Breaking News: First Motorboat to Provide Pupils of Bwama Primary School Safe Transport Realized!

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We are extremely excited to announce that the first motorboat, meant to provide the children of Bwama Primary School safe transport from and to their school, has now been realized!

During my first visit to the school in September 2017, I learned a lot about the everyday transport of the children over Lake Bunyonyi, using the traditional dugout canoes, and how it had become a big problem for the school. Not only was the number of canoes lacking, but also the safety of the children was continuously at stake, with bad weather circumstances often causing dangerous situations. The complete explanation about the problems the school was dealing with can be read in this last year posted article, ‘The Transport Issues for the Pupils of Bwama Primary School Explained’.

After having donated a big canoe that could compensate for two smaller canoes that had sadly turned out to be beyond repair, and therewith having solved a first urgent problem for the school, we started fundraising for the first motorboat. Today, we are very grateful that this first motorboat has been realized and that it has started safely transporting the pupils to and from their school every day.

After the necessary funds had been raised, project manager Noah travelled all the way to Kampala, the capital of Uganda, to purchase all the needed parts, including the engine (the most expensive part), from which the boat could be built. He put all the parts on transport to Lake Bunyonyi and also contracted an experienced boat constructor, Mr. Jamil Ryazi, to come to the lake very soon to construct the boat. Once both the parts and the boat constructor had arrived, the building of the boat could get started! Please view the construction process of the boat and the beautiful result in the photo slider below!

Of course now, with the first motorboat having become a reality, it is essential that it can keep moving. It needs fuel every day and at some point also costs for maintenance and repairs are going to occur. To guarantee that the children can count on the boat to transport them to school in the mornings and back home in the evenings we found the following solutions:

• With this being a community project, the school has asked the parents of the children and the community at large to join hands. The parents have agreed to pay a small fee for the safe transport of their children; both parents and other community members can also contribute by using the boat and pay a common fee when they need transport, for example to a local market.
• For additional support, through our recently established and officially registered Community Based Organization (CBO), called NiCA Foundation, with of course Noah as the experienced guide he is, tourist trips over Lake Bunyonyi are offered with part of the proceeds from that being used for the purpose of keeping the boat moving.

The teams from both HWMCO-Nederland and NiCA Foundation are very happy to have achieved this wonderful goal together. We now count on the community to join hands with us, so that the safe transport of the children can be guaranteed.

We thank all our donators for their wonderful support. Special thanks to Stichting Trap-In Uden, Stichting Uden WereldWijd, Thijs-Jan van Hoek, Ailesbury Clinic Dublin, Pierre Loeffen, Dania Nijs and Christine Wijgerse.

Please stay tuned for new updates about our projects!

HWMCO-Nederland
‘We Fight Poverty by Bringing Development.’

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