LRA victim picking up the pieces

Harriet Agenorwot plaiting one of her clients in her compound in Kasubi Central, Gulu municipality. She has managed to nurse her wounds, go to school and set up her own salon. PHOTO by Alice Adikin.

GULU.

By the time Harriet Agenorwot was rescued, she had suffered severe injuries that left her with one kidney and in a wheel chair. She also eventually suffered rejection by her own mother . None of these ordeals have phased her.

Even when she was rejected by her mown mother, Harriet Agenorwot continued to believe in herself and refused to be a failure. Alot of other misfortunes have befallen this 24-year-old. At 11, she was abducted by LRA rebels in September 2002. Agenorwot, who today resides at Kasubi central, Gulu municipality, had fled with other people in Gulu to the urban areas places for security reasons, but their parents kept on sending them to collect foods from the village. The day she was abducted, they were on their way from the village to collect food.
Although she was eventually rescued, she escaped with injuries to her spine sustained during a fire exchange between UPDF and LRA rebels. She was left with one kidney, in a wheel chair and worst of all, facing rejection from her own mother.

The abduction and rescue
Agenorwot was abducted with other children who she was moving with and she remained in captivity for one month.
In the bush, they moved around from different places carrying heavy luggage including looted food stuffs from people’s gardens and meat. When the rebels came across any cows or goats, they slaughtered and took their meat, leaving behind only heads and hooves for the owners.
“We had no time to sleep. We only rested for a few minutes and moved on to other places, surviving on raw foods or roasted meat because there was no time to cook. Also, the rebels feared smoke would give their position away to the UPDF. “Even when they invaded an area and found cooked food left behind by those fleeing from them, they did not eat it in fear of being poisoned,” Agenorwot explains. “We were not allowed to talk amongst ourselves; it got us wipped.”
In the bush, girls in her age group were charged with collecting firewood, fetching water and doing other small work.

UPDF to the rescue
Agenorwot narrates that one afternoon in October of 2002, there was gun fire between UPDF and rebels in Laliya village in Gulu municipality. She took advantage of the chaos to run but she ended up running the wrong direction and ended up getting shot in the spinal cord. “The bullets entered through my right sideexiting through the left and affecting my kidney,” she says.
She was later picked up by a Good Samaritan who put her on his bicycle and rushed her to Gulu Independent Hospital. Her parents were later informed and they came to take care of her.
In the hospital, Agenorwot stayed unconscious for four months under oxygen but her mother’s wish to her was death because she thought nothing good would come out of her again.
“My mother continously said she wished I had died instead of bothering them with carrying me around like a baby but my father remained loving towards me. My mother neglected me and I developed bed sores,” she narrates.
Luckily, an Italian priest came to her aid, took up her treatment and provided what she needed including a wheelchair. After her treatment in 2004, the Italian priest bought land and built her the house in which she still lives with her family.

Back to school
When she was not well enough, the Priest hired teachers to coach her to speak and write English until she could join school.
In 2008, she completed Primary Seven and Senior Four in 2012.
Even though she was the only school-going child at home, her mother couldn’t visit her at school. When she came back home for holidays, she was treated differently by her mother compared to her other siblings.
“My mother on many occasions threw me out of my own house that the priest built for me because the bed sores took long to heal and whenever I would sit for long, ‘water’ would flow from the soars and wet the house. She could not sympathise with me because I wasn’t able to clean the house and I became a burden for the rest of the family,” she says. She instead preferred to stay at school even during holidays because at least there, she was getting fair treatment at school compared to home.
She said after finishing Senior Four her sponsor suggested she enroll for a course in art and design but she preferred hair dressing. This brought conflict between her and her sponsor who later withdrew his sponsorship.

Turning point
After a year at home, she started moving around looking for schools and people who could offer her contracts for knitting and baking. She landed a job knitting at one of her former schools, earning Shs3,000 for each sweater she made.
“I worked hard to support myself so that I wouldn’t be a burden to anyone. At vocational schools, I was attentive. I even learnt to repair the sweater knitting machines,” she says.
After working for one year, she decided to pursue her dream of becoming hair dresser. In 20014 she enrolled for six months training in some one’s saloon while paying her own fees from the savings she got from knitting.
Upon completion of her course, she was offered a job at the same salon that she worked at for some time with the hope of setting up her own since she already had land in her compound where she could construct her salon.
The clients who would come to her work place appreciated her work and started offering her transport to go and work on their hair from different places and they would refer her to other clients. She was even asked by certain training institutes to train their students in hair dressing.
“I got also got saved and was able to forgive my mother and my siblings,” she says. Eventually, Agenorwot became the only child who supports the entire family and her mother is proud of her.

Making up with mom

Harriet Agenorwot’s mother has since made a turn around, probably after realising that her daughter, event hough with disabilities, is not useless. “No one would speak evil of me to my mother and expect to escape without a verbal assault from her,” Agenorwot says. With savings from the training institute, she has managed to build her own salon in her compound where she can attend to clients.

Future plans
Agenorwot plans to set up a bridal shop in her place with all the facilities and employ other people to work with her. She also wishes to turn her salon into a training centre where other people can acquire skills.