Can you help give Kalthura a very special gift for New Year?

We hope you are enjoying this festive season with your family and friends, and we wish you the very best for the year ahead.

We’d hoped that this week the only news we’d share were silly photos from our children’s Christmas parties in Kampala, but sadly we have an urgent ask.

Over Christmas we made a new friend! Meet Kalthura (5 years), her smile is testament to the hard work her new foster mum Zainab (also pictured) has put in to make her feel safe as part of her family.

Kalthura’s Mum was a widow and bringing up her daughter alone. She’d been ill on and off but it was a shock to everyone that she died suddenly in the night.

Sadly, no one realised what had happened until neighbours noticed that she hadn’t been at work and went to investigate. They heard Kalthura crying, she’d been locked in their home with her mum’s body for several days – she was scared and hungry.

When the police arrived, no relatives were found to take in or comfort Kalthura. As a friend and neighbour to her mother Zainab immediately offered to help.

When her mum was taken to be buried in the village she came from, Kalthura was also taken back to meet her grandma (her only known relative). But she was too elderly to look after her and lived too far away from a health centre.

She needs to live with someone who understands the care and support this little girl needs. She loves living with Zainab, they have built a close connection in a very short time.

Zainab can give her a stable family life and lots of love and care. But as she is also a widow and has four boys of her own. Taking on Kalthura means another mouth to feed, more clothes to buy, more medical bills.

The pressure of this increase on daily expenses will spread her tiny income even thinner but she is willing to take on that challenge to give Kalthura a family to grow up with.

And we want to give a little helping hand.

We’re confident that with our help Zainab can grow her small business and earn more.

And, as Kalthura has just turned five, we want to make sure we can enrol her into school now so she can start in the new year.

To do this we need someone (or a group of friends) willing to support with a regular donation of £25 a month. That way we can make a commitment to Kalthura in the long-term, ensuring she gets the education, skills and support that is vital to her future.

Of course, we realise it’s a big commitment and we’d appreciate your help in any way you can give it. There are lots of different ways to give here.

Thank you to everyone for your incredible support in 2018.