Bwindi Mgahinga Conservation Trust (BMCT) has today launched a one-year Sustainable Education Responses for Batwa Children (SEREB) project, worth 150 million Ugandan shillings to enhance Batwa education in the districts of Kisoro, Rubanda and Kanungu.
The USAID Funded project was launched at the Kisoro district headquarters.
The objective of the project is to improve Batwa children’s perception of education. The project also seeks to help Batwa parents improve on their saving skills in order to meet the needs of their school going children.
The Batwa, also known as pygmies, are indigenous tribal group in Uganda, living in southwestern Uganda.
The group that was formerly hunters and fruit gatherers were forcefully evicted from forests by the Government in a bid to conserve nature and the environment.
A small percentage of the Batwa have managed to adapt to life alongside other tribes by cultivating land for food, engaging in intermarriages and seeking formal education.
However a big number of the Batwa continue to struggle with finding their true place and identity among other tribes of the land.
The Batwa live a miserable life of begging, stealing and loitering, often ending up in prostitution and drug abuse.
BMCT Administrator Tumwesigye Wilberforce says the one-year project, valued at 150 million shillings will target 158 Batwa children in six schools in three districts.
According to Tumwesigye, a total of 84 pupils in Kisoro district will benefit from the project. Of these, 60 will come from Mabuyemeru Primary School in Mupaka Town Council and 24 pupils will come from Muganza Primary School in Chahi Sub County.
Tumwesigye says these schools have been selected under a pilot project, with hopes that many more Batwa children will pick interest to return to school to gain an education.
The Kisoro district LCV Chairperson Abel Bizimana commended the Organization for giving the marginalized group a fighting chance to catch up with the rest of the World.
Bizimana, who is currently pursuing a PhD in public Health with a particular emphasis on maternal health in the Batwa says, the Batwa are a group of people who should prized for their unique history and way of life.
Bizimana says, instead they are lowest caste of people, and all this can be attributed to high illiteracy rates among the Batwa.
Bizimana says that as the children return to the classrooms, a deliberate effort must be geared towards adult literacy programs for Batwa adults, whose circles of influence do not add any value but instead breed crime and reckless living.
The Kisoro Resident district commissioner, Hajji Shafiq Sekandi thanked BMCT for supporting Government Strategies of reducing illiteracy levels among Ugandans.
He called on the young people in the Batwa community to take this project as a golden opportunity to learn and gain skills that will allow them, one day access positions of power and influence, just everyone else.
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