2nd National Conference on Orphans and Other ... - FHI 360

VIDEO SCREENING
Rays of Hope:
Women’s Struggles to Care for the Orphans in Uganda
The morning session of Day 2 closed with a video on Uganda’s experience in addressing the OVC issue.
Prior to the screening UNICEF Regional OVC Advisor Ms Pelucy Nfambirweki (a Ugandan national)
provided some background information as recorded below. (Circumstances did not allow for copies of
this video to be distributed at the conference.)
Video cover blurb
This is a story of positive development and hope; a story
of a remarkable collection of women and their achievements
over the last 15 years in fulfillment of the rights of
orphaned children.
Initially a response to the alarming number of destitute
orphans of the war, post-war insurgency and HIV/AIDSrelated
mortality escalated the crisis thus creating more
need for deliberate interventions. The building of alliances
and increase in outreach and capacity have developed the
Uganda Women’s Effort to Save Orphans (UWESO) into
a formidable safety network.
The UWESO model of community-based approaches
to mitigating the socio-economic impact of HIV/AIDS has
brought “rays of hope” for this future generation, their
grandmothers and entire society. The experiences of these
people, brought from situations of hopelessness to levels
of confidence where they are eagerly looking out to a bright
future, are enormous.
Production facilitated by UNICEF. Co-facilitators: Embassy of Belgium, IFAD, UWESO, USAID.
A production of Media Forum, 2001. Duration 30 minutes.
Additional background given by Ms Pelucy Nfambirweki
Rays of Hope tells the story of how Uganda is grappling with its orphan population of over two
million. It addresses the very same issues being addressed in this conference.
Uganda is one of the few countries in the world that has seen a decline in the HIV infection rate
– from 35% in 1990 to 6% in 2002. This confirms that there is hope for us to fight the epidemic,
and to reach out to the children and improve their lives. Initially we were panicking because the
numbers were big – Uganda having experienced turmoil due to war and armed conflict, which was
heightened by HIV/AIDS. We then realised that to fight the epidemic, we had to fight poverty, and
the bulk of this video shows how grandmothers are coping with looking after 10 or more orphans
(35 in one case) and what we can learn from them. One thing we learn is that institutionalisation in
an orphanage in Uganda which catered for only 50 children cost five times more than it costs for
100 000 children to be cared for by a sister, brother or grandmother. Having realised this, we also
realised that meetings, workshops and seminars do not bring food or caregivers to the table.
After lunch the plenary split into five working groups to formulate recommendations on different
aspects of the national OVC programme. The group work continued for the remainder of Day 2.
52 <strong>2nd</strong> <strong>National</strong> <strong>Conference</strong> on Orphans and Other Vulnerable Children – Windhoek, Namibia, 25-27 June 2002: Full Report