Toronto Star
April 6, 2005
Band comes to aid of young amputee
Byline/Source: By Spencer McCormack Oshawa-Whitby-Clarington
This Week
Members of Sum 41 emceed a benefit concert with hopes of raising enough money for a Pickering girl to get prosthetic hands after hers were cut off while living in Sierra Leone.
On Thursday, March 31, G.L. Roberts Collegiate and Vocational Institute hosted almost 400 students, who came to lend support to Mariatu Kamara and to see Steve-O and Cone from Sum 41 open the night with tales of their time in the Democratic Republic of Congo and a question-and-answer period with fans. A number of local bands performed and Oshawa Mayor John Gray also made an appearance.
Before the benefit started, while Steve-O and Cone signed autographs and took pictures with fans, inside the library a timid Mariatu Kamara, 18, and her Canadian guardian Kadijatu Nabe told a group of reporters her story:
In 1999, during Sierra Leone's civil war, Ms. Kamara, then 13, was captured and held hostage by rebel soldiers. She was with her mother and brothers at the time, but they ran away and weren't captured. The soldiers held her for over 10 hours, beating and raping her, before chopping her hands off and letting her go.
She was found by a lady in another village after wandering in a forest for two days, said Ms. Nabe. Ms. Kamara spent the next two years at a refugee camp in Freetown, Sierra Leone's capitol. "While she was at the amputee camp she met her cousin, who was also amputated," said Ms. Nabe. "She's one of thousands of amputees in Sierra Leone." As a result of her rape, she gave birth to a child who would die eight months later from malnutrition due to poor conditions at the refugee camp.
In 2002, a generous Canadian heard Ms. Kamara's story and paid to have her come to Canada. Later that year, and, being from the same village in Sierra Leone, she invited the woman to her home. Ms. Kamara, now 18, has been living with Ms. Nabe and her husband, Abou, in Pickering since September 2003. "Today, I find my life is much better... I go to school now," said Ms. Kamara.
Ms. Nabe added, "When she came to Canada, she couldn't speak a word of English. Now she can carry on a conversation and she's doing very well in school."
Constantine Papoutsis, a teacher at G.L. Roberts, said that when Mariatu came to G.L. Roberts to talk to students, "a student asked for a comparison between her old school and school in Canada and she said, 'I don't know. I've never been to school in my life.'" "Another student asked what she did for fun and after about five minutes she said, 'work, there's nothing to do but work,'" said Mr. Papoutsis.
Members of Sum 41 had been students of Mr. Papoutsis's when they were in high school and happily accepted his proposal to emcee the benefit. And, judging by the applause of the crowd when they came and went, it was clear what 400 high school students had come to see.
Ms. Kamara needs $28,000 for prosthetic hands, of which $8,000 had been raised before the sold-out benefit, which had a goal of raising $5,000. If you would like to contribute, a fund has been set up at Royal Bank Branch 3832, 1340 Kingston Rd., Pickering.
Cheques should be payable to Sierra Leone Immigrant Resettlement and Integration Centre.