Help build an orphanage for the neediest orphans in Matopeni!
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Many children at Matopeni school are orphans who are living under terrible circumstances. The big number of orphans is one of the worst consequences of the very quickly increasing HIV/AIDS epidemic. Many of the orphans are living with very poor and sometimes also mad guardians. Because of poverty and because of the burden of also having responsibility for their own children the guardians find the education of the orphans of being of little importance or not important at all. Many of the orphans living at guardians are burdened with housework, which includes cooking, cleaning, washing and taking care of the guardians younger children. Many orphans are forced to work and earn money for school fees or just for surviving. Children labor is on rise in Kayole especially within the adjacent Quarry farms, an area that is engaged in the mining of ballast and building stones. Both boys and girls are employed to work in these farms. Many of the girls living at guardians are used as domestic workers , the boys are forced to steal wares during the weekends in order to earn money for fees. Both boys and girls are sometimes offer sex in exchange for money.
At Matopeni school the children get food during the day. But coming “home” in the evening and during the weekends there is often nothing to eat at the guardian’s family. The children must go out to the streets and search for food. Mad guardians might hit the orphans and use them sexually. Rather often the children are forced to escape for their lives.
Because of these circumstances there is an urgent need of an orphanage for the neediest children. The orphanage is needed as a rescue and crisis center there street children and from guardians running children can escape and can find a roof over their head, a piece of food and there they can feel that they are secure.
We need neighbors who want to be engaged in this project. We need help with the following tasks:
1) project plan
2) budget for the project
3) fundraising
4) building plan
5) equipment
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What work has been done to look at the most appropriate way of caring for orphans in Matopeni?
In some cases there may be no alternative but for the children to be taken into an orphanage.
But in many cases, there are options where they can continue to live with their families/guardians provided these carers are given some support.
For example, if the main problem is that the families lack a source of income, they can receive advice on starting a small business and how to get access to micro credit. Many of the carers may themselves have grown up in difficult circumstances so, although they would like to take good care of their children, they don't know how. But with the correct support from other members of the community, they can learn.
A brief overview of various care models from Malawi
http://www.ccih.org/resources/compendium/Models%20of%20Orphan%20Care%20i... may give some ideas of other options. And there is plenty more information out there.
Mary
Hi Mary,
thank you for your question, I think Stephen can better answer it.But I can tell you what I know. The orphanage will be planned for the neediest children for whom there isn't any other way out! We have experiences of many different ways of taking care of children around the world. In general an orpahanage is the last way we prefair. In Matopeni slum there aren't any other possibilities right now and children's lives are in danger. The community is extremly poor and the number of HIV/AIDS orphans increases very fast. Many of the children who don't have parents because of AIDS have already tested to stay with families of community members, guardians. Now also an increasing number of guardians are infected and several of them are going to die soon. The guardians are also very poor, they are not interested in the orphans. The situation in Kenya is very difficult because the prices go up all the time, por example maize cost three times much then before. The community members families included the orphans suffer of hunger, sicknesses. The community can't take care of the children. There aren't families who could help. An orphanage is the only way right now for saving lives of the children. The goverment of Kenya doesn't care of the orphans either. I think that a good orphanage is much better than poor and sometimes also really mad families who force the orphans to steal, to be slave and to prostitition. The orphanage is needed very urgently.
Kind regards from Ildikó
Hi Ildiko
Thanks for the explanation.
I see that you now have two more big building projects - the orphanage and the secondary school, which are both going to need quite a lot of money.
As well as plans for construction, are you also looking at how they will meet the ongoing running costs of both places? Assuming the money can be found, the construction is the easy part, its keeping things going once the donors disappear that can be much harder.
I thought that there was also the intention to look at long-term sustainability for the primary school, and possibly vocational training as well?
Mary
Hi Mary,
thank you for the link you sent me concerning the Malawi orphans! I have checked it and it is really intressant. I think Stephen also will check it!
You are right, we have now two new building projects and - besides the building costs we must also look at the ongoing running costs of both primary/secondary school and the orphanage. We have thought that some of the class rooms in the secondary school - temporary - could be used as a rescue home for the neediest children, because all the class rooms still not will be needed, because there are still not so many children in secondary school age. But they are coming.
I appreciate a lot your very constructive thoughts, please go on!
Have a wonderfull Sunday!
Regards from Ildikó
Hi Ildiko and Stephen
Have you ever come across an organisation called Women fighting AIDS in Kenya (WOFAK) http://www.wofak.or.ke/index.html ?
As well as supporting women who are HIV positive they also provide support to orphans and other vulnerable children http://www.wofak.or.ke/ovc.html and have a centre in Kayole http://www.wofak.or.ke/wofakcenters.html
They appear to receive a lot of international support, so from that point of view, may not work in a way that Matopeni can copy, but they could be a good local source of advice and contacts.
There will be a lot of information out there about the various ways of supporting children and their families, some of it based around running orphanages, but much of it based on supporting children in their homes. May be worth doing a little investigation, if this is not something Stephen has explored already.
Mary
Hello Mary,
Thank you for the address to WOFAK! No, I haven't ever heard about this organization, I am checking it immediately!
Where do you find all these very good and important informations?
Thanks a lot!
Ildikó
Hi Ildiko
I usually find stuff through Google, I can't remember exactly what search words I used to find that one, but I was looking for groups in the area who assist orphans, and that one came up!
Am sure we can find information on others, but we may find that Stephen already has contact with most of the groups in his area. Am also wondering if there are any organised networks for groups that provide education and other support to children in Kenya as, if so, they may be able to give him good contacts. I know similar networks exist in Uganda, but have no idea about Kenya.
Mary
Hi Mary,
Thanks for your good suggestions and referral links that gives a proper direction we should take as per our Orphanage project. However I may start by saying that I know where Wofak.org is located at the same time Kenwa.org. This entire two are located in Kayole and Soweto respectfully they have been of great help to me as a local representative of Matopeni in that being the only organizations dealing with HIV/AID patients in Kayole I have been referring to them sick guardians/parents who are HIV/AIDS positive from Matopeni alone and many a time they get counseled from there. So far I have referred 14 patients from matopeni from what I know they only deal with the HIV infected children and their mothers and when the children are not infected they tend to take care of their mother alone. How about the Fathers, who’s taking care of them???????????????? Are they left to die of AID’s ??????????????? who know’s. I sometimes sympathize with Men no body is taking care of them.
Ok…..Basically, as Ildiko has pointed out there’s urgent need for an Orphanage. It’s ok for extended families to take care of Orphans as we have seen it in many years that we have been in operation. From our baseline survey many of these guardians are very poor; some are sick and poor at the same time nothing to eat at all at all. Some are completely illiterate; don’t have even a basic education/knowledge to start any sort of income generating activity. Many guardians are not willing to stay with the children that are not biologically theirs hence torture the orphans time and again until the children run to the street for their own safety. Recently here in Matopeni one of the Orphans and his sibling were chased away at night by their Guardian who become Crazy, He burned all their clothes and bedings. Forcing the children to run into the darkness for their life.The Orphans spent three good days outside until we went out to look for them and brought them to the house of acertain pastor who took care of them untill we re-located to a nother a guardian who taking care of them to date.
However neighbors will concur with me that when having a sick person in the house all the concentration is on that particular person and you may not get enough time to focus on other issue. Same applies to Orphans, when they are staying with a sick guardian, go without food, or bullied because of A .B.C.D they looses focus about their tomorrow.
So the mentioned problems affecting needy Kids are what are pushing us to establish a children’s home/Orphanage for the neediest Orphans. By so staying here they will not be in conduct so much to be affected with the problems affecting their guardians hence concentrates on shaping their future. This will be a haven for them to be molded to become future prominent persons in the society.
God bless you all,
Stephen.
Hi Stephen
Its good that you already know WOFAK and that they have been able to assist you in some ways. And I agree that there should be services for men too.
I am certainly not trying to say to you "don't build an orphanage", that is a decision for the members of BCC to make. I was just not sure if you had considered alternatives like those mentioned on that site from Malawi, so thought I would pass it on in case it gave you some useful ideas.
I do think that, alongside all the building plans, you need to look at how things are going to be maintained over the long-term.
One option is to look for an organisation that can provide ongoing support - this might happen, but you will always have the worry of what happens to you if they are unable to continue providing money for some reason. Could you continue without them?
The other is to look at ways for the school to earn income for itself. I don't know if it will be possible for you to become fully self-sufficient, but with good planning you may be able to become partially so, meaning that you are less reliant on outside support.
At one point, looking at school business ideas was part of the plan, but I don't know whether that is still the case or whether all the focus is now on the secondary school and orphanage?
Mary
Hi Mary,
Actually your ideas are very good and I would like to share with you how we plan to sustain our project.
At the moment we have a small Peanut butter project which is our major income generator. We would like to have bigger machines to increase the output in terms of production and enlarge our market perimeter to maximize the profit margin hence being self reliance. Due to little resources in terms of finances we are unable to expand and that is why we need initial long term support from any organization that may partner with us to enable us stabilize financially before standing on our own.
Also now that this is a school project we hope that once all the classrooms are in place, and all other learning facilities are installed many children from reach families shall be interested to join us thus enrolled and charged school fees to enable the school project run on its own. On the other hand we shall seek to find people to sponsor Orphans and other neediest children by paying school fees for them.
We also plan to have community library in partnership with African book aid. Where by all sorts of books shall be stocked at used at a fee.
We are sure from other income generated from business curried out by B.C.C with the combination of Secondary and primary school fees collected shall enable us run our programs successfully.
It’s my desire to have the two projects (Orphanage and High school) run parallel to each other since theirs that immediate need. But our hands are tied up. We need people to take up those tasks to push them so that we may realize positive results. Here in Matopeni we have two people who will be helping me in corresponding to all questions raised.
God bless you all,
Stephen.
Hi Stephen
That's great - I had no idea you had started a business making peanut butter! Maybe expansion of that, and other business ideas, is something else we whould be looking at? Although not under this task as it will take the focus away from the orphanage.
Mary
Stephen,
That was a suprise to me too!
In your last message you said "We would like to have bigger machines to increase the output in terms of production and enlarge our market perimeter to maximize the profit margin hence being self reliance. Due to little resources in terms of finances we are unable to expand and that is why we need initial long term support from any organization that may partner with us to enable us stabilize financially before standing on our own."
How much money are you talking about to expand your peanut butter operation? Have you any plans for trying to raise the money required? Such as an approach to a micro-finance loan organization?
Regards,
Ron.
Ron,
Actually we have tried our level best to seek for soft loans from various financial institutions here in Kenya. They Majorly ask for securities in terms of assets to give loans and to make maters worse and what makes us fear more going for loans is the interests to be paid on those loans it’s exorbitant and time frame to repay those loans is very short. At our level of operation we cannot afford to repay back.
Stephen.
Stephen,
Thanks I can understand the problems you face with loans and interest rates but what amount are you looking for? Is $300 or $30,000?
Regards,
Ron.
Hi Stephen
To follow on fron Ron's question, do you have a clear budget for getting the new primary school classrooms fully up and running (equipment etc), ongoing costs (teachers pay etc), and for expanding thing such as income generation? If you can create one, it will make it much easier for you to focus on all the things that need to be done, not just the secondary school and orphanage.
Mary