Love and Care

BY BILL OKETCH boketch@ug.nationmedia.com

NAPAK. Karamoja is in the news again. Wait! Unlike the familiar story for which this sub-region of north

eastern Uganda has come to be linked to for generations: drought and hunger – this particular story is unique. It’s a story of hope.

More than 300 youth with a vision of how

to make their community a better place will have the chance to make a positive change in Napak District. At least 119 youth; both male and female between the ages of 14 and 35, are currently undergoing training in vocation skills and entrepreneurship at Kobulin Youth Vocational Training Institute in Lorengecora town council, Napak District.

The training is part of the youth vocational

skills development project funded by European Union and implemented by DanChurchAid-led consortium, Institute for International Cooperation and Development (C&D) and Caritas Kotido diocese. One of the facilities where this life-changing intervention is being implemented was established by the Uganda’s ministry of Gender, Labour and Social Development.

The three-year project that commenced in June 2016 will ensure that more than900 youth are trained by end 2019 . The first lot of the beneficiaries graduated last year and are currently delivering services to the community. Under this current second phase of the project, 30 female youth are undergoing training in hair dressing and beautification while 40 male and female

are doing tailoring and garment cutting. At least30 energetic youth are being trained in brick laying and concrete practice and another 19 in carpentry and joinery.

Angelina Lochoro, 27, is a tailoring student,

who feels so proud of the project. “Before I came for this training, life was not

really very easy, especially when I was a young mother. I finished my Senior Four but I had nobody to help me to go for any course. I conceived when I was 18 years then I gave birth when I was 19,” she says.

Lochoro later produced two children. Her

first born are twins who are followed by a boy. “So I had to stay home, work hard to make sure these children eat and to make sure they go to school and the children’s father had very many women, so I had to leave him. Currently, I stay with my sister,” she narrates.

“Now when this advert of Kobulin came, I applied and I was recruited. When I came here I was told that this training will enable us to get some skills whereby in the end we can be given machines to go and make garments. And also this machine will enable me to make clothes for my children.”

A trainee or a beneficiary spends six months

at the training centre to complete the course before graduating. After the graduation, they go back to their respective areas and display the skills they have acquired, supported by start-up toolkits received by the Programme. Beneficiaries with new equipment/supplies needed to get the business up and running can better fight the high start-up costs for a new venture..

Stella Owiny Achia, 20, is offering hair

dressing and beautification. “I’m sure I will live a happy life after finishing this course because the person who was paying my school fees passed away, so I had to remain home just loitering,” she says.

Owiny Achia dropped out of school in

2017 after her father who was responsible for paying her fees passed on. She was in Senior Three at Moroto High School at the time. “Now I am seeing the life that I’m going to live outside will be a bit better unlike the life that I was going to live before I had come here,” Owiny says. “If you are able to make at least one head in a salon, you can get something for survival.”

Mr Moses Kalle Olum, mobiliser and

counselor with C&D, says: “We [often] look at their level of vulnerability during recruitment. For example, we look at child mothers; we look at returnees because Napak registers

the highest level of returnees in Karamoja.” Lorengecora town council’s Community

Development Officer, Simon Peter Lemukol, says the intervention is well-timed.

“Generally, in Karamoja, the youth are

facing a number of challenges. Key among them is the issue of unemployment and this unemployment is attributed to the high rate of illiteracy,” he says. Secondly, there is an issue of lawlessness and then there is also a challenge of gender base violence aspect. That gender base violence aspect is able to create tensions among families and as a result of that you find that the children equally suffer; sometimes those ones who have been supported in education will definitely drop out of school,” he explains.

However, the Community Development

Officer acknowledges that the European Union-funded initiative is already making positive impacts in Napak.

Actually when this reporter ventured the area

he found youth who benefited from the first phase of the training busy on their tailoring machines; some have even opened their own workshops, where they make chairs and tables while students currently on course were out for their training on work. “Those are the skills are talked about that we want to exploit from them. Eventually, after some time you realise that the environment has changed totally,” Mr Lemukol says.

C&D is an established NGO that has

employed 150 people in Karamoja with over 15 active projects..

YOUTH HOPE TO BETTER COMMUNITY WITH EU-FUNDED PROJECT

Carpentry and joinery students busy joining two pieces of wood during class hour.

BCP students out for training on work. PHOTO BY BILL OKETCH

Students offering hair dressing and beautification work on their colleague’s hair at Kobulin Youth Vocational Training Institute on May 4 2018. PHOT

CO-OPERATION & DEVELOPMENT