Fr. Kasoma Speech
April 28, 2011
Good evening ladies and gentlemen.
Thank you for coming to the “Celebration of Hope” event.
I feel greatly honored to be standing here before you to
share with you a few points about myself and my country.
I am Fr. Aloysius Kasoma from Uganda. I was
born in 1959 in Uganda and I
have lived there for the most part of my life.
I did my primary school and senior secondary school in Uganda after
which I went to Austria/Tirol to study German and monastic life
for one year. When I realized that monastic
life was not my calling I moved to
Rome
and joined the Pontifical urban university to start my seminary
formation. I spent five years in Rome, without going back home and I obtained a
bachelor’s degree in Philosophy and a bachelor’s degree in
Theology. After my studies in
Rome, I went back to
Uganda
in 1986 and in December 1987 I was ordained priest of the
Catholic Church belonging to Masaka Diocese.
Since then I have been working in rural parishes with peasant
farmers as pastor and social worker. I have
been doing this job for 24 years. This has
helped me to acquired knowledge and experience in working with
rural communities in order to improve their living standards and
quality of life.
MY COUNTRY
Uganda is a small country in the heart of
Africa. It lies astride the equator on
241,000 Sq. Km. It has a population of about
30 million people. It is a beautiful country
with rolling hills and beautiful valleys.
The economic activities of the people:
About 80% of the population of Uganda
is composed of peasant farmers growing coffee, bananas, cotton
and corn, practicing subsistence faming: that is they consume
what they produce and have very little to sell.
This implies that the incomes of the people are very low.
The per capita income is about $100 a year, which means
that millions of people live with less than one dollar a day.
The food situation is that, although we get enough
rainfall, families can hardly feed their members adequately.
Many families get one meal a day and many children spend
a full day at school with empty stomachs. It
always makes me sick to see kids lying in the grass during lunch
hours to sleep away their hunger and get ready to go back to
class for their afternoon lessons and after class to walk 3-4
miles back home. When they get home they do
not expect to get a soup or candy. They right
away go to the well to fetch water and this means walking
another mile or two. Others go to collect
firewood otherwise there is no supper which is the main meal of
the day. In many villages there is no running
water or electricity. Poor nutrition has had
very bad repercussions in the lives of many children.
Many of them are physically and intellectually stunted.
Some people might wonder why people do not
work more to get enough food. People have
land and they do work but they are using very primitive methods
of farming. They use their own hands to till
the land. They do not have tractors or other
modern farming equipment that would help them increase
production. This situation is unlikely to
change in the foreseeable future unless developed countries
intervene to make African politicians realize the real need of
their people and try to work on them. African
leaders, instead of buying tractors for their people, are buying
jet fighters, not to protect their people but to keep themselves
in power, which is very sad.
PROBLEMS HINDERING THE ECONONOMIC GROWTH OF
(UGANDA) MY AREA
Persistent
Conflict: Uganda had had its fair share of
armed conflict. Many of you can probably
recall Idi Amin who ruled
Uganda
for 8 years in the 70’s. This dictator named
himself the King of Scotland. Sometime back
there was a movie called “The Last King of Scotland”; it was
about this guy. The war that toppled him went
through the southern central part of the country where I come
from. Thirty years later the remnants of that
war can still be seen in my town of
Masaka, e. g. the bombed out Town Hall.
What cannot be seen is the AIDS that came with it.
The north and northeast regions of Uganda have in the recent past
endured persistent conflict for many years. A
rebel group called the Lord’s Resistance movement waged a brutal
war against the central government authorities, targeting
civilians and children. The conflict saw
major violations of human rights against civilians, destruction
of infrastructure and reduced access to basic social services
and also paralyzed economic activity throughout those regions.
Fortunately, there has been
relative peace over the past couple of years as talks between
the government of Uganda and the LRA were held in Juba, in South Sudan. Despite a number of false
dawns and much internal wrangling on the LRA side, a
comprehensive agreement to end the war is yet to be signed.
But the war has ended.
Poverty: Poverty
continues to be the greatest challenge. Uganda
remains one of the poorest countries in the world, ranked 144th
out of 177 countries in terms of human development.
31% of the population lives in absolute poverty and
26% are chronically poor. The majority of the
Ugandans (80%) rely on smallholder agriculture as the main
source of livelihood, and access to land is a major
determinant of food security, especially among women.
Uganda’s predominantly agrarian
economy suffers from low income, limited diversification,
environmental degradation, world market volatility,
persistent insecurity and the impact of HIV/AIDS.
Efforts to stimulate innovation in agricultural
production and pro-poor markets occur in an economic context
of market liberalization and privatization while the
situation is often aggravated by the scourge of corruption
and abuse of public office.
Disease: The main
killer diseases in
Uganda
are malaria, HIV/AIDS, diarrhea and water-borne diseases.
Malaria kills many people, especially children,
causing a very high infant mortality rate.
This brings down the average life expectancy of Ugandans to
44 years. There is so far no vaccine to stop
the malaria. People use simple methods to
protect themselves against malaria. They sleep
under mosquito nets. It is at this juncture
that I would like to thank everyone who contributed to the
mosquito nets drive that was conducted recently.
The parents and students of St. Denis S.S.S. received
them and are very grateful to you all.
HIV/AIDS has claimed the lives of many people in
Uganda
and many more are still dying, leaving behind helpless
orphans and many vulnerable children.
It is against this background that
St. John the Baptist parish in
Makondo,
Uganda in 1994
started St. Denis senior secondary school to offer education to
the children of the area, regardless of their orphan status or
religious affiliation. We strongly believe
that it is through education and enterprise that we can break
the cycle of poverty, ignorance and dependency to create a
culture of self-reliance and development. The
parents, in spite of their meager resources, worked tirelessly
to put the first building in place, doing most of the work with
their hands. As the school was on the verge
of closing because of lack of funds, by divine providence we
came in touch with Into Your Hands Africa.
This organization resuscitated, so to say, the school and its
development is back on track. Into Your
Hands, which is the entire community of Christ the King, is
sponsoring 150 children. Most of these are
orphans and very needy children. You have,
through IYH, have put in place magnificent buildings, like the
Fr. Christopher Renner Library and the newly constructed boys’
dormitory. Many other projects, like the
water project, are going on to improve the infrastructure of the
school. On behalf of Makondo, accept our
sincere and heart-felt thanks for all that has been done.
God Bless you all.
Into Your Hands Africa is now taking a new
trend. In order to avoid creating a spirit of
dependence, we are now putting in place projects that will make
the school self-sustaining. That means when
time comes for IYH to pull out, St. Denis will continue to
operate normally using the funds from the projects established
at the school. These projects include a dairy
cattle project, a banana plantation, a school canteen, an
internet and secretarial bureau and a posho mill.
The ultimate goal is education for all at affordable
fees.
However, even if the fees will be low the
parents and students will have to meet some costs like
scholastic requirements, medical bills and domestic needs like
good sleeping arrangements and so on and so forth.
As a measure to limit dependence on sponsors and to
create a spirit of self-reliance among the students IYH offered
to sponsor the Send a Piglet/Goat Home Project.
This project was proposed by the students themselves
because the pigs are easy to raise and they make good money
quickly.
How does the program work?
- The selected students for a particular
phase get training on how to raise pigs. This
includes feeding, cleanliness, signs of diseases,
treatments, contacts with veterinary officers, how to handle
pregnant pigs, what to do when the sow is delivering and how
to look after the piglets.
- After training of the students we
build a shelter for the pig. In order to
stress ownership of the project, the students contribute the
wooden poles and grass thatch.
- When the pig shelter is ready a female
piglet is provided to the student, which he raises up to
full maturity. When it delivers the first
litter, the student gives back one piglet to the program and
this is given to another student. Another
piglet goes to the boar owner. The student
with the sow is free to sell all the remaining piglets or
can decide to keep all/some and raise them until they get
big after which he sells the to the butcher.
All the time we hire a veterinary officer
to inspect and give drugs to the animals whenever necessary.
We also have a project coordinator ensuring the smooth
running of the project.
So far we have 60 students who have
benefitted from the project and we have 70 students in the
pipeline. 30 students are from Makondo
parish, 25 are from my new parish called St. Charles Lwanga
Namabaale parish. 15 students will receive
goats. These are mainly Muslims because their
faith does not allow them to keep pigs.
The market is insatiable.
There is a very big demand for pigs and piglets both
locally and in neighboring areas. Trucks
drive to the villages looking for pigs to take to the bigger
markets in cities and towns. Even if we gave
out 500 piglets there is no fear of the market being saturated.
The demand is there and will continue to be there because
the population growth of
Uganda
is 3.4%.
HOW HAVE STUDENTS BENEFITTED?
The first beneficiaries of the project are
able to pay part of their school fees; some have paid for their
school requirements. One student caked
Kazibwe bought a bicycle which he uses to ride to school.
Some have bought mattresses to improve their sleeping
arrangements. The piglet project has helped
to make money available for a sibling to go to school.
The students have started a savings scheme whereby they
put money aside to pay for their higher education needs.
To me this project is stimulating economic growth in the
community. For example, a shop selling pig
feed has been established, shops selling veterinary drugs are
getting more, the local shops are getting more customers because
the community is financially empowered. It is
like throwing a stone in a pond and the ripples will reach very
far. I think the time has come; the need is
now to raise $7000 to cover the costs for the 70 new
beneficiaries. Allow me to thank you for your
generosity in advance.
May the good Lord
reward you abundantly.
Fr. Aloysius Kasoma, In-Country Director,
Into Your Hands-Uganda
