Ugandan lauds sponsorship

Richmond Wandera Tear Fund boy and his wife Rosette at the Faith Community Church. August 2013 Wanganui Chronicle Photograph by Stuart Munro

They were ill and desperate, stealing and fighting to survive - until the lives of 8-year-old Richmond Wandera and his family were changed through Tear Fund sponsorship.

The Ugandan man was on a brief New Zealand tour last week. He spoke in two Wanganui churches about how sponsorship by a 15-year-old English girl changed his life.

At 8 years old Richmond Wandera, the third in a family of seven children, lived in the Ugandan capital, Kampala. His father was a lawyer and that average income was enough to support the family.

Then his father was shot and killed by robbers. His mother witnessed the murder, and was traumatised.

"She fell to the ground, and suffered a cardiac arrest. We almost missed out on our Dad's burial because she was in hospital."

With his mother unable to work, the family could not pay the rent. And there was no social welfare, free health or education in Uganda.

"It's a country with plenty of natural resources, but the wealth is in just a few hands, maybe 1 per cent of the country," Mr Wandera said.

Mother and children ended up in a single room in Naguru, a slum on the outskirts of Kampala. His mother's health got worse. The children did what they could to protect their younger siblings and find food - stealing from gardens, taking clothing off lines, fighting to survive.

Then the mother heard about the Tear Fund, a New Zealand-based aid and development organisation, and applied for sponsorship help. Photographs of the family, and their story, were published for potential sponsors to see.

After four months' waiting 15-year-old Heather, in the United Kingdom, offered to sponsor Richmond. She took a babysitting job "a few hours a month and she just took care of me".

"I can't tell you the amount of joy that brought to us as a family," he said.

Young Richmand could go back to school, which he loved. His malaria, eye problem, worms and pot belly got medical treatment. Two months later his younger sister, Doreen, was sponsored by an Australian couple.

As well as going to school the sponsored children spent a day a week together, where they heard Bible stories and played games.

"It accessed me to the life of a child again, which I hadn't experienced."

The sponsorship helped the whole family. It provided essentials like mosquito nets, mattresses, food. Sometimes there was extra money for presents, which could be shared.

Fast forward to now: Mr Wandera completed his education and is now an accountant. He said some sponsored children wanted to forget poverty completely, but he wanted to go back and make a difference.

He's living in Kampala and active in community development. He's also a pastor in the New Life Baptist Church. And he's a sponsor now too, of Tanzanian child Benjamin Mwaniki, who had a story much like his own.

"It doesn't take too much to make a big difference."