When we arrived in Uganda in June 2011 the situation in Acholi Quarter, the poorest neighbourhood of Kasese town, seemed desperate. Uganda’s high inflation has caused difficulties throughout the country this year, but for those who are unemployed or in large single-headed households the hardship is always greatest. Lively community consultation meetings in July confirmed that the biggest challenges facing the community of Acholi Quarter were: high unemployment, worsened by a chronic lack of skills or education; the daily neglect of pre-school age children while their single parent (or grandparent) looked for work or dug their fields; and a general sense of despair amongst young-men, often leading to involvement in drink, drugs or crime.
Faced by such challenges it is easy to feel helpless but our Pastor Bwambale Alfonse has been working hard in this community for years. Through his CBO “Alpha Children’s Ministry” Pastor Alfonse is providing an affordable nursery and primary school in the heart of the community, resettlement of orphans with other family members, and assistance with medical expenses, and all with a positive Christian ethos. Alpha Ministry and the local Baptist Church of Nyakasanga work in partnership through sharing their land and buildings. Alpha’s school hall becomes the church building on Sundays, and the church’s Sunday-school block provides two classrooms for the school during the week. Alfonse’s vision was that this site, in the heart of Acholi Quarter, should have a wider impact on the community, serving people of all ages and denominations.
With the help of BMS World Mission, this dream is now being realised. On 28th of November three new projects were opened, all funded by BMS World Mission and managed by the new Kasese Baptist Association of Churches – Development Committee (KBAC-DC), which is answerable to the Baptist Union of Uganda (BUU). These projects are providing training in carpentry for young-men, and tailoring for women. Both of these courses also include weekly training in business skills, and life-focussed Christian discussion/Bible-study sessions led by local Pastors and clergy of all denominations. While local women are learning tailoring, or pursuing other employment, their 1-3 year old children are being cared for in a new Day-Care, where they receive maize porridge for breakfast and nutritious local food for lunch every day. They can play in a safe environment and learn through simple games, songs and bible stories.
It has been so exciting to see how these projects have progressed in the first three weeks. The Day-Care children cried solidly for the first three days, but are now beginning to play happily together. The young men, so often the subject of criticism and blame here, are already proving themselves at carpentry. Last week two of them made a bed which has been sold locally, followed by orders for another three! The money raised from selling these will be used to buy more timber for the next furniture they will make, alleviating some of the pressure on our inflation-stretched budget. They have also fitted a door- and will be making stools- for the Day-Care staff. The women are producing different items of clothing and will soon be making aprons for the Day-Care staff and uniforms for the toddlers. In addition to learning valuable skills, the trainees are also developing confidence and building friendships. The tailoring trainees proudly wear their tape-measures around their necks like mayoral chains and concluded this term with a friendly netball match with the Day-Care staff!
Without the grace of God and several other local and international partnerships, these projects might have been beset by endless delays and difficulties. The new building for the Skills-Centre, built by Alpha Children’s Ministry using voluntary labour (including ourselves) and roofed by BMS project funds, is not yet finished. The locally made bricks ran out and a delivery of bricks that Alpha Children’s Ministries purchased was lost when heavy rain caught the truck in mudslides and most of the bricks got broken. Fortunately Alpha School’s children broke up for their long Christmas holiday the Friday before the project started, so the skills centre started on time using the school’s hall and outside space. This gives them until February when the children return to complete the skills centre building. The school hall (and adjacent Day-Care room) had their floors cemented by the Meadowcroft family, supported by their Anglican church in Croydon, who are long-standing partners of Alpha Children’s Ministry. The Day-Care also received a free water-filter from “Life-Water” a project run by “Watchman International”, courtesy of local missionaries Roger and Sheryl London. Critically, the over-stretch on our budget caused by Uganda’s 30% inflation between our budget proposal submission in August and our receipt of project funds in November has been alleviated by partnering with UK-based charity “Tools With A Mission” (TWAM), who have a warehouse and friendly staff in Kampala. Purchasing good quality Sheffield-made tools and traditional Singer manual sewing machines at low cost from TWAM, rather than buying increasingly expensive and poor-quality Chinese imports has saved us a fortune and freed-up funds to cover shortfalls elsewhere. Our Day-Care staff received three days of bespoke training from BMS colleagues Deb and Dug Benn, who work with the Children’s Department of the BUU in Kampala. The Noah’s Ark mural on the wall of the Day-Care was painted by artist Louise Sunderland, a British friend of Bethan’s, during a brief visit to us.
We are grateful to God for his guidance to us and for sustaining us through the many challenges of the last six months. We are also very grateful for all those here in Uganda, in the UK and elsewhere whose generosity of time, skills, effort, prayers, money and resources have made it possible to start these projects which serve the people of Acholi Quarter. We ask for your continued prayers and support as we finish building and then move into the skills training centre, and as we work towards helping our first batch of trainees to establish successful and sustainable businesses when they complete their courses.
