Sustainable and key support for Kibagare Community

Greetings from St Martins School and the Kibagare community,

It has been a busy few weeks since the year started and we have made good progress as far as our community initiatives go and we are looking forward to more engagements with the community.

Late last year and at the beginning of this year, there were two fires in the Kibagare slum which affected 39 households and had one serious injury and one fatality. The community team was able to assess the effect of the fire and the needs of the community. The 39 households did not salvage anything after the fire incident and they had to spend their days and nights in the cold. Some of the children missed out on school during the reopening of schools. 

Some of the families have been able to rebuild their homes through the help of the local leadership and also through the assessment there was an urgent need for food, household items, and school materials including uniforms for the affected children.

The school was able to provide food baskets to the 39 affected households and the 4 children were also given school uniforms and learning materials to continue their education. We also provided mattresses and blankets to the affected households. 

16 cooperatives started the year in the Voluntary and savings groups, and so far the groups have 323 members. additional groups were formed through community sensitization and additional 21 people were recruited in the cooperatives group.

The voluntary and savings loan groups have been trained in January and February on the importance and benefits of cooperative groups, and small income-generating activities to help boost savings and improve their livelihoods. 44 group leaders were also trained on their roles as leaders, adherence to the group constitution and guidelines, and how best to manage the different and difficult dynamics that affect cooperative groups.

Men are also encouraged to join in groups and support each other, to this end 21 men from the slum have been able to form and register a group with the social development office and are currently saving and loaning among themselves voluntarily. Most of them are engaging in small skilled businesses and through the cooperative they can save and loan each other with the intent of diversifying their businesses and also have a safety net where they can air their issues.

We are also continuing to offer counseling and therapy to individuals and group members from this community here due to the various challenges they have to deal with on a daily. Students from both our schools benefit from the sessions done individually and as groups with a focus on peer pressure, study skills, identity exploration, self-awareness, drug use and abuse, social media, and behavioral changes. These sessions help us identify gaps and look for ways to help our students and the community cope and address the challenges even with their limited resources.

There are still challenges facing the implementation of community initiatives and also a lack of sustainable and stable incomes for most of the families living in the slum making it difficult to feed their families and also save for the knowns and unknowns. 

Despite the challenges, we are grateful for the strides made so far and we look forward to doing more. We will be sure to share the updates.

Thank you for your continued support.

Alfred M Aswani

Links:

• School Website
• Community Website