Ugandan child mothers get a second chance

This is a cross-post from World Vision U.S. by Simon Peter Esaku, World Vision Uganda, and Rachael Boyer

Franka, 17, sits with her baby, Sharon, in front of the Pader Girls Academy. Photo | Simon Peter Esaku/World Vision

She was born at the Kalongo Hospital in northern Uganda in 1992. Fifteen years later, Franka Aneno was back in the same ward, this time to deliver her own child — a baby girl named Sharon.

What Franka had thought was only a little adventure with a boyfriend became a life-changing situation. “When my mother found out I was pregnant, she whipped me,” Franka recalls. Then, adding insult to injury, Franka’s head teacher expelled her from school.

After her baby was born, Franka lived at home with her mother and 10-year-old sister, helping grow food and caring for baby Sharon. A Ugandan rebel group, the Lord’s Resistance Army, killed Franka’s father in 2003.

Franka's ray of hope

When her baby was about a year old, Franka found out about a program that might help her continue her education. It gave her a reason to hope. “In April [2008], I applied for World Vision to give me a scholarship to learn vocational skills in Pader Girls Academy,” says Franka. “My application was successful, and I reported to the academy in August.”

With Sharon securely wrapped to Franka’s back, the young mother explains, “I am learning tailoring and knitting, and I will complete my course in May this year.”

Picking up the Remnants of war

This photo essay was submitted by Pete Muller







After more than twenty years of armed conflict, the fertile hills of northern Uganda remain littered with the explosive remnants of war. In cooperation with the Danish Demining Group and the Uganda Mine Action Centre, I documented the clearance of landmines and unexploded ordinance (UXO) throughout this embattled region. At present, UMAC mine clearance teams are deployed in highly contaminated, mountainous areas along the border with South Sudan.

In addition to large-scale mine clearance operations in the far north, UMAC Explosive Ordinance Disposal (EOD) teams continue to clear UXO from the battlegrounds of northern Uganda. As millions of internally displaced persons return to their native lands, reports of unexploded grenades, RPGs, air-dropped bombs and other hazardous items pour in at alarming rates. UXO are highly unpredictable and pose considerable risk to all who encounter them. Such items are often located in extremely remote areas, requiring EOD technicians to brave heat and unforgiving terrain to reach them.





I have little envy for those tasked with clearing these deadly items. In oppressive heat, these committed men and women work on their hands and knees for long hours to make grounds safe for displaced Ugandans to return home. Mine clearance work is painstaking and requires intense concentration. Any lapse in focus can result in life-threatening accidents. De-miners may go hours, even days, without hitting a single mine. It is in such periods that maintaining concentration is essential, and exceptionally difficult.

I was shocked to see how tedious the process is. In northern Uganda, which has relatively low levels of mine and UXO contamination compared to Iraq, Afghanistan and Columbia, the grounds will remain hazardous for several years. Each EOD team can safely reach and clear one or two UXO per day, of which thousands are scattered about the region. Mine clearance moves at an even slower pace. In ideal conditions, each de-miner can clear approximately ten square meters per day, and even less with rugged terrain and tropical rains. Additionally, the grounds are highly contaminated with scrap metal and bullet cases, each of which gives a detector reading and must be approached as potentially lethal.



What strikes me most is the extraordinary disparity between how long it takes to contaminate ground versus how long it takes to clear it. A unit of fifty men can put down thousands of rounds, fire hundreds of mortars and RPGs and lay dozens of mines within a period of 24 hours. If they continue at such a pace for one month, it might take eight months to address the mess they made. Considering the massive scale of armed conflict in places like Iraq, Afghanistan and Chechnya, the implications are daunting.




Pete Muller
Danish Demining Group
Uganda Mine Action Centre

Striving Toward Change

Posted by Anthony Wald



Give Us Wings is celebrating its 10-year anniversary of humanitarian work in Kenya and Uganda. This grassroots organization’s success hinges on the relationship that it has developed with the people of Kenya and Uganda. From listening to people describe their lives and their needs, GUW evolved into an organization that restores and builds houses, started a clinic, and helps provide 20,000 people with clean water. Impressive accomplishments for an organization that grew out of listening to stories of struggle.

The events that led to its founding began in 1998 when Mary Steiner, now the director of Give Us Wings, volunteered in eastern Africa. After completing her volunteer commitment, Mary stayed in Africa to develop a book about behavior guidance for school-age children in the US. The story shifted when a local boy, Abdul, asked what she was writing about. She told him, and he said, “Why not write about children here?” Mary responded, “I don’t know anything about children here, but write me your story and maybe I will.” Upon reading Abdul’s story she was struck by his directness. She says, “Bam it hit me—this is what poverty looks like.”

Mary decided to compile a book of narratives about living with poverty. She explains, “The intense need and poverty in Africa can be overwhelming, but once people hear these stories, they’ll get it, they’ll respond.” Finding people willing to tell their stories was easy. “I just started doing this trust dance with people. Letting them know I was collecting stories,” she says. “I had no money to give them, and people just started lining up.”

Building a Future

Esther lives in Gita, Uganda, where soon she will go to school for free. Her mother, Hariyet, is helping to clear land and dig foundations for Esther’s new school. Hariyet, who only went to school through 4th grade, wants better for her six children. This fall, Esther along with her siblings, will begin classes at Building Tomorrow Academy of Gita.

Sub-Saharan Africa is home to one-sixth of the world’s children, but they make up half of the world’s uneducated children, in large part because of the lack of available educational facilities. Building Tomorrow works to reduce this disparity by connecting college students in the US with educational needs in Uganda.

George Srour was an undergraduate when he interned with the United Nations. Through the internship, he became aware of the vital need for educating the millions of children under age 15 in Uganda who make up half the country’s population. Returning to his campus, College of William & Mary, he organized a fundraiser which raised $45,000 to build a school in Kampala, Uganda. He went on to found Building Tomorrow to continue this project.