PRETITLE
1.
REFUGEES ON ROAD
GATHERING STORM
INTO NIGHT-TIME REFUGEES
NIGHT VISION SHOTS
Every night, all across north east Uganda, thousands of children flee their villages to sleep on the streets of local towns
THUNDER FX
They are fleeing a terror that grips the countryside by night, a rebel army that has abducted and enslaved thousands of children.
.
2.
MAN REVEALS AMPUTATED LIPS
FADE TO BLACK
Thomas survived kidnap by the rebels.
But at a price. They cut off his lips
.
3.
KID WITH CRUTCHES
But in this war children are not just victims. Its also children like this who’ve also done most of the killing.
4.
TITLE:
THE CHILDREN’S WAR
5.
DRIVING SHOTS
“UGANDA SPECIAL” SIGN.
DRUMS
We were heading into a battle zone - land under threat from the rebel group known as the Lords Resistance Army.
RAIN FX
They’d survived a government offensive.
Now the rebels had advanced further south than ever before.
6.
RAIN DRIVING SHOTS DUSK
The Lord’s Resistance Army preaches that its fighters are invincible, that they’re guided by the Holy Spirit, that every atrocity is endorsed by God.
Our driver warned us we had entered the danger zone.
7.
DRIVER SYNC:
FARAI: So you say we are in danger zone.
SERAMUNGA: Yes we are in a danger zone. Any time we can be shot or killed.
FARAI: So the rebels are as far as here.
SERAMUNGA: Yes. They made a road block, they killed epople and then ran away.
FARAI: They made a roadblock on this very road?
SERAMUNGA: Yeah.
8.
VIEW OF SURROUNDING COUNTRYSIDE
We wanted to reach a government outpost, the beleaguered town of Seroti, before nightfall.
I could see no sign of the Ugandan forces supposed to be defending the area.
9.
PTC DUSK IN CAR
PTC: We’ve been driving to Soroti now for about five hours in this heavy, heavy rain. And I keep wondering who has the most stomach for this fight in this kind of weather and this kind if terrain,. The Lord’s Resistance Army or the Ugandan People’s Defence Force.
10.
RAIN NIGHTIME
NIGHTTIME DRIVING SOROTI
DRUMS AND DRONES:
We arrived in Seroti just after sunset.
Night time is when the rebels make their incursions.
The streets were empty, the buildings locked and shuttered.
11.
MORNING IN THE SCHOOL
But this was no ghost town.
In the daylight the refugees emerged, sheltering in their thousands in the town’s schools and hospitals.
12
PTC IN CAMP
PTC: We’re here at Father Hilde’s Primary School in Soroti. Soroti had a population of about 60,000, before the rebel incursion by the LRA. At the moment the estimates are that anywhere between 150 or 160 thousand have moved into Soroti.
13.
FAMILIES UNDER THE TREE, WASHING ETC
SUSAN
It was easy to understand why.
When the Lords Resistance Army attack a village they take adults and older children to use as porters.
Younger children face a different fate. They’re brutalised and brainwashed and turned into child soldiers who are trained to kill without question.
I’d heard some abducted children had managed to escape to Seroti
A refugee worker said I could meet them
14.
KID WITH BABY THEN SUSAN WITH FARAI
SUSAN: We have abductees…here..
About three hundred
There’s 300 abductees?
Former abductees of the Lords Resistance Army
15
WIDESHOT AND VARIOUS INDIVIDUALS OF THE ABDUCTEES
Every one of these children had escaped, or been rescued, from the hands of the Lords Resistance Army.
Last year alone the rebels abducted eight thousand children.
To survive some children are forced to kill even friends or relatives. It’s how discipline is maintained.
16.
JOHN AND FARAI SYNC
FARAI I mean you are only 18
JOHN 18 yes.
FARAI: And how many people did they make you kill?
JOHN: I killed three people.
FARAI: You’ve killed three people..
One They told us to beat his head with sticks until his head was crushed.
FARAI On the head only
JOHN: Yeah
JOHN: And the other they made us step on him until he died. Just his head.
Did he speak? Did he say please stop?
He was asking forgiveness ….refuse
FARAI: That was the second person you killed.
JOHN: and the third person, they gave us panga’s
FARAI: panga’s.. Big knives..
beating his head with the side of the blade.
17
I asked him how old were the rebels who had ordered the killings.
18.
JOHN: That size… That is the size that gives the orders….. etc etc .
.
They are the ones who say kill
This size here..
FARAI And these killings …in your head..
JOHN: Yes sometimes I dream over them.
FARAI You dream about them..
When you try to escape and they get hold of you, that is the end of your life.
19.
This smuggled photograph shows the man who leads the Lord’s Resistance. Joseph Kony is more cult leader than guerrilla fighter. He believes he is possessed by the Holy Spirit, that he is fighting to bring God’s Kingdom to Uganda. Other than that his objectives are unclear.
20.
ARMY ON ROCK
The Ugandan soldiers guarding the refugees at Seroti are part of an army that for seventeen years has failed to defeat Kony’s army of abducted children.
21.
ARROW PATROL
SOROTI
MUSIC
Now, in the villages around Seroti, the government of Uganda are trying a fresh tactic.
They’re arming local people and organising them into a militia called the Arrow Group
22.
PATROL STOPS
SYNC: What happened? Why have they stopped?
23.
PATROL STOP
MCKULLA C/U
We joined the militia leader – a government minister called Mike McKulla - on a recruitment drive in an areas where the rebels had just been operating
.
24.
PTC
PTC: The Minister for Health is here inspecting his troops. We are going to have a look now,,,
He is, you’ll notice, the only one wearing a bullet-proof vest as we are…..
25.
THE PATROL BEGINS TO LEAVE
The soldiers protecting him were jumpy.
26.
SYNC
They’re going…
We’re going….
Lets get back to the car…..
27.
DRIVING SHOTS
VOLUNTEERS RUNNING
MUSIC – NO COMM - THEN
Driving at high speed because of the danger of ambush, we arrived at a village where 250 men had volunteered to sign up to the Arrow Group.
.
28.
MCKULLA CONDOM SYNC
CHEERS:
He said he has brought them even the condoms, so they can have safe sex. //. We want the boys healthy.
29.
DANCING AK47
START OF CHANTING SEQUENCE (NO COMM) THEN
The villagers are desperate for weapons. They have little faith in the Ugandan army.
But the prospect of more armed men roaming the north east of Uganda seems an unlikely road to peace.
The truth is – the Government is running out of ideas.
We prepared to leave Seroti and head north to Gulu, in the heart of rebel territory.
30.
GET INTO HELICOPTER…
To avoid the risk of ambush, we hitched a lift in an army helicopter.
Shortly after we left Seroti the Lords Resistance Army ambushed a bus on the outskirts of town, massacring 25 people.
31.
SUNSET OVER ACHOLILAND
The town of Gulu lies in the heart of Acholiland in the far north of Uganda
32.
NIGHT COMMUTERS ON THE ROAD TO GULU
As we arrived a remarkable nightly ritual was beginning.
33.
PTC
FARAI: Thousands of people, children, grandparents all moving away from what’s out there. All terrified to sleep out there in their villages.
34.
NIGHT COMMUTERS ON THE ROAD TO GULU
The Lords Resistance Army claims to have its roots in the Acholi people.
But it is the Acholi who are its main victims.
35.
36.
I/V WITH NIGHT SLEEPER
FARAI: Why did you come into town today.
Because of war
War – yes.
Are there rebels in your village?
What do they do to you if you stay there?
They cut us and then they take us into the bush.
They cut you. Yes.
37.
I/V WITH FLORENCE IN THE BUS PARK
FARAI: So how old are you now Florence?
FLORENCE: I am fourteen
FARAI: How long have you been doing this
FLORENCE: Since last year.
FARAI: Every day you do this walk. Why?
FLORENCE: Because I fear that if I stay at home the rebels will come and attack me like they did to my cousin’s sister.
FARAI They took your cousin’s sister?
Yes, they have even killed my father. The same rebels. I asked my mum how did they kill my father, but my mum didn’t want to tell me. She said if she told me I would be crying every time.”
38.
COUGHING
39.
PTC IN STORM
FARAI: Everywhere you walk though this town at night. The most memorable thing you hear is the sound of children coughing…
40.
RAIN EXTS
COUGHIING
RAIN
41.
MUSIC MAN
(MUSICIAN 2 AT 9.48)
In a town bar we met a local musician, Odidia Ngec Tebada
SINGING STARTS
His song says:
War has destroyed our life.
My people these atrocities are being committed by our sons.
Kony you have destroyed our homes
You have destroyed our lives.”
SINGING STARTS
42.
NIGHTVISION MATERIAL
NIGHT SLEEPERS SOUNDS
AND CHILD GETTING FRIGHT
43.
MORNING SHOTS GULU
KIDS WALK BACK HOME
CARLOS RODRIGUEZ
THUNDER
The next morning the kids, cold and tired, began to return to their villages.
[bags over shoulder]
Children who spend their lives in fear.
Local religious leaders – Christian, muslim and traditional - have been risking their lives to mediate.
They argue military action against an army of abducted children can never be justified.
Father Carlos Rodriguez is one of them. He’s lived here for 15 years.
44.
CARLOS SYNC
CARLOS Most of the combatants of the LRA right now are people who were abducted so they are not there out of their choice.
They have been brutalised, brainwashed, also afraid.
45.
CARLOS SYNC
CARLOS It has probably reached the point at which we need some kind of international intervention. For instance. Has never been discussed at the United nations security council, and we think it was high time it was discussed.
46.
CARLOS SYNC
CARLOS “And the way people perceive it is that of course here we don’t have oil, we don’t have mineral resources. This is not a place of strategic importance to anybody. This why the world doesn’t care about us.”
47.
ON THE ROAD TO PABO
SHOT UP TRUCK
ARRIVE PABO
Over one million Acholi people – nearly 80% of the population – now live in displaced people’s camps.
We drove to one, Pabo, thirty miles outside Gulu - along a road threatened daily by rebel attacks and littered with the wreckage of ambushes.
Sixty five thousand people live here, isolated and open to rebel attack.
One of their leaders is John Bosco Okello.
48.
WALKIE TALKIE WITH JOHN BOSCO
JOHN BOSCO OKELLO: In this camp where you are at do you often hear gunfire.
When they enter you do hear gunfire.
It is that you have got used to hearing the sound of gunfire.
Yes that is the case, that is the case.//
Yesterday evening they abducted about 10 people from that road. They come for food. . The transport is we people. We have to carry up to that mountain range there…Its about twenty mile from here...that mountain.
FARAI: That’s where they ask you to take the food to?
BOSCO: Yes.
49.
CAMP GVS
The sixty five thousand residents of this camp live and die in an area less than a mile square
50.
This is a grave … and that is a grave for a child?
51.
TRACKING THROUGH THE HUTS/LATRINE ETC
Despite the presence of a small detachment of Ugandan soldiers, children are sometimes abducted from the camp itself.
Toilets are holes in the ground, there’s no electricity.
Two years ago, the camp was hit by a lethal outbreak of Ebola disease.
52.
JOHN BOSCO WALKIE TALKIE
FARAI: How many people died?
JOHN: About 20 something..
FARAI: 20 people died of ebola
JOHN : Twenty died of ebola…
53.
GVS CAMP
LONG SHOT WOMAN WALKING
GVS LANDSCAPE
The only food comes in heavily armed convoys from the World Food Programme.
They’re never quite sure when the next convoy will arrive.
Children die because of malnutrition here - while surrounded by some of the most fertile farming land in the world.
54.
JOHN BOSCO WALKIE TALKIE
JOHN: In Uganda the most fertile place is here, where you are stood. The land is vacant, rebels are moving there.
FARAI: it is full of rebels.
JOHN: Yeah…
56.
PATROL – RUNNING SHOT
The next morning, on the outskirts of Gulu, we joined the Ugandan Army on a morning patrol.
57.
PTC ON PATROL
FARAI PTC: They are checking that the roads are clear of rebels …so the villagers can return home…
58.
PATROL RUNNING
PAUSE
They told me this stretch of road was particularly dangerous.
59.
PADDY ANAKUNDA ON BIKE
.
PADDY SYNC: Why is this area not so safe?
This area is not so safe because this is normally the enemy’s crossing point.
60.
Then one of them thought he saw something
61.
FARAI VO
FARAI: What are you doing now?… You think the rebels are in the maize?
62.
63.
MUSIC
64.
THROUGH THE BUSHES
INTO THE VILLAGE
They began to search the fields by the road side.
The patrol was heavily armed . The search was thorough.
The rebels in the maize turned out to be local villagers who told us that patrols like this were rare.
The truth is after years of war here and in the Congo, the army’s lower ranks are exhausted, while the higher ranks are riddled with corruption.
The villagers no longer trust the army to protect them.
And there’s another problem. Huge numbers of soldiers – for whom the government pays wages – exist only on paper.
Army officers pocket the cash.
An elected local official, Donas Okello, told me what that meant.
65.
OKELLO SYNC
OKELLO: The government will say we have 6000 soldiers on the ground and you will hardly get 600.// The government does not know what is on the ground.
The problem is that everybody in the army is doing business and an army is not supposed to do business….there is serious corruption in the army …
66.
ARMY TRUCKS SOROTI
SOLDIERS ON PICKUP
C/U ON RIFLE
Later we were taken to see some weapons captured from the Lord’s Resistance Army.
Uganda has given support to anti-government rebels in neighbouring Sudan.
67.
WEAPONS HAUL
And in retaliation Sudan supplied and armed the Lords Resistance Army and to this day, most of their arms, like these Iranian weapons, come via Sudan.
68.
WEAPONS
(script on weapons appears to be Persian)
69.
Uganda pays a high price for supporting the Sudanese rebels
70.
DRIVING SHOTS
.
The following morning we were told there’d been a major development.
71.
PTC IN CAR
PTC: We’re following an army public relations officer who’s taking us to see one of the wives of V O who is a senior LRA commander...
72.
WIVES ARRIVE
In fact not one, but four wives of Vincent Otty, Kony’s second in command, had escaped
They were deeply traumatised
All had been abducted as children
.
73.
WITH THE WIVES
FARAI: You’re fourteen now?
LUCY: Yes
FARAI: And Vincent Otty made you his wife.
LUCY: yes.
FARAI: And how old were you when he did that..
LUCY Thirteen…
74.
MOVE IN ON AGNES
Otty, it seemed, was especially angry about the escape of Agnes, abducted seven years ago when she was just fifteen
CHECK
75.
STILL 1
STILL 2
A smuggled picture showed Agnes with Otty. He’d threatened to wipe out her village unless she was returned to him.
But Agnes insisted her life as a rebel was over,
76.
FLIGHT TO KITGUM
We decided to go to Agnes’s village, near the town of Kitgum, close to the Sudanese border.
Flying was the safest way to get there. The roads are often mined and ambushed by the Lords Resistance Army
77.
PTC IN CAR WITH PAPER
“200 REBELS”
PTC: It looks like //other people are also coming this direction.
78.
BUILDING THE CAMP.
Because of Otty’s threat the villagers had already fled their homes. They were busy building yet another displaced people’s camp.
They were frightened.
79.
MAN IN CAMP
There is an order from the LRA leader that from which he says that he will kill about 5000 people from our area because that girl escaped…
80.
CAMP
In one week thousands had fled to this camp.
They had little food or shelter.
Already children were falling victim to diseases like scabies.
81.
WATERHOLE PTC
PTC: This whole camp which has 10000 people in it is relying on one borehole for their water.
82.
SCRABBLING AT THE BOREHOLE
Even here the rebels were all around us.
83.
GRASSLAND
MAN: Rebels are there
500 metres…..
rebels are there
are you saying that if I was to walk 1000 metres that way I would be in trouble..
1000 metres…
yes….
84.
ATROCITY STILL
We were given this photograph. It shows what happened when the Lords Resistance Army attacked the village of someone else who escaped.
Some limbs and a head were found in the pot.
85.
ARRIVE AT KITGUM HOSPITAL
The area around Kitgum has suffered terribly. One of the doctors showed us round.
86.
DOC: These are the victims….
87.
MULTIPLE AMPUTEE
John Ochola is a living testament to the cruelty of the rebels
88.
DOC: His nose cut off, his lips, both ears and his hands..
89.
DOC Actually they used an axe
90.
SKULL MAN
George Komakech was attacked in his village by child soldiers carrying axes.
91.
SKULL MAN SYNC
DOC: He was hacked and left for dead. But somehow he didn’t die.
FARAI How old were the people who did this too him?
DOC: From ten years old.
FARAI: From ten!
DOC: Oh yes
.
92.
BISHOP ARRIVES ON BIKE
Macleod Ochella recently retired as the local anglican bishop.
His daughter committed suicide after being abducted and raped by rebels.
Eleven years later his wife was killed by a rebel landmine.
93.
BISHOP SYNC
We have been telling the government that over 90% of the LRA rebels are abducted children. The government of Uganda as a nation has no moral obligation to should not wage war against those children. We have been advocating for peaceful, solutions which can actually save lives..
You want to forgive the rebels?
94.
BISHOP SYNC
“I have forgiven whoever killed my wife and my daughter and all the other people who have died in this war. All of them have been forgiven.”
95.
GUSCO
This centre is a sanctuary to some of the children who’ve escaped from the Lords Resistance Army.
Some were held for weeks, some years. Some were born in captivity.
96.
GUSCO MASS
These children have witnessed atrocities which no human should see.
And many of them have taken a bloody part in those atrocities.
Now they face another struggle: to come to terms with what they’ve done, and recover the childhood that was stolen from them.
97.
DANCING
SYNC: There is dancing today in the house of the Lord. Hallelujah.
98.
WIDE SUNSET SHOT
ROLL CREDITS
END
1.
REFUGEES ON ROAD
GATHERING STORM
INTO NIGHT-TIME REFUGEES
NIGHT VISION SHOTS
Every night, all across north east Uganda, thousands of children flee their villages to sleep on the streets of local towns
THUNDER FX
They are fleeing a terror that grips the countryside by night, a rebel army that has abducted and enslaved thousands of children.
.
2.
MAN REVEALS AMPUTATED LIPS
FADE TO BLACK
Thomas survived kidnap by the rebels.
But at a price. They cut off his lips
.
3.
KID WITH CRUTCHES
But in this war children are not just victims. Its also children like this who’ve also done most of the killing.
4.
TITLE:
THE CHILDREN’S WAR
5.
DRIVING SHOTS
“UGANDA SPECIAL” SIGN.
DRUMS
We were heading into a battle zone - land under threat from the rebel group known as the Lords Resistance Army.
RAIN FX
They’d survived a government offensive.
Now the rebels had advanced further south than ever before.
6.
RAIN DRIVING SHOTS DUSK
The Lord’s Resistance Army preaches that its fighters are invincible, that they’re guided by the Holy Spirit, that every atrocity is endorsed by God.
Our driver warned us we had entered the danger zone.
7.
DRIVER SYNC:
FARAI: So you say we are in danger zone.
SERAMUNGA: Yes we are in a danger zone. Any time we can be shot or killed.
FARAI: So the rebels are as far as here.
SERAMUNGA: Yes. They made a road block, they killed epople and then ran away.
FARAI: They made a roadblock on this very road?
SERAMUNGA: Yeah.
8.
VIEW OF SURROUNDING COUNTRYSIDE
We wanted to reach a government outpost, the beleaguered town of Seroti, before nightfall.
I could see no sign of the Ugandan forces supposed to be defending the area.
9.
PTC DUSK IN CAR
PTC: We’ve been driving to Soroti now for about five hours in this heavy, heavy rain. And I keep wondering who has the most stomach for this fight in this kind of weather and this kind if terrain,. The Lord’s Resistance Army or the Ugandan People’s Defence Force.
10.
RAIN NIGHTIME
NIGHTTIME DRIVING SOROTI
DRUMS AND DRONES:
We arrived in Seroti just after sunset.
Night time is when the rebels make their incursions.
The streets were empty, the buildings locked and shuttered.
11.
MORNING IN THE SCHOOL
But this was no ghost town.
In the daylight the refugees emerged, sheltering in their thousands in the town’s schools and hospitals.
12
PTC IN CAMP
PTC: We’re here at Father Hilde’s Primary School in Soroti. Soroti had a population of about 60,000, before the rebel incursion by the LRA. At the moment the estimates are that anywhere between 150 or 160 thousand have moved into Soroti.
13.
FAMILIES UNDER THE TREE, WASHING ETC
SUSAN
It was easy to understand why.
When the Lords Resistance Army attack a village they take adults and older children to use as porters.
Younger children face a different fate. They’re brutalised and brainwashed and turned into child soldiers who are trained to kill without question.
I’d heard some abducted children had managed to escape to Seroti
A refugee worker said I could meet them
14.
KID WITH BABY THEN SUSAN WITH FARAI
SUSAN: We have abductees…here..
About three hundred
There’s 300 abductees?
Former abductees of the Lords Resistance Army
15
WIDESHOT AND VARIOUS INDIVIDUALS OF THE ABDUCTEES
Every one of these children had escaped, or been rescued, from the hands of the Lords Resistance Army.
Last year alone the rebels abducted eight thousand children.
To survive some children are forced to kill even friends or relatives. It’s how discipline is maintained.
16.
JOHN AND FARAI SYNC
FARAI I mean you are only 18
JOHN 18 yes.
FARAI: And how many people did they make you kill?
JOHN: I killed three people.
FARAI: You’ve killed three people..
One They told us to beat his head with sticks until his head was crushed.
FARAI On the head only
JOHN: Yeah
JOHN: And the other they made us step on him until he died. Just his head.
Did he speak? Did he say please stop?
He was asking forgiveness ….refuse
FARAI: That was the second person you killed.
JOHN: and the third person, they gave us panga’s
FARAI: panga’s.. Big knives..
beating his head with the side of the blade.
17
I asked him how old were the rebels who had ordered the killings.
18.
JOHN: That size… That is the size that gives the orders….. etc etc .
.
They are the ones who say kill
This size here..
FARAI And these killings …in your head..
JOHN: Yes sometimes I dream over them.
FARAI You dream about them..
When you try to escape and they get hold of you, that is the end of your life.
19.
This smuggled photograph shows the man who leads the Lord’s Resistance. Joseph Kony is more cult leader than guerrilla fighter. He believes he is possessed by the Holy Spirit, that he is fighting to bring God’s Kingdom to Uganda. Other than that his objectives are unclear.
20.
ARMY ON ROCK
The Ugandan soldiers guarding the refugees at Seroti are part of an army that for seventeen years has failed to defeat Kony’s army of abducted children.
21.
ARROW PATROL
SOROTI
MUSIC
Now, in the villages around Seroti, the government of Uganda are trying a fresh tactic.
They’re arming local people and organising them into a militia called the Arrow Group
22.
PATROL STOPS
SYNC: What happened? Why have they stopped?
23.
PATROL STOP
MCKULLA C/U
We joined the militia leader – a government minister called Mike McKulla - on a recruitment drive in an areas where the rebels had just been operating
.
24.
PTC
PTC: The Minister for Health is here inspecting his troops. We are going to have a look now,,,
He is, you’ll notice, the only one wearing a bullet-proof vest as we are…..
25.
THE PATROL BEGINS TO LEAVE
The soldiers protecting him were jumpy.
26.
SYNC
They’re going…
We’re going….
Lets get back to the car…..
27.
DRIVING SHOTS
VOLUNTEERS RUNNING
MUSIC – NO COMM - THEN
Driving at high speed because of the danger of ambush, we arrived at a village where 250 men had volunteered to sign up to the Arrow Group.
.
28.
MCKULLA CONDOM SYNC
CHEERS:
He said he has brought them even the condoms, so they can have safe sex. //. We want the boys healthy.
29.
DANCING AK47
START OF CHANTING SEQUENCE (NO COMM) THEN
The villagers are desperate for weapons. They have little faith in the Ugandan army.
But the prospect of more armed men roaming the north east of Uganda seems an unlikely road to peace.
The truth is – the Government is running out of ideas.
We prepared to leave Seroti and head north to Gulu, in the heart of rebel territory.
30.
GET INTO HELICOPTER…
To avoid the risk of ambush, we hitched a lift in an army helicopter.
Shortly after we left Seroti the Lords Resistance Army ambushed a bus on the outskirts of town, massacring 25 people.
31.
SUNSET OVER ACHOLILAND
The town of Gulu lies in the heart of Acholiland in the far north of Uganda
32.
NIGHT COMMUTERS ON THE ROAD TO GULU
As we arrived a remarkable nightly ritual was beginning.
33.
PTC
FARAI: Thousands of people, children, grandparents all moving away from what’s out there. All terrified to sleep out there in their villages.
34.
NIGHT COMMUTERS ON THE ROAD TO GULU
The Lords Resistance Army claims to have its roots in the Acholi people.
But it is the Acholi who are its main victims.
35.
36.
I/V WITH NIGHT SLEEPER
FARAI: Why did you come into town today.
Because of war
War – yes.
Are there rebels in your village?
What do they do to you if you stay there?
They cut us and then they take us into the bush.
They cut you. Yes.
37.
I/V WITH FLORENCE IN THE BUS PARK
FARAI: So how old are you now Florence?
FLORENCE: I am fourteen
FARAI: How long have you been doing this
FLORENCE: Since last year.
FARAI: Every day you do this walk. Why?
FLORENCE: Because I fear that if I stay at home the rebels will come and attack me like they did to my cousin’s sister.
FARAI They took your cousin’s sister?
Yes, they have even killed my father. The same rebels. I asked my mum how did they kill my father, but my mum didn’t want to tell me. She said if she told me I would be crying every time.”
38.
COUGHING
39.
PTC IN STORM
FARAI: Everywhere you walk though this town at night. The most memorable thing you hear is the sound of children coughing…
40.
RAIN EXTS
COUGHIING
RAIN
41.
MUSIC MAN
(MUSICIAN 2 AT 9.48)
In a town bar we met a local musician, Odidia Ngec Tebada
SINGING STARTS
His song says:
War has destroyed our life.
My people these atrocities are being committed by our sons.
Kony you have destroyed our homes
You have destroyed our lives.”
SINGING STARTS
42.
NIGHTVISION MATERIAL
NIGHT SLEEPERS SOUNDS
AND CHILD GETTING FRIGHT
43.
MORNING SHOTS GULU
KIDS WALK BACK HOME
CARLOS RODRIGUEZ
THUNDER
The next morning the kids, cold and tired, began to return to their villages.
[bags over shoulder]
Children who spend their lives in fear.
Local religious leaders – Christian, muslim and traditional - have been risking their lives to mediate.
They argue military action against an army of abducted children can never be justified.
Father Carlos Rodriguez is one of them. He’s lived here for 15 years.
44.
CARLOS SYNC
CARLOS Most of the combatants of the LRA right now are people who were abducted so they are not there out of their choice.
They have been brutalised, brainwashed, also afraid.
45.
CARLOS SYNC
CARLOS It has probably reached the point at which we need some kind of international intervention. For instance. Has never been discussed at the United nations security council, and we think it was high time it was discussed.
46.
CARLOS SYNC
CARLOS “And the way people perceive it is that of course here we don’t have oil, we don’t have mineral resources. This is not a place of strategic importance to anybody. This why the world doesn’t care about us.”
47.
ON THE ROAD TO PABO
SHOT UP TRUCK
ARRIVE PABO
Over one million Acholi people – nearly 80% of the population – now live in displaced people’s camps.
We drove to one, Pabo, thirty miles outside Gulu - along a road threatened daily by rebel attacks and littered with the wreckage of ambushes.
Sixty five thousand people live here, isolated and open to rebel attack.
One of their leaders is John Bosco Okello.
48.
WALKIE TALKIE WITH JOHN BOSCO
JOHN BOSCO OKELLO: In this camp where you are at do you often hear gunfire.
When they enter you do hear gunfire.
It is that you have got used to hearing the sound of gunfire.
Yes that is the case, that is the case.//
Yesterday evening they abducted about 10 people from that road. They come for food. . The transport is we people. We have to carry up to that mountain range there…Its about twenty mile from here...that mountain.
FARAI: That’s where they ask you to take the food to?
BOSCO: Yes.
49.
CAMP GVS
The sixty five thousand residents of this camp live and die in an area less than a mile square
50.
This is a grave … and that is a grave for a child?
51.
TRACKING THROUGH THE HUTS/LATRINE ETC
Despite the presence of a small detachment of Ugandan soldiers, children are sometimes abducted from the camp itself.
Toilets are holes in the ground, there’s no electricity.
Two years ago, the camp was hit by a lethal outbreak of Ebola disease.
52.
JOHN BOSCO WALKIE TALKIE
FARAI: How many people died?
JOHN: About 20 something..
FARAI: 20 people died of ebola
JOHN : Twenty died of ebola…
53.
GVS CAMP
LONG SHOT WOMAN WALKING
GVS LANDSCAPE
The only food comes in heavily armed convoys from the World Food Programme.
They’re never quite sure when the next convoy will arrive.
Children die because of malnutrition here - while surrounded by some of the most fertile farming land in the world.
54.
JOHN BOSCO WALKIE TALKIE
JOHN: In Uganda the most fertile place is here, where you are stood. The land is vacant, rebels are moving there.
FARAI: it is full of rebels.
JOHN: Yeah…
56.
PATROL – RUNNING SHOT
The next morning, on the outskirts of Gulu, we joined the Ugandan Army on a morning patrol.
57.
PTC ON PATROL
FARAI PTC: They are checking that the roads are clear of rebels …so the villagers can return home…
58.
PATROL RUNNING
PAUSE
They told me this stretch of road was particularly dangerous.
59.
PADDY ANAKUNDA ON BIKE
.
PADDY SYNC: Why is this area not so safe?
This area is not so safe because this is normally the enemy’s crossing point.
60.
Then one of them thought he saw something
61.
FARAI VO
FARAI: What are you doing now?… You think the rebels are in the maize?
62.
63.
MUSIC
64.
THROUGH THE BUSHES
INTO THE VILLAGE
They began to search the fields by the road side.
The patrol was heavily armed . The search was thorough.
The rebels in the maize turned out to be local villagers who told us that patrols like this were rare.
The truth is after years of war here and in the Congo, the army’s lower ranks are exhausted, while the higher ranks are riddled with corruption.
The villagers no longer trust the army to protect them.
And there’s another problem. Huge numbers of soldiers – for whom the government pays wages – exist only on paper.
Army officers pocket the cash.
An elected local official, Donas Okello, told me what that meant.
65.
OKELLO SYNC
OKELLO: The government will say we have 6000 soldiers on the ground and you will hardly get 600.// The government does not know what is on the ground.
The problem is that everybody in the army is doing business and an army is not supposed to do business….there is serious corruption in the army …
66.
ARMY TRUCKS SOROTI
SOLDIERS ON PICKUP
C/U ON RIFLE
Later we were taken to see some weapons captured from the Lord’s Resistance Army.
Uganda has given support to anti-government rebels in neighbouring Sudan.
67.
WEAPONS HAUL
And in retaliation Sudan supplied and armed the Lords Resistance Army and to this day, most of their arms, like these Iranian weapons, come via Sudan.
68.
WEAPONS
(script on weapons appears to be Persian)
69.
Uganda pays a high price for supporting the Sudanese rebels
70.
DRIVING SHOTS
.
The following morning we were told there’d been a major development.
71.
PTC IN CAR
PTC: We’re following an army public relations officer who’s taking us to see one of the wives of V O who is a senior LRA commander...
72.
WIVES ARRIVE
In fact not one, but four wives of Vincent Otty, Kony’s second in command, had escaped
They were deeply traumatised
All had been abducted as children
.
73.
WITH THE WIVES
FARAI: You’re fourteen now?
LUCY: Yes
FARAI: And Vincent Otty made you his wife.
LUCY: yes.
FARAI: And how old were you when he did that..
LUCY Thirteen…
74.
MOVE IN ON AGNES
Otty, it seemed, was especially angry about the escape of Agnes, abducted seven years ago when she was just fifteen
CHECK
75.
STILL 1
STILL 2
A smuggled picture showed Agnes with Otty. He’d threatened to wipe out her village unless she was returned to him.
But Agnes insisted her life as a rebel was over,
76.
FLIGHT TO KITGUM
We decided to go to Agnes’s village, near the town of Kitgum, close to the Sudanese border.
Flying was the safest way to get there. The roads are often mined and ambushed by the Lords Resistance Army
77.
PTC IN CAR WITH PAPER
“200 REBELS”
PTC: It looks like //other people are also coming this direction.
78.
BUILDING THE CAMP.
Because of Otty’s threat the villagers had already fled their homes. They were busy building yet another displaced people’s camp.
They were frightened.
79.
MAN IN CAMP
There is an order from the LRA leader that from which he says that he will kill about 5000 people from our area because that girl escaped…
80.
CAMP
In one week thousands had fled to this camp.
They had little food or shelter.
Already children were falling victim to diseases like scabies.
81.
WATERHOLE PTC
PTC: This whole camp which has 10000 people in it is relying on one borehole for their water.
82.
SCRABBLING AT THE BOREHOLE
Even here the rebels were all around us.
83.
GRASSLAND
MAN: Rebels are there
500 metres…..
rebels are there
are you saying that if I was to walk 1000 metres that way I would be in trouble..
1000 metres…
yes….
84.
ATROCITY STILL
We were given this photograph. It shows what happened when the Lords Resistance Army attacked the village of someone else who escaped.
Some limbs and a head were found in the pot.
85.
ARRIVE AT KITGUM HOSPITAL
The area around Kitgum has suffered terribly. One of the doctors showed us round.
86.
DOC: These are the victims….
87.
MULTIPLE AMPUTEE
John Ochola is a living testament to the cruelty of the rebels
88.
DOC: His nose cut off, his lips, both ears and his hands..
89.
DOC Actually they used an axe
90.
SKULL MAN
George Komakech was attacked in his village by child soldiers carrying axes.
91.
SKULL MAN SYNC
DOC: He was hacked and left for dead. But somehow he didn’t die.
FARAI How old were the people who did this too him?
DOC: From ten years old.
FARAI: From ten!
DOC: Oh yes
.
92.
BISHOP ARRIVES ON BIKE
Macleod Ochella recently retired as the local anglican bishop.
His daughter committed suicide after being abducted and raped by rebels.
Eleven years later his wife was killed by a rebel landmine.
93.
BISHOP SYNC
We have been telling the government that over 90% of the LRA rebels are abducted children. The government of Uganda as a nation has no moral obligation to should not wage war against those children. We have been advocating for peaceful, solutions which can actually save lives..
You want to forgive the rebels?
94.
BISHOP SYNC
“I have forgiven whoever killed my wife and my daughter and all the other people who have died in this war. All of them have been forgiven.”
95.
GUSCO
This centre is a sanctuary to some of the children who’ve escaped from the Lords Resistance Army.
Some were held for weeks, some years. Some were born in captivity.
96.
GUSCO MASS
These children have witnessed atrocities which no human should see.
And many of them have taken a bloody part in those atrocities.
Now they face another struggle: to come to terms with what they’ve done, and recover the childhood that was stolen from them.
97.
DANCING
SYNC: There is dancing today in the house of the Lord. Hallelujah.
98.
WIDE SUNSET SHOT
ROLL CREDITS
END