The Children of War
The former child soldiers of Mozambique's civil war offer insights into morality and human resiliency
The interventions at Lhanguene were deceptively simple. Indeed, when I asked the men about their time at Lhanguene, without exception the first thing they mentioned was playing soccer. At first I just noted this and dismissed it as a childish memory, but when it came up again and again I began to realize that soccer wasn't trivial to these child soldiers' psychological recovery. What they wanted more than anything--and Boothby's later research with many other child soldiers documented this--was to once again to be "like everyone else." Playing soccer did a lot of things--it re-established rules and sense of fair play--but perhaps most important, it made them feel "normal" in their own minds. In psychological jargon, they were moving from a survival mentality, which they had adopted of necessity, to a security mentality normal for their age. In other words, they were learning to become kids again.
Other interventions more directly involved resolving the wartime traumas of these children. They were encouraged, for example, to draw pictures, and when they did their drawings included typical childhood things like houses and family--but they also included, often tucked off in a corner, an automatic weapon, a slain body. Such drawings provided an opening for discussion about the horrific experiences they were reluctant to bring up themselves. So did the use of psychodramas, which were explicit opportunities for the kids to act out, and denounce, the hateful acts of Renamo, and in addition to celebrate the virtues of nation, community, and family.
I asked Boothby at one point if there was a clear greatest success story among the kids with whom he worked to heal and reconnect with their homes and families. He explained that there are three dimensions that define success and failure for these young men: financial success, marital stability, and the classical measures of mental health, like clear thinking and emotional steadiness.
If you're talking about traditional western ideals of career and financial success, almost none of these former child soldiers could be called successful. One, Angelo Jose Macouvele, went on to become a professional photographer, working both in Mozambique and in the much more affluent South Africa. But he is the exception. Most are subsistence farmers, raising maize and beans to feed their own families, then looking for real currency income where they can find it.
Take the case of Israel Armando Massingue, who was abducted by Renamo in 1987, when he was 14 years old; he's in his early 30s today. He dresses in western clothes, including an "America on the Rise" T-shirt. He is handsome and fit, like a college running back, with an engaging smile. He is the president of the local equivalent of the PTA. His wife, Saugina Salvador Sitoe, attests that he is a good husband: He doesn't drink and he isn't rough with me, she says.
Yet Massingue cannot find work. He raises his food crops right now, but he is more ambitious than that and feels he just needs a leg up to start some sort of small business. He dreams of getting a small piece of property where he could build a furnace, and produce concrete blocks for construction, or perhaps have a small chicken farm. But such dreams are a long shot.
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