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Raising Awareness Around Genocide
April 8, 2005 | Sharon Advocate | Jessica Scarpati

Nicole le Reux is painting the town green starting Wednesday.

Kicking off Sharon's "100 Days of Action" April 6, the founder of the Africa-advocacy group Kukummi said residents can buy green wristbands that read "Not On My Watch" to raise awareness for genocide occurring in the Darfur region of Sudan.

The color green symbolizes support against violence in the region, according to the Web site for the Save Darfur Coalition.

But the $3 rubber wristbands - modeled after cyclist and cancer survivor Lance Armstrong's widely popular yellow "Live Strong" bracelets - are only one part of what le Reux calls Kukummi's "three-stage plan."

Sharon is one of four high schools participating alongside 73 universities across the country in the letter-writing and fund raising campaign spearheaded by the Genocide Intervention Fund, a movement founded by two students at Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania.

While the GIF's national 100 Days campaign hopes to raise $1 million and garner 100,000 signatures in letters to politicians, le Reux said Sharon will need to contribute $1,000 and 1,000 signatures to do its part.

"But we will definitely go beyond that," she added.

The money, however, will not go to humanitarian aide in a region wracked for years with civil war, violence and famine.

"The security crisis is so bad at this point that the humanitarian organizations are having to pull out," said le Reux, a Sharon High School senior and South Africa native. "The first thing that needs to happen is on-the-ground security. The crisis is just escalating out of control."

Money from the 100 Days will go toward bringing more United Nations-backed, peacekeeping African Union troops into Sudan, she explained.

"We don't want to buy them weapons. They do have enough equipment and just their presence is enough," she said. "But of the 10,000 troops there are only 3,000 in Darfur - a region as big as Texas."

While le Reux said more troops "is in no way enough" to end the violence, she called it "the first immediate action" that should be taken.

Keeping small communities and the greater public focused on the crisis has been challenging, le Reux explained, but said she expected Sharon would continue its pattern of support.

"It's always hard because people get burnt out by an issue, but I think there's so much momentum on this issue that it'll be easier to motivate people," she said.

Bringing Sudanese refugee and Sharon High School graduate Ayueil Agani to speak to students last December stirred enough interest in Sharon, said le Reux - interest she believes will help 100 Days succeed.

Mentor and Sharon resident Janet Penn said le Reux has been "the engine driving this process," calling the teen's leadership "spectacular."

"I'm a really strong advocate for supporting teens to be the beacons and to take on the responsibilities," said Penn, who is the director of the Sharon Interfaith Youth Leadership Program said. "Nicole is taking the role of community organizer for the town."

Penn said she contacted initially le Reux to talk about a Sharon-wide project to help the crisis in Sudan and bring together teen leaders from both Sharon and surrounding towns.

''I said to myself, I think I can't live with myself if I write a check and say, 'There's nothing I can do personally,' and feel like I did when I look back at Rwanda," Penn said.

The 100 Days campaign, she explained, sounded realistic and influential enough to get people involved throughout town and the country.

"With issues that are this large, it's so easy to feel hopeless and this particular project is a way for people not to have to stop their life and move to Africa but still make a difference," Penn said.

The education-focused first stage of the campaign will start with 100 "recommended" student leaders at the high school attending a training workshop April 12 with three Sudanese refugees who will share their stories, le Reux explained.

An evening workshop for interested adults in Sharon and for students of surrounding towns will also be held that night.

The green rubber wristbands are also part of the first stage but will be sold all 100 days, le Reux said, their "Not On My Watch" message taken from a note President George W. Bush wrote in the margin of a report about the 1994 Rwanda genocide occurring under former President Bill Clinton's administration.

The wristbands will come with an information pamphlet and a pre-written letter to local and federal politicians for residents to sign and mail, she said.

"We're training those hundred students to know enough of what's happening on the ground so they can convincingly get people involved," Penn said. "It's not just like, 'Here's a pretty green bracelet,' but instead, 'Here's what's happening now and here's the choices we can make.'"

A donor requesting anonymity gave Kukummi its first 1,000 wristbands, le Reux said, explaining the full $3 of each sale will go to the campaign.

Any wristbands the group decides to buy thereafter - costing them $1.50 each - will see about half of its profits go to aid, she said.

Next month, the second outreach-focused stage of the campaign will invite Sudanese speakers into houses of worship to share their experiences and lead a weekend of prayer May 20 and 21.

"The idea is really that we want an ongoing town thing," le Reux said. "Instead of just having 20 to 100 adults [at the workshops], we actually want to reach as many people as possible throughout the town directly."

Penn said religious groups have responded supportively, with leaders from Temple Israel and the Unitarian Church of Sharon being "actively involved."

While le Reux said no definite plans have been set for the campaign's third culminating event, she said Kukummi will likely organize a fair celebrating Sudanese music, food and culture to continue promoting the bracelets and letters in conjunction with the Father Bullock run-walk race set for June 12.

"I think this is something that would've been so close to Bob's heart," Penn said of the late Our Lady of Sorrows Church Father Robert Bullock, who died last June.

"We're hoping to get final signatures from everyone who's working with us in the run," she said. "We want to tie it into already existing program that would really honor father Bullock and kind of issue he would support."

 The evening educational workshop will be held April 12, 7:30 -9 p.m. at Sharon High School and is open to the public for adults and teens of Sharon and surrounding communities. Those interested in attending should RSVP to Nicole le Reux via email at darfur@kukummi.org