A Lifeline

by Susan Warshauer, Vice Chancellor of the African Rural University (at Uganda Rural Development and Training) -- submitted (#405)  to Nicholas Kristof's "Half the Sky" contest. 

I look up and Odembos, the Human Rights Officer at URDT, is standing in my office door. After a few minutes of chatting, Odembos explains that he has a sad story to tell me. He hands me a photo of a very little girl talking into the microphone at KKCR, the community radio station run by URDT. He tells me she is 8 years old; she looks about 5 or 6.

Apparently, the little girl’s Mother moved away and her Father began abusing her. Although her Father said he would kill her if she told anyone, she told her Aunt. Her Aunt began treating the injuries she sustained from the abuse but would do nothing about stopping it. Finally, this tiny, little girl went to the church in her village. She sat still and waited until everyone finished praying, then told them she wanted to see the Human Rights Officer she had heard on the radio. She said she needed his help and explained what was happening. The good people at her church raised the money necessary to transport her to URDT. While they were making the arrangements, the little girl’s Father came looking for her. The members of the church told him that she was at URDT already.

When the little girl got to URDT she told her whole story to Odembos. He worked with her over several days, getting her lodging and food in the URDT Girls’ School. Odembos kept reassuring her that she was now safe. He went to the police, they investigated, and the Aunt and others from the village came forward. There was more than enough evidence to arrest the man.

The photograph Odembos had just handed me was taken when the little girl decided she would go on the radio to talk about what had happened to her so other children would know that they too could get help from URDT.

For more than 20 years, Uganda Rural Development and Training Programme (URDT) has helped people in rural, western Uganda create better lives for themselves. Besides KKCR, which has over 2 million listeners, and the Human Rights Office, URDT offers many other services. There are primary and secondary schools for girls that use a two-generation approach involving the students’ families in training and back-home projects. URDT runs a Technical Institute for young men and women helping them create jobs for themselves and others, a Land Rights Office, an HIV/Aids Programme, a demonstration organic farm and farmer training, and African Rural University (ARU) for women, focused on creating Rural Transformation Specialists, where I work. http://www.urdt.net

— Susan Warshauer