He is a young man, a Zambian citizen in his early 20s. A mild and intelligent yet shy young man in his expression, and as they say every face tells a story, his can be read at a distance. He is an orphan, his father passed away when he was three years old, ever since, he has been brought up by an old and housewife mother.
He completed his high school education with impressing results such that he was offered a bursary to study a five years Bachelors Degree program in Chemical Engineering at a University in Zambia. Towards the end of his third year of study, as he was coming from a school event –celebration which was held at a nearby park, he was attacked by a group of thugs. They beat him up, left him unconscious and got all his clothes and belongings. The following morning, his was rushed to a psychiatric clinic on grounds that he was suspected to have started having psychosis. There he was admitted for about three weeks and treatment continued from home for about two months. This calamity forced him to withdraw formally from sitting for his third year examinations. After he had recovered and recommended to continue with his studies, he applied for readmission into university and was accepted. Unfortunately, his bursary was withdrawn even though he was accepted to continue studying at this university.
Before his first admission at the university, this young man opened a tuition centre where he taught high school pupils from different school in subjects including chemistry, physics, biology and mathematics. With what ever he earned from this initiative, he paid rentals for the shelter which he occupied together with his mother and provided the basic necessities. When he went to the university, he could share his bursary allowances with his mother to partially pay for her rentals and upkeep.
After dropping out from university due to lack of sponsorship, his mother relocated to the village to seek refugee at relatives’ village. This young man has remained on the Copperbelt province staying with his elder sister.
The ambitious young man has been exploring offices and institutions hoping that he will find sponsorship to continue with his studies, since he is hopeful that life will become better for him once he completes his studies. He is truly innovative; he looks too at other workable alternatives or channels. He visited as asking how we help young people to be self-employed, it is after an intensive interview that I learnt about his touching story. Taking advantage of his past experience, skills and knowledge, this young man wants to set up a simple tuition centre for high school pupils in chemistry, mathematics, physics, and biology. He is confident that he can use the income realised from this initiative to provide him with basic necessities and more importantly to save so that he can pay for his studies at the university.
Interesting enough, this young man is not just dreaming but is practical, such that he has already done market research and has established a very promising market. It is truly a promising market because I discussed this with him and I know the area where he wants to establish the tuition centre. However, all he is lacking are resources to rent or put up a temporal shelter, a black board, pieces of chalk and basic teaching materials. This young man came to find out how possible it is for us to help him acquire the necessary support as stipulated, which would allow him to start his initiative.
Please publish on your blogs and circulate widely.
By Wandila Simon Kamukwape
Information and Communication Technology (ICT) plays an important role in enhancing the impact and performance of agricultural production and poverty alleviation by increasing productivity through new credit and financial services. Ensibuuko , a mobile and web application that helps farmers in accessing financial services is making a huge impact in Uganda as it has enabled saving and credit associations (and other financing organisations) to handle savings and make loans to smallholder farmers. Ensibuuko was conceived over a cup of coffee between two friends in 2010. Mr. Gerald Otim and Mr. Opio Obwangamoi David shared a similar background as they were both raised in peasant farming communities. Mr. Otim had attempted to establish a microfinance organisation for farmers, but with a lot of frustration. It is from these frustrations that he and Mr David were moved to establish Ensibuuko. The solution is targeting farmer’s welfare through Savings and Credit Cooperative Organis...
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