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Showing posts from March, 2017

Bidi Bidi refugee settlement, a symbol of Ubuntu in practice

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The last time I visited one was in March 2006 with Rev. Alfred Acur (he is now the Bishop of West Lango Diocese).   We went to Alebtong and Aloi; these were settlement areas for the Internally Displaced Persons in northern Uganda.   The war by the Lord’s Resistance Army was setting, and in a couple of months was a pending (2006) historical election; the first of its kind after the return to multi-party politics.   Back then; I was combing the country, mobilizing people to participate in the 2006 elections. In Alebtong and Aloi, I could read in the faces of many glum but hopeful young and elderly people that all they needed was an immediate assurance that peace would one day come back to their tormented land. Eleven years after my visit, there is a semblance of peace in the northern part of Uganda. Earlier this week, I had a coincidental opportunity to visit Bidi bidi refugee settlement area.   Bidi bidi is in Yumbe district, and boarders South Sudan on the upper side.   It is one