-Caveat Lector-
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/africa/story.jsp?story=139416
25 February 2002 08:29 GMT
Home > News > World > Africa
This man thinks he is handing over $50 to free a slave. But, like thousands of
Americans, a band of pop stars and a British baroness, is he being conned?
Scam in Sudan: An elaborate hoax involving fake African slaves and less-than-
honest interpreters is duping concerned Westerners
By Declan Walsh in Nairobi
24 February 2002
High-profile Western campaigners who spent millions of dollars buying the freedom
of slaves in war-torn Sudan have been the victims of a scam, it is alleged.
Anti-slavery organisations have "redeemed" more than 65,000 Sudanese slaves from
their Arab masters over the past seven years, usually for $50 (�35) a head. The
leading charities are the Swiss-based Christian Solidarity International (CSI) and
Christian Solidarity Worldwide (CSW), founded by Baroness Caroline Cox, a deputy
speaker of the Lords. But although slavery in the African country is a reality, The
Independent on Sunday can reveal that "redemption" has often been a carefully
orchestrated fraud on the charities.
According to witnesses, local villagers are rounded up to pose as slaves when
Christian groups arrive with briefcases full of money. The "slave traders" are
sometimes disguised rebel soldiers from the Sudan People's Liberation Army
(SPLA). A retired Italian missionary told the IoS he saw his own parishioners posing
as slaves. A European aid worker saw children she knew pretending they were in
bondage. And a former rebel commander said a relative, also a soldier, had been
forced to pose as a slave trader.
The emotive issue of slavery in Sudan has had a particularly strong impact among
black Americans and Christian groups in the US, where it has become the biggest
African cause since apartheid. Politicians have chained themselves to railings in
protest, pop stars have given free concerts. The CSI has raised millions of dollars
with its promise to save a slave for $50, and raised the issue in public consciousness
by inviting well- known figures such as the Rev Al Sharpton and Perry Farrell, lead
singer of the rock group Jane's Addiction, to witness redemptions.
Last May, a 12-year-old American schoolgirl, Laquisha Gerald, raised $44 for the
cause. "I thought it was good to give up my lunch money to free slaves," she told the
Philadelphia Inquirer. "We're doing something good."
Baroness Cox, who split from CSI to form CSW in 1997, has spent over �100,000
redeeming 2,281 slaves. She insists she was not cheated. "We double and triple-
checked and did spot interviews with the people redeemed," she said. "Their stories
rang true." The decision of her charity, CSW, to stop redeeming slaves a year ago
had nothing to do with suspicions of corruption, she said. According to the
organisation, her missions to Sudan simply became too dangerous.
Some genuine slaves have been set free � nobody can say how many � but
frequently redemption is a deceit, stage-managed by corrupt officials of the Sudan
People's Liberation Army (SPLA). "The racket comes right from the top," said
Samson Kwaje, an SPLA official, last week. "The money comes from those
American kids. But who gets the cheque?"
The Khartoum government, which has been fighting southern SPLA rebels since
1983, is a notorious human rights abuser. The rebels have mainly traditional and
Christian beliefs, while the government is dominated by Muslim extremists. Last
week a government helicopter gunship fired five rockets into a southern village,
killing 17 civilians in an attack which prompted the US to break off a peace
initiative it
is sponsoring.
Nor is there any doubt that the government has deliberately rekindled the slave trade
as a counter- insurgency measure. It has armed the Murahaleen, a murderous Arab
militia that destabilises rebel-held villages by killing the men, stealing the cattle
and
taking women and children into bondage. In the north, the slaves endure a terrible
life of harsh labour, physical abuse and sometimes forced Islamisation or female
circumcision.
Swiss-based CSI has sought to counter this terrible trade since 1995 by buying the
freedom of more than 63,000 "slaves". In theory, it arranges for Arab middlemen to
buy up the slaves and secretly walk them across the front line to the safety of the
rebel-held south. Then the CSI representative flies in, pays the going rate � usually
$50 per head but currently $35 � and the slaves walk free.
Or so it seems. Father Mario Riva, an Italian missionary, witnessed a CSI
redemption in the late 1990s. Unlike nearly all other Westerners who have been
permitted to witness a redemption, he knew the Dinka people and their language. Fr
Riva saw John Eibner, an American CSI official and the driving force behind slave
redemption, standing under a tree with some slaves. The priest recognised them as
his own parishioners. "The people told me they had been collected to get money," he
said. "It was a kind of business."
Interpretation was key to the deception, said Fr Riva. If Mr Eibner asked whether a
slave had been taken into captivity, the interpreter would ask if they had suffered in
the war. If the "slave" answered that they had, Mr Eibner would be told they had been
captured and badly treated by Arabs, and were grateful to be home.
A nurse with a European charity recalled seeing a slave redemption in late 1999
carried out by American Christians. "They brought the kids to be redeemed to a
clearing under the trees. I knew two of them by name," she said. Her colleague
recognised the "slave trader" as a rebel official, but warned her to keep quiet. "He
said: 'There are guys here with guns. Let them give the money if they want,' " she
recalled. The nurse requested anonymity, fearing retribution against colleagues.
If the slaves are fake, the money is very real. After the CSI plane takes off, the
profits
� sometimes over $300,000 in one week � are divided up. A small cut goes to the
slaves and the traders, but the lion's share goes to local commanders and SPLA
figures. One is said to have earned enough to buy 40 wives, and others have
allegedly built houses or financed businesses.
Mr Eibner denies CSI has been duped. "The money involved is publicised, but we
have mechanisms to ensure there is no fraud," he said. But the organisation recently
announced that it had freed 14,500 slaves without paying a penny.
Experts have long maintained that CSI's figures did not add up. At times when it was
"redeeming" over 6,000 people, aid workers in the north saw no mass movements
south. Colleagues in the south reported no surge in demand for food aid from the
returned "slaves". In 2000, Fr Riva compiled a list of southerners who had returned to
Nyamlell, the town where the CSI campaign started, over the preceding seven years.
They were only 300.
Redemption has caused upset within the SPLA, where accusations of profiteering
have been made against senior figures. "It has divided us," said Mr Kwaje. Aleu
Ayieny Aleu, a retired SPLA commander, alleged that a relative had been "forced
several times to pretend [to be] an Arab and simulate the sale of free children" to
CSI. And a storm of profiteering allegations prompted the SPLA leader, John
Garang, to ban five people from entering Sudan on CSI redemptions.
CSI estimates there are still 200,000 slaves in Sudan. Save the Children puts the
figure at no more than 7,000.~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Forwarded as information only; no endorsement to be presumed
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In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. section 107, this material
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The only real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking
new landscapes but in having new eyes. -Marcel Proust
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"Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe
simply because it has been handed down for many generations. Do not
believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do
not believe in anything simply because it is written in Holy Scriptures. Do not
believe in anything merely on the authority of Teachers, elders or wise men.
Believe only after careful observation and analysis, when you find that it
agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all.
Then accept it and live up to it."
The Buddha on Belief, from the Kalama Sutta
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A merely fallen enemy may rise again, but the reconciled
one is truly vanquished. -Johann Christoph Schiller,
German Writer (1759-1805)
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It is preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that
prevents us from living freely and nobly. -Bertrand Russell
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"Everyone has the right...to seek, receive and impart
information and ideas through any media and regardless
of frontiers."
Universal Declaration of Human Rights
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