KASSIM OUMA: American Dream or African Nightmare

Much has been said about Kassim “The Dream” Ouma and his tragic kidnapping at the hands of the Ugandan army when he was only 7 years old. Every time he fights on HBO, the commentators feel the need to play sad music and go into this sad story about how this poor little guy from Africa was kidnapped by some bad guys and forced to fight in an army. At times the announcers will even go as far as to admit that Kassim Ouma has probably even killed people (gasp!). Ouma fought in this army for at least ten years. He was a foot soldier, he had a gun, and his job was to kill.

Although Ouma was forced into a life of war and all of the violence that comes with it, are we to assume that he was some type of morally charged super soldier that only took out the bad guys? Does Ouma really warrant being felt sorry for in light of the potential victims of his actions left behind in war torn Uganda?

Ouma's story is kind of a dark version of the proverbial “American dream”. At this point, we see him bouncing around the ring sometimes winning fights and sometimes losing them. He did achieve his dream in the process, by winning a version of the 154lb championship and marrying a hot blonde. According to sources, Ouma became obsessed with escaping to the United States after viewing a copy of Girls Gone Wild as a soldier in Uganda.

Extreme acts of rape?

Anyway, when you look at the actions of the Ugandan army and the many other little armies running around Uganda and the rest of Africa, it becomes obvious that if Ouma participated in what seems to be the general practice of the Ugandan army, he is probably fortunate to not be rotting in a prison somewhere for war crimes. For those unaware, the Ugandan army is notorious for committing atrocities against humanity, particularly against females. Killing, torture, and rape are all just part of the average day in the life of a Ugandan soldier.

In June of 2005, UNICEF indicated in a report that rape was the most common form of violence in the so-called “protected” villages set up by the Ugandan government. According to a Human Rights Watch report in September 2005 found that "soldiers prey upon women and girls they find traveling outside the camps out of necessity--to collect firewood or water or to sow, tend or harvest crops." Now just imagine your grandmother going out to the corner store for some beef jerky only to get beef jerkied by Kassim Ouma in the bushes. That is what these poor sisters in Africa have to go through every day. These African soldiers are notorious for busting into huts, gang raping everybody, forcing family members to rape each other, and then never getting punished. There are reports of more than 15 solders at a time raping 10-year-old girls and then firing off a rifle into their vaginas when they’re done. Unfortunately for the girls, they don’t die. They just walk around with their vaginas stinking and rotting because the wall dividing their intestines and wombs has been virtually destroyed leading to infection and total loss of control. Tyrone Jenkins, ebonics expert, put it this way: " In lay terms, these chicks can’t stop shitting and pissing on themselves after getting gang raped and then literally taking a bullet up the ass."


Using villagers for punching bags?

What about the Ugandan military’s occupation of the Congo? According to a U.N report, “on average, some 40 women were raped every day between October 2002 and February 2003 in and around the town of Uvira,” a town with a population of between 200,000 and 300,000. Do you know what it means to have 40 women raped in your neighborhood EVERY DAY!? Why are these soldiers so horny? When did Kassim Ouma find time to even practice boxing? Is it true that Kassim Ouma, while a soldier, once tied an 88-year-old man up to a plantain tree and practiced his jab on him for several days only feeding him 2 live crickets a day before he finally died? Is this why Kassim Ouma has such an excellent jab? Is boxing equipment really that scarce in Uganda that boxers have to go to these extremes in order to train?

Innocent or guilty?

This is the type of organization that Kassim Ouma belonged to for at least a decade. Are we supposed to believe that he was the only angel in the Ugandan army and that he never did anything bad? If Kassim Ouma is so innocent, why doesn’t he use his popularity to speak out about these horrible atrocities in Africa? Even if he is not innocent, shouldn’t he say something?

Sadly for Ouma, his father was beaten to death by members of the Ugandan army because of Ouma's defection. Nevertheless, Ouma's story should be used in order to shed light on the civilian population of Uganda that bear the brunt of the violence and not to convince viewers to feel sorry for the perpetrators.