See Beautiful Grant Applicant: Hope for Justice

The feature below is brought to you by Hope for Justice, an organization that is in the running to receive a See Beautiful Grant. For more information about our giving initiatives, please click here.
 
To learn more about the featured organization, please visit their website here.

A lighthouse for children

Poverty is a major issue in Kampala pushing children to migrate, and into situations of child exploitation. Additional factors such as family breakdown, lack of access to education and community attitudes contribute to children migrating to the city to escape and, or, to look for work to support themselves and their family.

Bulamu Lighthouse will directly benefit girls living in the slum communities of Kampala, Uganda who are trapped in a cycle of poverty and abuse. 

Our experience highlights that girls are at a higher risk of being trafficked into domestic or commercial sex work. The current estimates of people living in modern slavery in Uganda are 304,000 (Global Slavery Index, 2018). The common cases are exploitation of children through the worst forms of child labor, primarily in commercial sexual exploitation and forced labor in industries such as street work, domestic work etc. Children are being used in illicit activities such as drug smuggling and production of pornography, as well as in general street vending and begging. In the urban slum communities of Katwe, Kibuye, Kisenyi and Kivulu, there are high numbers of refugees and migrants who are in slavery, specifically girls who are in commercial sexual exploitation or forced marriages.

This project particularly targets the empowerment of young vulnerable girls who will rise to be included in the economic structures of their communities.

Hope for Justice operates Lighthouse Assessment Centers (“Lighthouses”) where we provide accommodation, care and protection for children. A Lighthouse is a safe place where a child can access holistic care as they work to overcome their trauma, restore their lives and prepare them for reintegration into family or community-based care.

Bulamu Lighthouse is specifically for female victims of sex trafficking up to the age of 18, offering a 12-week stabilization period and can house up to 25 girls at any one time. Victims are highly traumatized with a number of issues resulting from their abuse and stabilization requires intense therapy and a high degree of personal care. Issues include mental health illnesses, difficulty trusting, relationship development problems, in addition to physical health issues and diseases. Dealing with the complex trauma requires an intensive, tailored program of recovery with healthcare professionals, counsellors and teachers, in addition to cooks, cleaners, house mothers, security guards and drivers.

Your funding support will enable us to protect young girls and women living in the slum communities of Kampala from exploitation and abuse, through the provision of vocational skills, education and training.  So that they are able to live sustainable independent lives that allow them to economically support themselves and their families and contribute to their local economy’s. A donation of $1,000 - $5,000 will help to cover college fees for some vulnerable girls to receive accelerated vocational training. The cost per girl is circa $350.

Our organisation has been working in Uganda supporting highly vulnerable children, families and their communities for over 20 years, therefore possessing detailed knowledge of the issues vulnerable girls face and the specialist support they need.

Through this project girls like Maria will be given an opportunity to come off exploitative situations.
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Maria lived with her grandmother in a destitute household in a Kampala slum. She lost her mother to HIV/AIDS and has herself lived with HIV since birth. Trapped in a cycle of extreme poverty and vulnerability, Maria found herself forced into commercial sexual exploitation in the brothel adjacent to her home. With several men abusing her, Maria conceived. At the age of 16, she gave birth to a baby with hydrocephalous without knowing who the father was.

When Hope for Justice came into contact with her, Maria was very lonely and stigmatized. After watching at a distance, she enrolled for life skills training with other out of school youths in her community and that marked the turning point in her life.

She said - “For the first time in my life I feel valued. I am no longer the hopeless young mother of the big headed baby but a unique girl with special abilities. I am a mother of a beautiful baby girl that I must raise well. I have learnt to make decisions that keep me safe. I must use my skills and talents to earn a decent living. I love tailoring”.

Maria then enrolled for apprenticeship training in tailoring. When the local artisan tried to lure her into sexual exploitation, she was resilient enough to resist and report this to our staff. She was then moved to a vocational training school where she completed her training.

We supported Maria with start-up tools and she is now self-employed within her community. She was able to take her baby for reconstructive surgery and continues to provide for her with pride.
Maria is living her dream: a life of freedom from slavery. The long-term impact of this project is 100 women like her, living independent lives and forging safe and stable communities no longer threatened by exploitation.

As an organization, we also work to influence policies and practice at a local and national level through evidence informed advocacy for children and young people who are in exploitation – child labor, domestic servitude, sexual exploitation etc. Hope for Justice is currently active in a number of national networks such as the National Taskforce Committee on Prevention of Trafficking in Persons, National Child Protection Working Group, Alternative Care Coordinating Committee, as well as District OVC (Orphans and Vulnerable Children) Committees. We also provide training for frontline duty bearers equipping them with knowledge and skills to prevent, identify and handle cases of human trafficking. We have also finalized the enumeration research report documenting the numbers and characteristics of children who are living and working on the streets in Kampala, Iganga, Jinja and Mbale (copy available on request).

Submitted by Isabelle Bryan