The Life in Africa Context
Outside of Uganda’s capital Kampala, where the eastern border of the city blurs into messy suburban sprawl, a rocky hill has offered 25 years of refuge to 10,000 of the people who fled Joseph Kony’s rebel war in Acholiland, about 400 kilometers to the North.
Known locally as the Acholi Quarter, Kireka hill is also home to one of the city’s largest stone quarries, which offers low paid and back-breaking employment to hundreds of traumatized hillside residents.
Twenty five years ago, the local king of the Buganda tribe offered Kireka hill to the Acholi people who were fleeing from the north, for as long as they needed a safe place to stay. Since the rebel attacks stopped seven years ago, the people here have been
trying to figure out how to scrape together enough resources to move their families home.
In mid 2013, Acholi Quarter residents were informed that the land they are living on has been sold for commercial development. Though going home is what they have dreamed of, that hope is now infused with the very real fear that these fragile
families will once again be forcibly displaced. In recent months there has been some unrest…. whether they have the money to move or not, it’s now really time to go home.
Once a week for the past several years, 35 women who live in the Acholi Quarter gather at the small Life in Africa (LiA) community center near the bottom
of the hill. They bring in products made from paper beads to fill orders from abroad and to sell at their small community shop. They learn and practice new skills like sewing together, they save small weekly amounts of money together, and they support each
other through life’s challenges.
More than anything these days, the LiA ladies plan together for the very complex and expensive challenge of rebuilding their destroyed homes and farms in the empty countryside 400 km away, so they can finally move their families back.
The Family Transition Center Plan
The plan they've developed represents these inspiring women’s collective vision and wisdom for how they can best support each other through their individual transitions (with as little interruption of their children’s education as possible), and contribute
as a group to rebuilding their post-war community and culture in the North.
Most own land already, but they'll need to plant food and build homes for their families to arrive to when they move. Those who don't have their own land (especially the single mothers among them) will need a place to re-settle more permanently. The Family
Transition Center they'd like to establish will cater to all of their own needs and more.
Their co-created plan includes 3 main phased objectives:
- Construct a centrally located center that offers a temporary home-base in the North, from which the 35 women can work in rotating teams to help each other plant, build and prepare their family
homes;
- Support the physical resettlement of their 35 families;
- Serve the local community in the North with skills and talents that the Life in Africa group’s members and global allies have to offer.
A number of the LiA group’s friends and allies from around the world are onboard with a longer term intent to support the Family Transition Center’s development within the next 2 years. With thousands of families currently at various stages
of resettling in the North, the LiA group's objective in bringing their global allies onboard is to evolve the center into a local community education and transition support hub.
To that end:
- The community at Edgeryders.eu has committed to working with the Family Transition Center to host trials of Hi-Lo technology,
potentially including solar appliances, biochar stoves, permaculture, mesh networks, hexayurt relief housing, etc;
- As part of the Ashoka Globalizer program, the founder of Naireeta Services, India has committed to bringing new irrigation
techniques for demonstration at the center, which are working well for Indian farmers in similar arid areas;
- Ci2i Global would love to host a Learn/Share Lab for Co-creative Impact and Innovation at the new center, inviting practitioners
in co-creative impact and innovation from around the world to share knowledge with the local community on nurturing co-designed community driven solutions to local challenges.
The LiA women and a number of the LiA group's international allies also plan to specifically support the children associated with and living near the Family Transition Center, as they will be facing dramatic adjustments. In addition to learning
how to enjoy an agricultural lifestyle, the children will need guidance and social support in adapting to the traditional Acholi culture that they have missed out on growing up in urban and IDP camp conditions.
Timing & Location
Upon the success of this campaign, land for the Family Transition Center will be purchased and the basic lodging will be constructed that will enable LiA women to begin preparing their homesteads in the North during the July-Sept 2014 planting season.
With luck, their families will continue to live in Kampala while the women travel in scheduled teams to help each other plant, build and harvest through December, when the current school year in Uganda will end. The families will physically relocate
by February 2015, in time for the children to begin at new schools in the north. The budget the women have developed includes a transport fund which reflects that ideal scenario.
There is, however, the very real possibility that the families will not be able to stay in Kampala through December. Since they already know that the land they live on has been sold for commercial development, they could be forced to leave their
current homes at any moment. There have been cases in Uganda where bulldozers have arrived unannounced to demolish whole neighborhoods or IDP camps from one day to the next.
But the rich farmland they are returning home to was cleared of human habitation for more than 20 years. In most cases, rebuilding literally means starting life from scratch in the wilderness. Even if they had the money, there is currently no place for these
families to stay. In case they are forced to leave Kampala before their homes are ready, the Family Transition Center will serve as a temporary refuge for all 35 families for a while, until they can build and move into their own homes.
At least they will be together.
After mapping out where their individual lands are and sharing what they know about current infrastructure in the region, the group has decided to locate the Family Transition Center in Kitgum District, within a reasonable distance to Kitgum
town. There are adequate schools there, and the area is central (within 1.5 hours) to 22 of the 35 members' former homes.
Another 5 members' former homes are significantly further away, which means they are likely to stay at the Family Transition Center for at least a 6-12 month period. Another 8 members do not have their own family land to move back to, and may stay indefinitely
to help develop and run the center over the long term.