1 of 84 million: Sifa’s life of despair and displacement, resilience, courage and hope
I met an extraordinary woman in the maily Congolese Rwamwanja Refugee Settlement in Western Uganda whose story has stayed with me ever since.
The boy who adopted me
Like so many children in Rwanda at that time, this sweet adolescent boy was the head-of-his-household and responsible for raising his siblings on his own.
Tuning into Radio-Based Education Beyond COVID-19
With COVID-19 disrupting education for billions of students across the globe, radio education has renewed importance as an effective, reliable and highly personal medium for fuelling learning.
Displaced in South Sudan – A Visit With Dignity
It’s a place incompatible with human dignity. Some of the worst living conditions I’ve ever seen were in a crowded internally displaced persons (IDP) camp in Juba, South Sudan. The residents...
Try not to sprain your ankle in Ethiopia – Highlights of 20 years working in Africa
A few years ago while photographing Speckled Mousebirds of my hotel in Addis Ababa, I fell and sprained my ankle. No doubt aided by the altitude, it was swollen and sore, but I didn’t think it...
Our Best Tips and Ideas for Work Travel in Africa
During my 20 year tenure at Lifeline Energy, I’ve travelled to 31 of Africa’s 54 countries. This has meant sleeping up to a third of any year on a mattress that I didn’t buy. And plenty of nights where that mattress wasn’t exactly a Sealy-Posturepedic. These include a house without windows or doors in the Sahara Desert…
Teachers Can Now Have a “Second Voice”
It’s one thing to hear about classrooms with 200 students, but it’s another to visit one. While at Kakuma Refugee Camp we spent time in a Grade 3 classroom packed with 200 students. There wasn’t so much as a chair or brick for them to sit on. all of Kakuma’s 24 primary schools are overcrowded.
Leaving Their Past Behind – My Work With Refugees
Education provides a way to help to rebuild a refugee child’s life through normalising social interaction and gaining knowledge and skills. We believe our power-independent Lifeplayers have an important role to play in providing education and information when it’s needed most.
Speak Up in South Sudan – AET’s Case for Lifeplayers
By Jonathan Coxall | Africa Educational Trust (AET) is partnering with Lifeline Energy to deliver Speak Up, a radio-based English language course for youth and adults in 130 rural communities in South Sudan.
Water is Life. But What Kind of Life?
You know the picture I’m talking about. You might have seen it in National Geographic. That one with the African woman serenely carrying a bucket of water on her head. Colourfully dressed; perfectly...
Courage and Conviction Should Not be Border Controlled
Fatu is afraid to come to America. It’s almost too hard to believe, knowing what I know of her life. She’s stood her ground in the face of young weapon-carrying warriors in Kenya. She has been...
A Cow Doesn’t Give Me Information: How Radio Played a Role for Children in Post-Genocide Rwanda
When asked if he had to choose between his wind-up radio or his cow, he didn’t hesitate. Fordward, an 18-year-old Rwandan head of household said, “I shall choose my radio, because a cow doesn’t give me information.”
Who Would Have Imagined Rwanda 25 Years On?
World headlines fixated on one event – the culmination of the long march to democracy in South Africa and the inauguration of Nelson Mandela. As Western media seem to feature one African story at a time, another African event was a footnote: an ‘African tribal war’ in a country not many had heard of.
Charcoal Children: Danger in Lusaka’s Compounds
When I returned to my Lusaka hotel room I looked like I had been dipped in charcoal dust. Although it was an inconvenience, the grime could be scrubbed off. But what I found hard to ‘wash-off’ was...
An Unlikely Friendship: Remembering Feroza Adam – Activist and Treasured Friend
Kristine Pearson shares a deeply personal story of her friendship with South African women’s leader and ANC activist, Feroza Adam
When Tuaregs Exchanged Guns for Radios
In January, extremist Tuareg rebels launched a rebellion in Northern Mali taking advantage of a coup in the capital of Bamako. Since then the rebels have declared independence for a region they call...
Shooting to Score, Not to Kill: International Woman’s Day Tribute
In Kenya’s remote Marsabit district near the Ethiopia border, girls face female genital mutilation (FGM), early or forced marriage, and lack access to education and health services. A sparsely...
“I May be Blind, But this Radio Allows me to See Again.”
Our First Meeting, Her First Radio I first met Senkeiyan two days after the attack at Nairobi’s Westgate Mall. We were in the Great Rift Valley distributing Prime radios to rural classrooms....
Kerosene – A Burning Issue in Women’s Rights, Human Rights
Like many girls I’ve met in Africa, Rose’s dream is to become a teacher. The shy grade 6 student revises her homework at a rickety table in a tin shack in a Nairobi slum.
A Teacher who Provides more than Just an Education
The second teacher we’re profiling in our #teachertuesday series is our old friend, Mwenya Mvula. In 2001, Mr Mvula served as a volunteer ‘mentor’ in Zambia’s Learning at Taonga Market primary radio...