Attack on Lietnhom

On May 6, we received word that the city of Lietnhom was on fire. Some of ALARM’s most significant ministries in southern Sudan are based in Lietnhom. Linda Primary School, Hope Secondary School, our new training center—what was their fate? Even more significantly, was our staff safe? We knew they had fled to the desert with their young families, but they had no food, and Lietnhom was burning.

The conflict that produced this scene began in 2005 with disputes about cattle. When members of one group went to participate in the war, they found, upon return to their homes, that their cattle had been looted. They blamed an adjacent group for the theft and took legal action. The court ruled that the accused tribe must compensate for six heads of cattle each. When the payment was made, the compensated tribe argued that they had been given inferior animals. To correct the perceived injustice, they launched multiple attacks on their rivals. On May 6, those attacks reached Lietnhom, leaving a burning trail behind them.

ALARM personnel were not involved in the conflict, but they suffered along with the other citizens of Lietnhom. All fled for their lives, leaving their possessions behind. When they began to trickle back to their homes two days later, they found almost everything burned and their village looted.
Manasseh Kenyi, director of ALARM’s Chriistian Leadership Institute of Sudan and now our acting country director for Sudan, was at ALARM headquarters in Nairobi when the attack occurred. Also in Nairobi was Rev. James Baak, on study leave from his leadership of ALARM’s ministry in Lietnhom. As soon as they received clearance from the United Nations to fly into the region, Manasseh and James went to Lietnhom to assess the damage and bring as many supplies as they could. Since their homes had been burned, ALARM staff and several hundred members of the surrounding community were camping in and around the ALARM compound. James and Manasseh provided the first relief to these people, many of whom were literally living on water and wild leaves. Assisted by Abraham Ngor, one of ALARM staff at Lietnhom, they were able to distribute maize flour, beans and salt to 93 families displaced within the compound, including ALARM staff and the teachers from our two schools.

Surveying the compound, they confirmed that ALARM’s permanent buildings had not been damaged. When the raiders came through, all of the schools’ paper, workbooks, and pens and pencils were burned, but the buildings remained intact. Likewise, the training center, including the dining hall and guest house, had not been affected. The ALARM office, however, had been completely burned. The staff and teachers had all lost their homes. In Lietnhom as a whole, approximately 5000 homes had burned to the ground.

The homes and buildings that were not burned had been looted. This was true of the ALARM compound as well. When Manasseh undertook a complete inventory of supplies, he discovered that the raiders had taken mostly furniture, a large number of plastic chairs and mattresses, and cooking supplies. Left untouched were brand new computers, still in their boxes, which had just arrived for ALARM’s new internet café.
None of the ALARM staff were harmed. However, the raids led to the death of twenty people and displaced about 45,000 others. Most remain homeless and are sleeping under trees.

The ALARM schools hope to reopen in the next couple of weeks. Many of our partners have funded relief for Lietnhom, and now that the roads are safe for travel we are bringing supplies by truck from nearby Wau. Please pray that these supplies will reach the needy families in Lietnhom, especially since the rainy season has started and the roads may quickly become impassable.