooper said, she decided to try to “forget everything.” Now she has found a comfort zone at the YMCA, which has welcomed her despite her past.

        “They even made me the chaplain,” she said. “I can pray now.”

        Robert Kamei, head of the psycho-social program at the Ganta Y, said reintegration has been a priority, and has meant reaching out to kids who are often “very hostile” at first.

        “Counseling has to be a continuing effort,” he said.

        Another challenge is division between war-affected youth who did not fight and those who did.

        The United Nations and government-led disarmament and reintegration process has included giving ex-combatants apprenticeship training, medical screening and treatment, food and cash — up to $300.

        But the Y’s goal — to help those who fought and those who didn’t — hasn’t changed.

        “Statistically they (the war-affected youth) form a vast majority of the population,” said Peter Kamei, general secretary of the YMCA of Liberia. That’s why “it is very important that they be included.”

        “Training is very necessary, but it also has to be linked up to some productive activity that generates income for them,” he added. Young people need to be involved in activities that “let them find meaning to life.”

        "They are still going to be a burden if they are not transformed,” Kamei said.  “This is the biggest threat to (Liberia’s) stability.”