ABSTRACT
In this chapter the author was recruited to work with vagrant children in South Sudan, still part of Sudan, in the short peace following the 1973 Addis Ababa Agreement, preceded by 17 years of the First Anyanya War. Deputised to an experienced British development worker, he helped revitalise the government’s Social Welfare Department, train diverse social workers returned from seven diaspora countries, and establish multipurpose community development centres in the four towns with the worst vagrant children problems. The social workers, the advisers and the whole project had a rigorous self-help ethos: all were engaged in building as well as social work. This was against a background of balancing a large post-disaster flood of agencies and the State’s difficulty in balancing the claims of different tribes. This was against the State’s background of balancing a large post-disaster flood of humanitarian agencies and the claims of different tribes.
The author recounts stories of sickness in unhealthy South Sudan, journeys overland to Kenya for supplies, sometimes through Amin’s Uganda, and surprising visitors arriving to capture wild animals for UK safari parks.
