INDEPTH: A WORLD OF DIFFERENCE
Inquiry: Uganda AIDS aid
CBC News Online | February 17, 2004
Reporter: Costa Maragos
Christine Lwanga, who now lives in Regina and is originally Ugandan has returned to her home to help those who have been devastated by HIV/AIDS.
Christine Lwanga has received another letter from her childhood village.
It's written by Josephine Namakula who runs the Nazareth Children's Home in Masala, Uganda, for children who have lost their parents to HIV/AIDS.
"Some of the children, the majority, are children who don't have any tracing [idea] of where they came from," she says in the letter.
In the past few years, Namakula has cared for 180 children. The children's home typically houses 20 orphans. It has two cows, goats, chickens and ducks used to feed the children.
Lwanga knows the stories and the people well.
The orphanage is in the Masaka district of Southern Uganda where she grew up, a place she's visited three times in the last five years.
Lwanga comes from a family of 10. She has a picture that was taken long before the world knew of AIDS.
It's different now. In Uganda more than a million people have HIV/AIDS. Last year at least 75,000 died from it.
"I can frankly tell you, in Uganda there isn't a single family that doesn't know or doesn't have a person, a relative, family member, who has died from HIV/AIDS," she says.
With parents gone, hundreds of thousands of children have been left to fend for themselves.
Lwanga has seen the despair. She was in Masaka last month with money for the orphanage, the school and other projects.
The work continues in Saskatchewan where Lwanga raises money.
"Projects like this that people do in our communities give us more of a feeling of power that we can get involved.
"Christine is also so positive and so full of hope. And I think that is the attitude we all need to have," says Lori Latta of the Saskatchewan Council for International Co-operation.
Lwanga has been given Saskatchewan's Global Citizens Award.
In five years she's brought about $10,000 in aid to Masaka.
This isn't a huge number but it means a lot to the children.
"The children were thanking me for remembering them and caring for them and that they're very happy that I've come from Canada to visit with them and care how they are doing," Lwanga says.
"That's the hope that I'm talking about that we have taken back to the village. For people to know that people in Canada care and that things can be done…that people haven't given up. And people are struggling. It's a tough life. It's a hard life. But people haven't given up. But there's hope."
Lwanga has also raised money for:
- St. Ignatius Nyendo primary school: about 300 students
- St. Jude Counselling Health Clinic. It needs ongoing support to help pay for those who can't afford medical services in relation to HIV/AIDS.
Lwanga says there are many more groups in the area that need help but she says rural areas of Uganda seem to receive less support than the country's urban areas.
It's the hope that brings Christine Lwanga back to Masaka, where she's making a difference.
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CUSO tracks volunteers from:
AFS Interculture Canada
Canadian Crossroads International.
Canada World Youth.
Centre for International Studies and Cooperation
Canadian Executive Service Organization (CESO).
CUSO.
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SUCO - Solidarité Union Coopération
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CUSO Statement
Collectively, our organizations send or receive more than 3,000 volunteers each year and remain in touch with more than 60,000 returned volunteers. These figures include significant numbers of volunteers from the South, but by and large they represent Canadians so concerned about the disparity between life here and life in poorer countries that they are willing to give up weeks, months or even years of their time to improve the world. Through our network of members and volunteers, we reach into almost every community in Canada, coast to coast to coast. Ours is a real, concrete presence for Canada around the world, often the only Canadian presence outside of capitals, or even in some entire countries.
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