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.
Location: Near Nyamata town, Rwanda | I first met Sonia in October 2009 when she received her Lifelight. She was shy for her age and wore her best Sunday yellow church dress with frills and lace to the distribution session held at a local community hall.
For nearly three years, I’ve been focusing on understanding the use of firewood, kerosene and candles by vulnerable children and women in sub-Saharan Africa. I often write and speak about how kerosene, outside South Africa.
Today is why I do my life’s work. A colleague, and I spent the day in Bugasera, Rwanda in an area where prior to the genocide, the population was 64,000, afterwards 2,000. We spoke with 30 (50/50 female/male) child heads of households