Mokhtar Mohmed Abdallah's Story Script (pdf 83Kb) - Board of ...

Script for Mokhtar Mohmed Abdallah’s story
4 minutes
1. Let Justice Flow is a three year campaign of Presbyterian World
Development, supporting Tearfund and Christian Aid projects that
give people hope for the future by equipping them to find justice
today.
2. The focus this year is on Egypt where, as in so many other countries,
the gap between rich and poor is growing steadily and where in the
last two years the political landscape has changed dramatically.
3. Mokhtar Mohmed Abdallah is 38 years old, and he lives in Dar El
Salam, 100kms to the south west of Cairo. He is married to Dalia,
and has four children all below ten.
4. A trained carpenter he had a steady job in a furniture workshop and
was just about making ends meet. While the revolution brought
hopes and dreams of a better Egypt these soon withered for
Mokthar when the furniture orders simply stopped coming in.
5. Within a very short time, Mokhtar, like many of his friends was out
of work and had no income. He felt, he says, “like I was suffocating.
I was out of work for nearly a year and while I got occassional work
it was not enough to keep my family.”
6. Already working in the community alongside the local church was
an Egyptian Christian development organisation, CEOSS. Mokhtar’s
wife, Dalia, had been attending parenting classes they ran and that
is where she heard about the emergency cash for work scheme that
had been started. She told Mokhtar who immediately went along to
get involved.

7. These innovative cash for work schemes are being run by local
people for local people and involve employing 10-15 workers on
short term projects to generate a small income, and complete vital
work identified by the community.
8. In Dar El Salam the schemes were providing workers to rebuild and
repair the school and the police station, both of which had been
badly damaged in the immediate aftermath of the revolution.
9. Mokhtar was put to work immediately repairing desks and doors in
the school, and although the work was short-term, it turned his life
around. He is proud that his two older children now attend the
school he helped to restore.
10. Through the project he has also made firm friends with others in
similar difficulties, like Mahmoud. Working side by side has helped
create a new confident community that is growing together for the
good of everyone and putting the turbulent past behind it.
11. “Being able to talk and share my problems with others has helped
me and made me feel better,” explains Mokhtar. “Because we all
faced similar difficulties it was good to share and talk about our
problems.
12. “In our society where there is a lack of money it can make us yell
and be violent and scold our children. Because of the help I have
received I go home now and I am happy and pleasant.”
13. Life is still hard and Mokhtar is conitnues to search for full-time
work. But the difference in his life is huge. He now feels he is part
of something much bigger than himself. He is helping to build a
new community, a new Egypt.

14. “It’s the freedom to express myself. If I get one pound a day and
have freedom it’s better than having ten pounds a day and being
down trodden and oppressed.”
15. By setting up local development groups, and then training them to
take their own initiatives people in Egypt are being helped to tackle
the roots of poverty in their own communities.
16. Presbyterian World Development, with your support for ‘Let Justice
Flow’ is enabling Christian Aid and Tearfund to help groups like
CEOSS in taking practical action in creating a more just and hope
filled society through people having the skills and confidence to
speak up and speak out.