GRASSROOTS RECONCILIATION GROUP

We have five main types of projects for former child soldiers and refugees in Northern Uganda. These include:

- Livelihoods
- Trauma support
- Community microfinance
- Reconciliation
- Cultural activities

Each group designs its own projects. The group first develops its own multi-year development plan, which may include a range of different types of projects to support the individuals’ and groups’ development.

Track record: GRG’s first decade of work from 2007 to 2017 was focused on addressing key needs in northern Uganda that emerged from the 30-year war with the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA). We focused on helping former LRA child soldiers and other ex-combatants reintegrate into their communities and rebuild their lives through innovative reconciliation, microfinance, livelihoods, and trauma counseling projects. We successfully help reintegrate former combatants in 27 communities in remote areas. 98% of the former child soldiers reported having better relationship with community members after attending trauma counseling. Today, we run a smaller program for 350 former LRA combatants focused on survivors of sexual and gender-based violence (233 women & 117 men).

Current work with South Sudanese refugees: GRG shifted its focus in 2018 to use our expertise to address the new acute need in northern Uganda: the over 1 million refugees from war-torn South Sudan. Our needs assessment found that the refugees have severe trauma from the conflict, and also that there are dangerous tensions between refugees and Ugandan host communities. We developed three projects under this framework, which began in June 2018:

War trauma counseling & support: Trauma counselling for individuals, families, and groups; anti-stigmatization training; and training of peer counselors. 1,090 beneficiaries.
Sustainable livelihoods: economic empowerment through animal husbandry, organic farming, microfinance, & small business training. Three groups of beneficiaries, 30 members each.
Peace-building: Addressing conflicts between refugees and host communities through conflict resolution skills training; peace dialogues; community theater; and training of peace agents. 1,090 beneficiaries total.