Child Soldier: Inside the world of an NRA Kadogo

Child Soldier by China Keitetsi is an eye witness account of a girl whose childhood was robbed.
As a result, in her quest to recover her childhood Keitetsi lost her adolescence. Rejected by her father at an early age for being a girl and chased from her matrimonial home by her mother, the young Keitetsi was packed off to her grandmother’s place.
To save her from her grandmother’s mistreatment, her father sent her to a cruel stepmother and her extended family.
In the first section of the book the author gives a graphic step by step account of how her childhood was a robbed.
Told in the first person narrative, it’s easy to create mental pictures of this girl in a village in rural western Uganda.
Not knowing what to do, she finds ways of fighting back, for instance when she dried chicken droppings, crushed them and mixed them in her stepmother’s tea.
Confined to running home errands, such as milking the cows, Keitetsi was also sometimes loaned to other families to run their errands.
At the age of eight, Keitetsi had had enough and decided to run away from home; away from her torturous family. Unfortunately, she jumped from the frying pan straight into the fire. She fell in the hands of NRA rebels who she says forcefully conscripted her.
Though she gives no dates when certain events in her life happened, the book comes as a result of therapy she got when she moved to Denmark after the NRA Bush War.
Having been forcefully conscripted into the rebel ranks, Keitetsi talks of sexual abuse her and the likes of her age suffered at the hands of their commanders in the bush.
To differ from the rosy storyline often told by the senior commanders of the rebellion, Keitetsi paints a picture of alcohol, sexual abuse, drugs and cold-blooded execution of some of the captured government soldiers. She also talks of tribalism and nepotism during the Bush War.
At some point she mentions names of officers who made life a living hell for many of the children in the rebel ranks, but were untouchable. She also names those who tried to protect the vulnerable children and ended up in jail.
Keitetsi rose to become an escort of the commander of the 5th Battalion which she belonged to up to the time Kampala fell.
As part of the group that fought at Katonga and Entebbe, among other places, Keitetsi gives the readers an insight into the atrocities committed by some rebels not only on their way to Kampala, but beyond.
Despite the life of abuse in the bush, Keitetsi finally found love in the hands of Moses Nyanzi (Drago) with whom she had a baby boy.
After the fire that gutted Republic House (Bulange) and destroyed records, her boss Kashilingi, then in-charge, was arrested. She says she became a hunted person and sought to run for safety.
The Danish-settled former child soldier started her life into exile from Kenya to South Africa and later settled in Denmark.
Souvenir Press Ltd came about as a form of therapy for the author. The therapist working with her asked her to write down what was hurting her and the troubles she had gone through, thinking it would be a few pages.
The many pages of her experience were turned into a book, telling the other side of the NRA war, very different from what is told by the commanders.
Unfortunately, Child Soldier, originally published in 2002, cannot be found in the local shops. After a search and request to have the book brought in on special order, book importers told me they are not allowed to import it. For now, it can be found online on eBay and Amazon.
Following the publication of the book, Keitetsi went on to meet Nelson Mandela (RIP); addressed the United Nations and became a crusader against the use of children in war.

Book review
Book title: Child Soldier
Author: China Keitetsi
Publisher: Souvenir Press Ltd
Price: Shs100,000
Available at: eBay and Amazon
Reviewed by: Henry Lubega