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Students raise awareness of Darfur crisis

By John Larson

Tacoma Weekly
jlarson@tacomaweekly.com
Published on: October 16, 2008

A playground in Proctor District may not seem to have much in common with a refugee camp in Africa, but for a group of Tacoma teenagers it was a place to make a statement and show solidarity with those suffering from what is perhaps the most tragic humanitarian crisis of our time.

The individuals were Stadium High School students. Their reason for spending the night on the playground was to raise awareness of the plight of refugees fleeing Darfur. A region in the western part of Sudan, Darfur has been a place of chaos and heartache in recent years as civil unrest and ethnic tension have consumed this section of the African nation.

On one side of the conflict are the Sudanese government and a militia group called Janjaweed, whose members are mainly from Arab tribes. They have been fighting two rebel groups, whose members are mainly from black ethnic groups. Janjaweed fighters are widely considered to be responsible for attacks on civilians and have the backing of the government. It is estimated that 2.5 million people were displaced by the conflict as of October 2006.

Luke Kneeshaw, a senior at Stadium, is president of the school’s chapter of Darfur Action Network.

He was inspired to hold an event in Tacoma by a displacement camp set up in Seattle a few years ago, where activists created a temporary refugee camp.

About 50 Stadium students spent the evening of Oct. 9 on the playground at Washington-Hoyt Elementary School.

A speaker who is originally from Sudan and now living in this area discussed the situation in Darfur with the students.

The students slept in makeshift tents made from cardboard. To get a feel for the hardships refugees face, they were given a choice of a blanket or jacket to keep warm through the chilly evening. Their rations were five crackers and a bottle of water.

They were not allowed to have electronic items such as cell phones or iPods, objects few refugees would likely possess.

“I think Americans have a little knowledge of the situation there,” Kneeshaw said. “A lot of people choose not to act, or they put it on the back burner.”

Shelley Weiseth, a Stadium teacher who is advisor for the club, was one of several adults who supervised the demonstration.

She is a fitting choice to advise the club as she has lived in the African nations of Mozambique and Guinea. When she lived in Mozambique, its civil war had ended 10 years before, but in Guinea she did witness the sort of civil strife that afflicts many nations in Africa.

There has been some pressure put on China, which has considerable investments in Sudan, as well as oil companies with operations there to use their influence with the Sudanese government to resolve the conflict.

“There is so much corruption with the countries involved that it is hard to make headway,” Weiseth remarked.

Kneeshaw said a United Nations resolution on Darfur that called for, among other things, the protection of civilians under threat of physical violence, has largely been ignored by the Sudanese government.

Each student donated $10, which will go towards relief efforts in Darfur. In addition to the money, Kneeshaw hopes the event raised some awareness, and that the participants will inform classmates and relatives about the situation in Darfur.

“I am super proud of them for doing this,” Weiseth said.

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