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FREETOWN, Sierra Leone — Ten thousand pairs of crutches were distributed across Sierra Leone in a single day.
The country's landmine victims, amputees and polio sufferers all benefited from “Operation Rise,” run by an American organization called The Peace Project.
“I realized the incredible energetic shift and social and psychological impact of getting 10,000 people on their feet on one day would have on the morale of the country," said organizer Lisa Schultz. "And I knew that to engage people worldwide in caring about a problem caused by a war that ended 10 years ago, we had to do something big that would engage their imagination.”
The event was held on International Peace Day, to highlight the fact that many of the beneficiaries were disabled during Sierra Leone's civil war.
Amputees, regularly seen begging on the streets of Freetown, are a visible reminder of the brutal conflict.
There are no reliable statistics for how many people had feet, hands, arms, lips, ears or genitalia cut off during Sierra Leone's decade-long civil war from 1991 to 2002.
Some estimates are as high as 10,000 people who suffered amputations, but Handicap International and Médecins sans Frontières put the figure at around 4,000 deliberate amputations during the conflict.
Some of the survivors lining up to receive new crutches on International Peace Day were planning to use the equipment not just for getting around but also for playing competitive football, or soccer.
The Single Leg Amputee Sports Association was formed in 2001, according to spokesperson Albert Manley Mustapha.
http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/africa/111031/sierra-leone-hope-civil-war-amputees
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