Mutombo Trying To Bring Ray Of Hope To Somali Refugees

NEW YORK - While the Dream Team was making history at the Olympics, Dikembe Mutombo was in Africa trying to bring hope to the present and future.

Mutombo, a spokesman for CARE, spent nine days in Africa this summer, much of it in the Kenya-Somalia border area where hundreds of thousands of Somali refugees have fled famine and civil war.

"I went to a camp housing 180,000 desperate and poor people forced from their homes," Mutombo, a native of Zaire who plays in the NBA for the Denver Nuggets, said last week. "It was so large you couldn't see it all in one day. And it was located in the middle of nowhere."

Mutombo said he saw CARE, which last year fed 25 million people worldwide and spent more than $400 million on programs for the poor in developing countries, doing remarkable work in Africa.

"They have a tree-saving program among the farmers, teaching that they need trees to save the land," Mutombo said. "I met people who for the first time in their life had access to clean water because of pumps built by CARE."

Mutombo was unable to visit Somalia because of the danger of guerrillas, but he was deeply affected by the suffering he witnessed at refugee camps.

"The people at these refugee camps are desperate," Mutombo said. "More than 1,000 Somalis cross the border into Kenya every day, and most arrive in poor physical condition. Some are barely able to walk, many are sick and all of them need immediate help."

Mutombo, who went to school at Georgetown University before moving on to the NBA, said he is amazed at the willingness of Americans to help people from other continents even when there have been disasters at home.

"Americans have open minds about people in trouble," he said. "I'm impressed with Americans' generosity even with all the problems here with hurricanes and other things."