“I didn’t understand how fearful I should have been.
I was young. I was ignorant.”
So says Deng Thiak Adut about the moment, at age six, he was taken from his family and forced to join the Southern Sudanese rebel army. The country was inn the midst of its second civil war of the century, and so Deng was thrust into one of the most brutal conflicts of the 20th century. The cause of the war is argued to be due to many factors, from marginalisation to religion, but the intention of both sides was clear: they wanted power, no matter what it took.
Mass slaughter, slaver raids, and famine resulted in the highest civilian casualty rate since World War II, and a total death count estimated at 2 million in a country with a population of only 12 million. 80% of South Sudanese were displaced from their homes, and children were taken en masse from their family to bolster the ranks of both government and the self-proclaimed ‘liberation’ forces.
Deng was forced to march thousands of kilometres, watching many of those who had been enslaved with him, including relatives, die along the way. At the rebel camp, which had been disguised as a base for refugees, Deng witnessed children of 10 or 11 pick up their AK47 machine guns and shoot themselves in the head.
“In a better world those fingers might have made music in a place such as this hall, built homes, operated the equipment of scientific discovery. Instead their short lives were as nothing – innocents destroyed.”
As one of 300,000 child soldiers in the world, Deng reflects on his younger self as an oppressor. If anybody in his path refused to support the liberation army, Deng was ordered to kill them immediately.
Over the next few years, Deng suffered from malnutrition, and was wounded on several occasions. Fortunately, he was eventually rescued by United Nations forces thanks to his half-brother John, and was settled in Australia at age 15.
Unable to read or write, and bearing a sense of extreme isolation, Deng nevertheless felt extremely lucky. He began to teach himself to read, and fostered a passion to help other refugees.
In 2005, he applied to enrol in a Bachelor of Laws at the Western Sydney University, and upon graduation then went to University of Wollongong to complete his Masters degree.
Along with Joseph Correy, he founded the AC Law Group in Blacktown, Sydney, where he fights for the rights of Sudanese refugees.
Deng finally had a chance to return to Sudan in 2012. He found his old village, and in it, his mother. She had never left the place where her family had been torn from her so many years ago.
The moment she saw her son, she recognised him.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=buA3tsGnp2s
The Western Sydney University shared Deng’s incredible story as part of their Stories of Unlimited campaign in 2015.
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As part of the Australia Day commemorations, Deng delivered a lecture on his life, and the power of belonging. Not having reached the age where he could be initiated into his tribe before being taken away, it wasn’t until Australia opened its arms to him that he realised his place in the world.
Deng also addressed the topic of race in his speech. In South Sudan, the colour of his skin alone would have stopped him from achieving anything more than the completion of primary school, giving him a certain perspective of equal opportunity in Australia.
“I know that some who are watching and listening will be wondering why I, so black, am ignoring that the ruling majority appear to be white. I don’t ignore it, just as I don’t ignore that the colours and faces of the Australian community are such a rich palate. Take a trip around an Australian city, visit a building site, walk around an educational campus, look at the names in our sporting teams, and hear, see, smell, and taste the richness of the cultures in any of our shopping centres. White is a colour to which so much can be added.”
Counselling inclusivity, and reminding Australians that the country can only remain free of fear if we embrace what makes us the same, rather than rejecting what makes us different, Deng’s speech was a timely reminder of how ethnicity, religion, and borders do not define who we are, nor the change we can make in the world.
Read the full transcript of Deng Thiak Adut’s 2016 Australia Day speech here.