El Fadel Arbab Most people know the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. as the face and voice of the civil rights movement in the United States in the 1960s, but it seems safe to say that most people are much less familiar with El Fadel Arbab, a man who has dedicated his life to raising awareness of an ongoing human rights tragedy in Africa.
On Jan. 15, Arbab stood in front of a packed auditorium at Howell High School to tell the story of how he survived the genocide in Darfur, Sudan, that has claimed 400,000 lives and displaced 2.5 million people.
The date of Arbab’s visit to Howell was quite meaningful, since King was born on Jan. 15, 1929.
“Telling this story is my way of thanking the American people for giving me a second chance at life, and [the ability] to help myself, the community, and people around the world,” he said.
Stan Koba, who is Howell High School’s supervisor of social studies, music and humanities, said it took months to arrange a visit from Arbab, but he said it was worth the wait.
“If he affects just five kids, then we have done our job,” Koba said. “If he moves somebody, who knows what these kids will do in the future [for the movement]?”
As Arbab related details of gruesome violence, the separation of his family members and friends, his near starvation, and his eventual emigration to the United States, his story was sometimes grave, but always inspiring.
In 1996, when Arbab was 12 years old, his small village was the scene of a mass murder. He said armed Sudanese military men riding horses and camels surrounded the village, set fire to every home and cut down everyone inside.
Arbab said he survived after he narrowly escaped a burning hut where he was thrown and left for dead. He said thick smoke from the fires concealed his movements as he ran into the adjacent forest to hide.
He spent the following weeks traveling from village to village before making it to Sudan’s capital, Khartoum, where he joined a society of refugee children who lived off leftover food from restaurants. In 2004, Arbab, then 20, was granted a visa from the American Embassy in Sudan to work in the United States. He now lives in Portland, Maine, where he divides his time between working toward his General Educational Development (GED) certification and telling his story of survival.
“When I came to the U.S., it was difficult to sleep or eat because I felt I was lucky to escape the genocide, but there were millions left behind,” Arbab said. “I have a lot of pain in me, but when I share my story my pain goes away. I can eat and sleep again.”
Arbab is now the primary speaker representing the Darfur Community Center of Maine, which, according to its Internet website, is a non-governmental, nonprofit organization committed to broadening the public’s awareness of genocide in Darfur, [and] serving the needs of the Darfur community in the United States.
Arbab has spoken at schools and community centers from Maine to Colorado, and he spoke at the Peace in Sudan rally at the White House in Washington, D.C., in 2011. He plans to continue speaking until the fighting and the civil war in his native country has ended.
“A lot of kids tell me that my story changed their lives forever, so my goal is to reach all 50 states and tell it,” he said.