Former refugee speaks

Some people need someone to speak for them.

Simon Deng, a human rights activist and… Some people need someone to speak for them.

Simon Deng, a human rights activist and refugee from southern Sudan, delivered a speech on Sunday evening at the William Pitt Union Ballroom. The event, which was free and open to the public, was part of Pitt’s Black History Month Celebration. It was sponsored by the University’s Black Action Society, the African Students Organization, Hillel and STAND.

Addressing an audience of more than 100, Deng opened his speech saying, “You have given me a chance to be a voice for those who have no voice.”

Deng was referring to the African tribes of southern Sudan, who suffered greatly throughout two recent civil wars. Deng himself is a member of southern Sudan’s Shiluk tribe and bears the marks of that tribe across his forehead.

The first part of Deng’s speech focused on his childhood memories when he was witness to the destruction of his homeland by northern Sudanese militias.

“I will never forget that day when the soldiers came to my village,” Deng recalled. “I didn’t know what was going on. Everyone had to run to the bush – everyone had to run for his own life.”

At the age of nine, Deng was kidnapped and given to an Arab family in northern Sudan. He was kept there as a slave for three years until he was discovered and taken home by members of his tribe.

Deng emphasized that slavery continues to exist in Sudan today.

“You can buy a human being in Sudan for $15,” Deng, referencing a U.N. report, said.

After relating his personal story, Deng broadened the picture by explaining modern Sudan’s long, war-torn history.

“To most of you who hear about Darfur, you think the atrocities only began in 2003,” Deng said. “But the atrocities started in 1955 when the war began. The Sudanese government slaughtered one million Christian Sudanese.”

An uneasy peace was established in Sudan in 1972, but war broke out again in 1983, (ending in 2003) when the Sudanese government declared a new set of Islamic laws and waged a jihad on the Christian South. The combined losses suffered from both wars by southern Sudan totaled 3 million dead and 7 million people displaced.

With regards to Darfur, Deng spoke not only of a religious jihad in Sudan, but a cultural one as well. According to Deng, the people of Darfur are being killed for resisting “Arabization” – a Sudanese government policy designed to press Arab culture on Sudan’s African population.

“In the south, the war was waged for Islam. In Darfur, the people are already Muslim,” Deng explained. “They are African Muslims. They accepted Islamization, but not Arabization. They are being killed because they didn’t take the whole package.”

For Ernest Miller, a teacher from Central Catholic High School who attended the event, this detail brought a new light to the Darfur crisis. Specifically, it helps explain why many Sudanese government militias are ostensibly of African blood but are still classified as Arabs.

“[Darfur] is a complex issue that can’t really be discussed in a forum like this one,” Miller said, “but he is the first I’ve heard that puts the emphasis on Arabization. In the common press, we see it simply portrayed as lighter-skinned people against darker-skinned people.”

Deng also had many harsh words for the United Nations on its inaction during African crises.

“The U.N. failed miserably in the continent of Africa,” Deng said. “To anyone who trusts the U.N., who thinks the U.N. will do anything now, let’s go back to Rwanda and ask the skulls and bones there if they trust the U.N.”

Deng criticized the Chinese government for its role in blocking U.N. initiatives to send peacekeepers to Sudan, allegedly because of its oil interests in Sudan.

“The Chinese are the obstacle in the U.N. against action in Sudan,” Deng said. “They do not care.”

Having dismissed the United Nations as impotent, Deng instead looks to the United States as the best possible hope for the salvation of southern Sudan.

“Today, no one is in a better position to [help southern Sudan] than the citizens of this lovely nation. We have a moral obligation to get our government involved. It is we who elected these officials.”

Responding to an audience question regarding what exactly the United States should do in Sudan, Deng said, “I’m not asking the U.S. to send soldiers to that country. We just need to help African troops – African troops need logistics, tools to fight.”

Deng has been living in the United States for 17 years and has been an activist since he arrived. His central message has always been that the United States should take up the mission in Africa that the United Nations never fulfilled.

“My fellow Americans, as a citizen of my adopted nation, I am begging for your help for those I left in the refugee camps in Sudan,” Deng implored towards the end of his speech. “We have the power to stop this madness today. If we don’t, our conscience will not forgive us.”