Have you ever imagined that millions of people lack what others take for granted?  This is very true in our country Uganda, in rural and poor slums.  Most children have never received a present or gift from anyone at any big event including the Christmas season or their birthdays.

Namara Brenda (12) lost her parents when she was just three years old from HIV/AIDS.  She was left in the care of her aging grandmother in her little hut in the outskirts of Kampala. Last Christmas she was not sure of whether they would eat or not while the rich family neighboring them was throwing meat and ripe bananas in the garbage can. Namara and her grand mother were saved by friend of her late parents who brought them what to eat on Christmas Eve.

There are many people especially children who are living the lives of uncertainty and when you talk of presents is something unheard of.  Despite of this, one thing is clear. You can change the situation of children like Namara this coming Christmas.

Gifts like clothes, mattresses, shoes, balloons, goats, pigs, cows, toys, books were cited as one of the perfect gift they would love to receive during this Christmas. With about $50 or more you can buy a X-Mas gift for the poor, orphaned and abandoned child in Uganda.

Think of the way to give, think of the children this Christmas.

For the Children,

Ntenga Moses

Executive Director

Joy for Children - Uganda

Recently, we led more than 200 children on the street to peacefully demonstrate and promote their rights. This was done in the commemoration of the day of African child that is celebrated very June 16.

On that day, traffic came to a sttand still as the children matched on the streets of Capital Kampala. It is evident that children participation in issues affecting them has a profound impact on their growth, development and well-being. Children participated in addressing the media partinent issues affecting on television, print media and hundreds of local FM radios.

It was a great day for the children in Uganda. Read more

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Poverty is fundamental cause of violation of human rights, stretching far beyong material deprivation.

UNICEF's state of the world children 2005 report proposes the following work definition of child poverty: Children living in poverty exprience deprevation of the material, spiritual and emortional resources needed to survive, develop and thrive, leaving them unable to enjoy their rights, achieve their full potential or participate as full or equally members of the society.

Poverty is a attribute of the environment in which children live, a situation where the families and communities are unable to nurture and protect children and where children are unable to develop their full potential. These deprivations cause suffering in the short term and hinder development in long term. Lack of adquate nutrition or access to safe water and sanitation makes children vulnerable to sickness and diarrhoea, reducing their resistance to disease.

At Joy for children-Uganda strives to ensure that children living in poverty are given an opportunity, to access clean and safe water, education, clothings, food and nutrition, and health to enable them realise their full potential.

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Kampala Uganda, On Saturday June 14, 2008, we are holding a Child Rights Promotion Walk in the capital Kampala a head of the day of Adrican Child. The Walk will start from Centenary park on Jinja Road to Bugand Road Primary School grounds. More than 300 people are expected to attend. The purpose of the walk is to highlight the plight of children and a call to an end all forms of abuse, neglect and exploitation. Children in Uganda continue to struggle with abduction, disappearance, prostitution, trafficking, sacrifice, defilement, forced labour and homelessness. There are reports of child disappearances, mostly in and around Kampala, with no sufficient explanation as to why, how, to where and at whose hands children disappear. The majority of the children continue to live in situations characterized by lack of essential requirements for healthy growth, whether physical, mental or spiritual. According to the Uganda Human Rights Commission Annual report 2006, Child maintenance and neglect was among the most-violated rights with 25%. 15,385 cases of defilement were reported to Police in 2006, an increase in 23% from 2005 figure of 12545 according to Annual Crime Report of Uganda Police Force. Children’s access to health services remains far from being achieved. This situation is more pronounced in child headed families. The majority of the children born with HIV/AIDS cannot access anti-retroviral treatment resulting into early deaths. Baylor College of Medicine (Children’s foundation) estimates that children’s life span is about three years if they don’t access treatment. About 66% of them die before they are three years while 75% die with in five years. There are about 140,000 children living with HIV/AIDS, only 8,000 are receiving anti-retroviral treatment. A total of 50,000 children need the treatment. UNICEF estimates that only 20% of Ugandan Children who complete six years of schooling attain the required proficiency levels. It also estimated that 7,000-12,000 Ugandan Children are involved in commercial sex, 90% of them girls and 47% orphans. More needs to be done to protect the children in Uganda.

As we move toward the Annual Africa Malaria Day on 24th April 2008, the disease that has and still claiming millions of lives around the world, we need to take quick decisions to save the African babies from a disease that is highly preventable and entirely curable.
We need to support efforts that will bring the disease down and give a chance to children to live. In malaria kills about 320 every day and close to 220 are children under the age of five.

This time round make a committement to donate to our campaign or buy Insecticide Treated Nets (ITNs)at about $8 each and save more than six children. ITNs have a capacity to repel mosquito once it is hang in the room. And in African setting all children sleep in the same room.

Joy for Children will coordinate the efforts to ensure that children are protected. Malaria is not only an African problem, and global cooperation is needed to defeat it.

We are targeting to rise about US $ 2,000 for bed nets and awareness creation for this year's commemoration. As we promote the human rights right to life becomes paramount.

Together We Can Beat Malaria.

Ntenga Moses
Director, Joy for Children-Uganda

 

AIDS in Uganda was first diagnosed in early 80s around the fishing areas. Many people did not know the disease neither its cause for many years. Blames were put on the lake and the African witchcraft for many couple of years. Even after it was diagnosed many people still feared to seek medical attention for opportunistic infection fearing stigma as the ARVS were not in existence. Cultural practices coupled with ignorance and polygamous lives, the disease in some areas whipped out the entire family.  AIDS did not discriminate it killed the rich and the poor, the urban and the rural, the illiterate and the literate they all fell pray to this preventable to but incurable disease.

After many people had died, massive campaign to educate the population on the causes and possible prevention of the disease was carried out and ARVS were made accessible to the worlds poor. However the effects of this scourge still remain as many people still fall pray to this does due to a number of factors including poverty. The main effects of the disease can be seen on the faces of many children, women and grandmothers who struggle every day to survive.

Close to 2 million children in Uganda have lost one or both parents due to HIV/AIDS and the biggest burden of looking after these children has been naturally shifted to the elder child in the home, a widow or an aging grandmothers- the unsung Heroes of Africa.

Despite of all these we can still do something for the sake of humanity. Joy for Children-Uganda, has taken on the challenge to aid the people who are infected and affected by HIV/AIDS, the majority of these are households headed by children, widows and grandparents. Our work entirely depends on the giving of people around the world.

Our simple but effective projects such child sponsorship, donation of goats, pigs, and cows, chicken has help to bring hope on the lives of many families. What does it take to give? In Uganda you can sponsor a Child at $30 per month or less, buy goat or a pig at $50, a cow at $300 and chicken at less than $5. By giving what you can you will be amazed at the change you will cause by bring life and hope to a family. You will know the family you support and you can offer visit to them and feel part of their family