In May of this year, my brother, brother-in-law and several close friends got on a plane and flew to South Sudan to document the ravages of the war that has been smoldering there since 1989.
For the uninitiated, Sudan and South Sudan are ground zero for some of the worst humanitarian situations in the world. For 25 years, the government of Sudan has committed mass murder on a horrific scale supported international terrorist organizations with complete impunity. Omar al-Bashir and his government has been systematically bombing and starving entire people groups to death.
He’s a monster, and he has to be stopped.
The International Criminal Court has an arrest warrant out for al-Bashir, but he is still at large, still murdering his countrymen and fellow human beings.
The fall-out of all of this is a new generation of “Lost Boys,” children driven from their homes, often after seeing their parents murdered.
These children are the future of Sudan and South Sudan, but they are living in refugee camps, without hope of an education.
My brother’s non-profit is trying to change that. His non-profit’s latest film tells the story of Jargi Joseph, a 19-year old who had to flee his home when the al-Bashir’s jet fighters started bombing his village. He is now in South Sudan, carrying the weight of a new generation of children without homes and parents.
With this film, Operation Broken Silence is launching Project Endure, a coordinated effort to put these kids — and their teachers — back in the classroom. It’s a targeted program designed to bring change directly to the children Jargi Joseph cares for.
It was an honor to help plan and produce this film, let alone narrate it, but the need to educate and care for Sudan’s 25,000 orphans is the world’s responsibility. We should shoulder it together.