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Otholi, Ariet and their son Jackson escaped with only their lives when their village was burnt to the ground. Now resettled with Ariet and Jackson in Australia, Otholi looks forward with faith and hope as his new life rises from the ashes. He told his story to Chris and Julie Hahn.

I want to start at the very beginning.

We are Anuak, from the region of Gambella on the border of Sudan and Ethiopia. Our village was Punydo, about four hours from the city of Gambella, the capital city of the region. The population of our village was about 10,000. For my work I sold bananas, mangoes and other fruit.

In my village were Assembly of God, Presbyterian and Baptist churches. God sowed the seeds in my heart and I decided to go to church. From there I met with people in the church and became a friend to them. I joined in a program for prayer. I started to know how to pray but did not really know God in my heart. I did not really know about life after death and I did not understand that I am a stranger here on earth.

In December 2003 a government vehicle was attacked on the road in our region. The government said that because it was on Anuak land, the Anuak people were responsible. There had been much disagreement between Central Ethiopian businesspeople and Anuak people. There had been years of torture and beatings of Anuak people.

On Saturday, 13 December people gathered in Gambella. The Anuak police had their guns taken from them. The military distributed machetes to civilians. At 9.00 pm they began to burn the city, shooting and killing Anuak people, to totally get rid of us. Our friend’s father was the Assemblies of God pastor. He was shot and killed and his body was burnt by soldiers.

At 10.00 pm soldiers walked into our village in groups of ten. There was a young boy, a Year 12 student, who got into a fight with a Central Ethiopian. It was just a little fight. He taunted and teased the military. Then he ran. They shot and killed him.

I was in a prayer group at the time. I had left my wife Ariet and son Jackson at home and wanted to get back to them. I held my Bible under my arm. The soldiers saw me but they ignored me.

They killed ten people that night.

When I got home Ariet and Jackson had gone and Ariet had locked the door.

I broke in and hid inside, not knowing what to do or where to go. Then I went to our auntie’s home. Ariet and Jackson were there.

We began to walk in the middle of the night. With others we walked but we could not talk. We needed to remain silent. There were about a thousand of us. We walked for four hours. We hid in the bushes.

The Anuak people began to gather together to find guns and to seek revenge. Four soldiers were killed on the Monday. I wanted to pray; I did not want to fight. They told me I was a coward.

The soldiers camped during the day and in the evening went to villages. They had heard that the people in the villages had guns. They killed the Anuak and burnt down whole villages.

On Tuesday we walked for six more hours. Eventually, after walking about 150 kilometres, we arrived in Sudan. But we didn’t have any food.

We set off for Pochalla. But still there was no food. It was not organised as a refugee camp, not recognised by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Refugees kept arriving in Pochalla, but there was not enough food to feed them. There were 22,000 people in that camp. People died of malnutrition, especially mothers after childbirth.

We stayed there for two years, fending for ourselves. We caught animals according to the seasons. As a group we would work together to catch them. Our favourite was antelope. Eventually, there were no animals left. No food at all.

Ariet and I decided to go to Kenya, carrying Jackson on our shoulders. We left our older children — who had been living with other family members — with their grandmothers in Pochalla. It was unsafe to take them with us because we would have been too slow.

For eleven days we travelled. We walked for three days and then we rode in the back of a military truck. There were 50 of us in the back of the truck. We were so close to each other, leaning on each other, our legs scrunched up, with no room to move or stretch out. During this time we lost our documents.

When we got to the Kenyan border the police wouldn’t allow us to cross. They put us in prison for five days. Then the UN negotiated with the police to release us.

We went to Kakuma Refugee Camp and stayed there for three months, together with Sudanese and Somalian refugees. While we were in Kakuma I worked with the men to dig a bore hole. It had a solar-powered pump and irrigated a field. I was paid for my work.

We saved as much money as we could, enough to catch a bus to Dadaab camp.

We stayed in Ifoh, a suburb of the Dadaab camp.

In Ifoh, Lutheran counsellors worked with the Anuak people. I was chosen to be taught the Apostles’ Creed and the catechism. I had three months training, was confirmed and became a Lutheran. In 2006 we began praying as a Lutheran congregation but we had no place to worship. I was running a program in my house. But eventually we were given land in Ifoh and we built a church there.

The Lutheran World Federation came to Dadaab in 2008. It organised security, shelter, water and training. I was trained in security and became a volunteer team leader. My job was to monitor the housing shelters. I was leader over many people. I was given a CB handset and had good communication with police officers.

While we were in Dadaab a friend told me that my name had appeared on the noticeboard to say I had been chosen to have an interview. There I was told that my name had been selected from a thousand names.

My second interview was with the Australian embassy. They asked me, ‘Do you know which embassy is interviewing you?’ I did not know. I was not excited. Going to Australia was not something I had ever thought about. I had only ever thought about going back home; that is all I wanted. All I knew about Australia was what I’d learnt in Grades 6 and 7. I had heard about kangaroos. But I believed that I needed to seek God’s kingdom first and everything else would be given to me. So I just accepted.

The Australian embassy offered me the opportunity to resettle. From there it took about eight months to come to Australia. The Australian government paid for and arranged everything. We just followed instructions: go to the interview, go for the medical, pack your bags, get on the bus, get on the plane …

God has a plan for the people who trust in him. When I had been called a coward, I was not demoralised. God protected me. If it were not for God, I would not be alive today. ‘If the Lord had not been on our side … if the Lord had not been on our side when men attacked us, when their anger flared against us, they would have swallowed us alive’ (Psalm 124:1-3).

I can see God’s plan now. God knew the plan for me (Jeremiah 29:11), even when I was just surviving. I was just living to be safe, to survive. But God had a bigger plan to use me. He led me. He had prepared a place for me.

When, back in the village, I held the Bible in my hand, when every young man was being killed, the soldiers just looked at me and kept running. It was as if they looked at me but couldn’t see me. I understand now that God was protecting me at that time.

Since I’ve been a Christian and have known God, I don’t think of being Anuak anymore. I feel that my brothers and sisters are all those who are in Christ. The word of God says, ‘Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with God’s people and also members of his household’ (Ephesians 2:19).

Now I am in Australia and am learning to build. I dream that I could go back to my country—to show my people how to build, and to build a church. Then to train people to build their houses. In my country, education is only to make people accountants or teachers. There are no doctors, no engineers. People have to pay lots of money to others who have learnt new ways to do things.

I am dreaming that I can help, that my children can make a difference in my home country, that Jackson could go to teach them—or that my other children could join us here.

But although I have these dreams, I am whole enough. I know that God can do it. Without God’s help, it won’t happen. But with God’s help, greater things than I can dream of can happen.

Otholi, Ariet and Jackson, and Chris and Julie Hahn, are members of The Ark Lutheran Church at Salisbury, SA.