A day for the history books: President Obama signs the LRA Disarmament & Northern Uganda Recovery Act
At 5pm this evening, the team at Resolve Uganda was privileged to watch history being made as President Obama put pen to paper and signed the Lord's Resistance Army Disarmament and Northern Uganda Recovery Act into law.
In an extremely rare move, the President invited our team -- alongside Members of Congress and our partners at Invisible Children, Enough Project, International Rescue Committee, and others -- to take part in a signing ceremony right in the Oval Office. As the President made clear in his comments to all of us assembled, his choice to do so came as a result of the incredible movement -- and "young people," as he said, in particular -- that formed to support this legislation and see an end to the LRA's campaign of violence across central Africa once and for all. Representative Jim McGovern, one of the bill's champions in Congress, told the President that it was the "most impressive grassroots movement behind a bill" he had ever seen, and noted that the Act was the most widely cosponsored Africa-specific legislation in United States history.
Most importantly, the President expressed personal concern for the families and especially children who had been abducted, displaced, or otherwise affected by LRA violence, and pledged that this issue would be a priority for his Administration. He promised that he would make sure the legislation was "vigorously, vigorously" implemented. As a demonstration of this commitment, he sent all of us to meet directly with the White House and State Department officials responsible for United States policy on this issue immediately following the signing ceremony.
Words cannot do justice to the excitement each of us feels to have been a small part of making this happen. We recognize that so many people were behind this, and that such clear victories for the values we all share are incredibly rare. All the more reason to let this one soak in.
Look for a video with more details and a full run-down of what took place tomorrow.