Last week one of the founder’s of CIYOTA, and my future boss, was able to come to america as a finalist for the Echoing Green Social Enterprise Fellowship. You can imagine how hard it is for a Congolese Citizen, living in Refuge in Uganda, to acquire a US Visa. His came through less than 24 hours before his flight was set to take off from Entebbe, Uganda. After interviews in New York for Echoing Green, Benson Wereje came to Boulder to meet many many people who have been enthralled with the work he and CIYOTA have done in the region. While Benson was in Boulder, Echoing Green selected him and CIYOTA as fellows for this next year! This will open many doors for organizational and financial partnerships that we could not be more excited for.
While Benson was in Boulder I had the privilege of accompanying him and Eric Glustrom (chairman of the CIYOTA board, founder of Educate! and Watson University, and my initial connection to CIYOTA) to many meetings and heard Benson’s and CIYOTA’s founding story about a dozen times, first hand. Here it is:
In 1998, as violence was escalating in Eastern DRC, Benson’s village was attacked. Rebels massacred everyone they could find and teenage Benson survived the raid, only to help bury the 100’s of members of his family and community, lost. He spent a two years surviving in the bush of eastern DRC, lost. He eventually made his way across the border into Uganda and the Kyangwali Refugee Settlement (my new home for the next year). This was a refugee camp set up and operated poorly by the UN in the middle of a dense forest. Orphaned, he was greeted with a machete, the same instrument used to slaughter everyone he knew, and told to go clear a patch of land and build a shelter for himself…and find food. Kyangwali was not a pleasant place back then; corruption and violence was rampant and the entire group fighting over what limited food they could find. Benson was telling us how he would see grass start to grow on the path to the front door of a shelter since no one had been entering or exiting. Sure enough, he’d open the door to find a famished corpse of a stranger, a friend, an orphan, having lost their homes, their families, and unable to survive in the only place that would accept their existence. Starved.
If there was one thing to look forward to, it was soccer. Benson and his friend’s would play every evening, and afterwards sit down and try to figure out what they could do. Sitting by and rotting away in Kyangwali was not an option for them, and the UN was providing a place to live but not much else. School? Jobs? Did they have a future? They had to figure something out.
They started farming the land of nearby land owners, and they farmed like their lives depended on it. 500 shillings (~33 cents at the time) a day was their wage, and nearby land owners started asking for these farmers to come and farm their land. Soon enough, business was growing and they founded COBURWAS, a farming business. Benson was elected as the first president and organized a leadership structure. “You’re in charge of getting contracts, you’re in charge of managing these farmers, you’re in charge of recruiting more employees, and do a good job, like your life depends on it.”
After founding COBURWAS, Benson was awarded a soccer scholarship to finish his high school in a nearby town, 14 miles away. He would alternate between working and school. Budgeting the money he’d save over three months of working to afford a meal every other, or every third day while he was in school. Once I asked him if he was hungry, he said he doesn’t get hungry anymore. I cajoled him into trying a hot dog from a stand on Pearl Street. We joked about eating a hot. dog.
Ugandan public school was no easy place for a Congolese refugee. Not fluent in english nor the local language, awarded a scholarship for tuition, but not supplies. Pens, papers, books, school uniforms, a place to sleep all were all luxuries. As the only student in no uniform, a refugee stands out like a sore thumb. Constantly asked why he doesn’t have anything, pitied, segregated against, he became invisible. He’d go to sleep after everyone else and wake up before them so he wouldn’t have to explain why he didn’t have a mattress and he’d ask to borrow friends’ books while they weren’t using them. “In some ways, school was worse than living in Kyangwali, not everyone who was awarded the scholarship stayed in school.”
One afternoon he collapsed from hunger – too weak to bring in firewood, too weak to walk any further. He surrendered. He had fallen into a bush that he was attempting to gather firewood from and could not for the life of him pick himself back up. “That’s it, I will die here” Benson thought. Exhausted, he lay there. Thinking. “Why am I dying now? Why is this my time? If I get up, if I survive, I will commit myself to solve these problems. This is not OK what is happening in the Congo, something must be done. I will educate the youth, the next generation will break this cycle of violence, I must do something. I couldn’t believe it when I heard thumping on the ground next to me, I thought I was going crazy but it was fruit falling from high up in the trees. I had food. The afternoon breeze saved me.” He graduated high school in 2005.
After 6 months of prosperous work, COBURWAS had saved $400. They decided to use that money to send the most vulnerable kids to school, young orphaned girls, and to buy a plot of land so they could start selling and eating some of the food they farmed. After some more time they had the resources to build a primary school so that kids could have the pre-req’s to attend high school on a scholarship. Orphans study for free. Today this school is the best primary school in Kyangwali and educates 220 kids per year.
Next project, provide for the kids who COBURWAS was sponsoring to attend the nearby town’s high school. They built a hostel nearby the high school so that the students wouldn’t have to squat every night or walk the 14 miles back to Kyangwali. In this hostel, we provide additional classes in leadership, entrepreneurship, and non-violence to empower the teens to start their own organizations and businesses to improve their communities.
Nearby villages and refugee settlements have seen what CIYOTA (new name) has been doing and we’re now counseling them in how to replicate what’s happened in Kyangwali. This specifically will be my job, to travel to these CIYOTA satellite communities.
CIYOTA is now invited to the monthly coordination meetings between the UN, the German refugee settlement implementing agency, the Red Cross, and the Ugandan Government. These are the meetings where resources, programs, and future planning are discussed for the entire settlement of 25,000 people. Benson’s mentioned that most of CIYOTA’s input has been on what is actually needed, not what the elites think is needed.
What’s next for Benson and CIYOTA? “500 villages, 50 trainings, 10 kids per village” as Benson says. He wants to reach out to 500 villages in North Kivu, DRC and run seminars in leadership, entrepreneurship, and non-violence. Re-direct the attitude from one of revenge to one of peaceful cooperation. If these 5,000 youth can go back to their communities and affect 200 people. One million Congolese will be exposed to these ideals. there’s potential. One of our partner’s here in Boulder said “Benson! You could be the hero of a million faces.” Well doesn’t that have a nice ring to it.
I’ll leave you with this quote: “Refugee’s are not problems, refugee’s have problems. All they need is a little bit of love” Benson Wereje.
Yazan Fattaleh 