Two years later, Katine locals reaping the fruits
Nov 22, 2009
I was finding it difficult to educate my children after my husband passed on. When I attended the African Medical and Research Foundation (AMREF) sessions on how to save and borrow money using a savings scheme, I benefited a lot.
By Simon Naulele
I was finding it difficult to educate my children after my husband passed on. When I attended the African Medical and Research Foundation (AMREF) sessions on how to save and borrow money using a savings scheme, I benefited a lot.
I can now buy scholastic materials and food and pay medical bills for my children,†says Rose Akello.
“I could not understand why my children were falling sick. They would develop terrible stomach problems, get diarrhoea and skin rash. This is because we used to drink water from a swamp until AMREF came to our rescue,†adds Alugeresia Abuto.
These and many more are the testimonies residents of Katine in Soroti district give in praise of Katine Community Partnership Project (KCPP).
The project, implemented by AMREF, is a rural initiative designed to improve the lives of the locals using the five interventions of health, education, water and sanitation, livelihood and empowerment. It is funded by The Guardian, UK, and Barclays Bank.
Katine, with a population of 25,000 people is one of the poorest sub-counties in Soroti district. It was badly affected by the Lord’s Resistance Army insurgency in 2003.
The infrastructure and all sources of livelihood were destroyed, leaving the people hopeless.
However, hope in this remote area, 25km northeast of Soroti town, is slowly returning, thanks to the KCPP project.
“I hope the Government uses what is happening here as a model elsewhere in the country to change lives,†said John Varley, the Barclays Bank executive officer.
Varley, who was in the company of Alan Rusbridger, The Guardian executive editor and Joshua Kyallo, the AMREF country director, made the remarks during a tour of the project in Soroti recently.
He said KCPP has positively changed the lives of people in the communities through improved health and sanitation programmes, which reduced diarrhoea cases among children above five of age.
John Enomu, the LC5 councillor for Katine sub-county, said more needs to be done.
“I am told out of the sh10b, some money is used in Kenya, where the AMREF head office is and some in Kampala to cover administrative costs. Only a small portion is sent here,†said Enomu.
However, he said the project has achieved a lot in terms of health, education, water and sanitation.
“They have built classrooms, toilets and bought furniture.
The cases being reported to health units have also reduced compared to the previous years. We attribute this to AMREF intervention,†he added.
Enomu noted that AMREF is not involving politicians in the project yet when it comes to lobbying, it is politician, who can sell the project better.
“They say planning begins from down. If they do not involve us then you are not involving our people because we are accountable to them,†he added.
The group also toured Ojom Community Primary School, where they commissioned a classroom block and planted trees.
AMREF has had a number of interventions at the school, which include construction of a classroom block, improved pit latrines, teaching children to make tippy-taps (a locally made device in which a jerry can and a rope are used for washing hands) and locally made sanitary pads.
Simon Mugenyi, the project communications officer, said it took five months to put up the classrooms at the cost of sh40m.
He said the project also distributed 290 desks, trained teachers in personal hygiene and sanitation and making sanitary pads.
“We sew pieces of old cotton cloth,†said Jessica Apolot, a pupil at the school said.
Mugenyi said they constructed 13 latrines in 13 schools and five ECOSAN latrines, increasing the schools’ sanitation and hygiene coverage to 79% from 25% at project inception.
“These interventions are expected to improve the learning environment at the school,†Oketch said.
He said they had also trained teachers and the school management committee members to equip them with necessary skills and improved management of the school.
Varley applauded the interventions and said the growth of the community largely depends on education.
Rusbridger representing The Guardian newspaper which is read by over 30 million people worldwide, said they are delighted to be associated with the communities in Katine.
He donated two small torches to two outstanding pupils in the school.
The project, in partnership with CARE and Uganda Women Effort to Save Orphans, has also set up eight voluntary savings and loan associations.
The team also visited Abia farmers’ group, where they witnessed the process of lending and borrowing money at a meeting held under a mango tree.
They visited Abia borehole, which was set up by AMREF to provide safe water to communities.
Mugenyi said the group met members of the water management committee that was set up by AMREF.
More than 300 people (about 40 households) now have access to clean water from the borehole. This showed a 66% increase from 42% at the start of the project in 2007.
At Tiriri Health Centre IV, Varley and Rusbridger witnessed the work AMREF has done to give quality healthcare to patients, including the use of village health trainers.
“The health trainers have helped to reduce the pressure the few health workers were facing as a result of having to attend to too many patients,†said Joseph Otim, the AMREF health officer.
He said the project has given refresher training on management and treatment of HIV/AIDS and malaria to the health workers.
“We have trained them in prevention of Mother-to-Child transmission ,†said Otim. He says since the project started immunisation coverage against measles, polio, tuberculosis, whooping cough, hepatitis B, tetanus, haemophilus influenza and diphtheria cases have increased to 95.9% from 43%.
Mugenyi said out of 9,245 children below five years, who visited the health centre in the first year of the project and 8,544 in the second year, diarrhoea cases have gone down to 501 and 162 respectively.
“The village health trainers act as a link between communities and the health centres,†Mugenyi explains.
Francis Ecel, a psychiatric clinical officer in charge of the health centre, says the inadequate supply of drugs remains their biggest challenge.
“People working with the Government should help send drugs to Katine Health Centre to improve on the health condition of the people so that they can live a productive life,†urged Rusbridger.
Kyallo called for empowerment if communities are to develop through controlling diseases that hinder development.
I was finding it difficult to educate my children after my husband passed on. When I attended the African Medical and Research Foundation (AMREF) sessions on how to save and borrow money using a savings scheme, I benefited a lot.
I can now buy scholastic materials and food and pay medical bills for my children,†says Rose Akello.
“I could not understand why my children were falling sick. They would develop terrible stomach problems, get diarrhoea and skin rash. This is because we used to drink water from a swamp until AMREF came to our rescue,†adds Alugeresia Abuto.
These and many more are the testimonies residents of Katine in Soroti district give in praise of Katine Community Partnership Project (KCPP).
The project, implemented by AMREF, is a rural initiative designed to improve the lives of the locals using the five interventions of health, education, water and sanitation, livelihood and empowerment. It is funded by The Guardian, UK, and Barclays Bank.
Katine, with a population of 25,000 people is one of the poorest sub-counties in Soroti district. It was badly affected by the Lord’s Resistance Army insurgency in 2003.
The infrastructure and all sources of livelihood were destroyed, leaving the people hopeless.
However, hope in this remote area, 25km northeast of Soroti town, is slowly returning, thanks to the KCPP project.
“I hope the Government uses what is happening here as a model elsewhere in the country to change lives,†said John Varley, the Barclays Bank executive officer.
Varley, who was in the company of Alan Rusbridger, The Guardian executive editor and Joshua Kyallo, the AMREF country director, made the remarks during a tour of the project in Soroti recently.
He said KCPP has positively changed the lives of people in the communities through improved health and sanitation programmes, which reduced diarrhoea cases among children above five of age.
John Enomu, the LC5 councillor for Katine sub-county, said more needs to be done.
“I am told out of the sh10b, some money is used in Kenya, where the AMREF head office is and some in Kampala to cover administrative costs. Only a small portion is sent here,†said Enomu.
However, he said the project has achieved a lot in terms of health, education, water and sanitation.
“They have built classrooms, toilets and bought furniture.
The cases being reported to health units have also reduced compared to the previous years. We attribute this to AMREF intervention,†he added.
Enomu noted that AMREF is not involving politicians in the project yet when it comes to lobbying, it is politician, who can sell the project better.
“They say planning begins from down. If they do not involve us then you are not involving our people because we are accountable to them,†he added.
The group also toured Ojom Community Primary School, where they commissioned a classroom block and planted trees.
AMREF has had a number of interventions at the school, which include construction of a classroom block, improved pit latrines, teaching children to make tippy-taps (a locally made device in which a jerry can and a rope are used for washing hands) and locally made sanitary pads.
Simon Mugenyi, the project communications officer, said it took five months to put up the classrooms at the cost of sh40m.
He said the project also distributed 290 desks, trained teachers in personal hygiene and sanitation and making sanitary pads.
“We sew pieces of old cotton cloth,†said Jessica Apolot, a pupil at the school said.
Mugenyi said they constructed 13 latrines in 13 schools and five ECOSAN latrines, increasing the schools’ sanitation and hygiene coverage to 79% from 25% at project inception.
“These interventions are expected to improve the learning environment at the school,†Oketch said.
He said they had also trained teachers and the school management committee members to equip them with necessary skills and improved management of the school.
Varley applauded the interventions and said the growth of the community largely depends on education.
Rusbridger representing The Guardian newspaper which is read by over 30 million people worldwide, said they are delighted to be associated with the communities in Katine.
He donated two small torches to two outstanding pupils in the school.
The project, in partnership with CARE and Uganda Women Effort to Save Orphans, has also set up eight voluntary savings and loan associations.
The team also visited Abia farmers’ group, where they witnessed the process of lending and borrowing money at a meeting held under a mango tree.
They visited Abia borehole, which was set up by AMREF to provide safe water to communities.
Mugenyi said the group met members of the water management committee that was set up by AMREF.
More than 300 people (about 40 households) now have access to clean water from the borehole. This showed a 66% increase from 42% at the start of the project in 2007.
At Tiriri Health Centre IV, Varley and Rusbridger witnessed the work AMREF has done to give quality healthcare to patients, including the use of village health trainers.
“The health trainers have helped to reduce the pressure the few health workers were facing as a result of having to attend to too many patients,†said Joseph Otim, the AMREF health officer.
He said the project has given refresher training on management and treatment of HIV/AIDS and malaria to the health workers.
“We have trained them in prevention of Mother-to-Child transmission ,†said Otim. He says since the project started immunisation coverage against measles, polio, tuberculosis, whooping cough, hepatitis B, tetanus, haemophilus influenza and diphtheria cases have increased to 95.9% from 43%.
Mugenyi said out of 9,245 children below five years, who visited the health centre in the first year of the project and 8,544 in the second year, diarrhoea cases have gone down to 501 and 162 respectively.
“The village health trainers act as a link between communities and the health centres,†Mugenyi explains.
Francis Ecel, a psychiatric clinical officer in charge of the health centre, says the inadequate supply of drugs remains their biggest challenge.
“People working with the Government should help send drugs to Katine Health Centre to improve on the health condition of the people so that they can live a productive life,†urged Rusbridger.
Kyallo called for empowerment if communities are to develop through controlling diseases that hinder development.