Hope for Zimbabwe
Oasis has been working in Zimbabwe since 2002. In that time the team, based in the nation's capital Harare, has faced more than its fair share of challenges. At the time of writing, Zimbabwe is in the midst of the Presidential and parliamentary elections but whatever the result, the reality is that it will take a long time for things to improve on the ground.
In the past 8 years Zimbabwe's economy has halved in size and every sector - manufacturing, mining, agriculture and tourism - has been hit. Because the government has not responded by cutting costs, Zimbabwe faces hyper-inflation of over 100,000% per annum. On top of the economic crisis, HIV / AIDS continues to have a devastating effect. The pandemic has left nearly a million children orphaned and has effectively wiped out a generation of bread winners, leaving the survivors, financially and emotionally burdened.
The impact of this is plain to see, hospitals are understaffed, under equipped and struggle to function with a widespread shortage of drugs, and schools are losing teachers at an alarming rate.
You would be forgiven for feeling hopeless in the light of these circumstances, but hope is the one thing Zimbabwe does have as Kevin Brits, Director of Oasis Zimbabwe explains,
"There is hope." He says. "We learn from the last 8 years, and ensure we have a wiser more mature Zimbabwe in the days to come. We realise that we must continue to invest in the children and youth of Zimbabwe today, so that they might be better equipped to lead the country now and in the future."
Hope is not about giving up. Throughout all the difficulties in the last 8 years Oasis Zimbabwe has worked on three major programs with the children and young people of Harare to bring hope and change.
In Kambuzuma, a high density suburb of Harare, Oasis runs a skills training centre to combat unemployment which has reached 80%. The training centre provides greatly subsidised courses in Carpentry, Tailoring, Agriculture and Information and Communication Technology alongside life skills development to give disadvantaged young people the skills they need to live independent, sustainable lives. The Oasis team in the centre work with around 100 young people year.
Young people in Zimbabwe are vulnerable to many dangers and pressures. Oasis Zimbabwe's Tanaka project provides residential care for 20 street girls aged 13-18. Like all Oasis housing projects across the world, this medium-term residential centre is more than a roof over the girl's heads as Kevin explains,
"We work with the girls to help them deal with their past traumas. We provide psycho-social support and use formal education or skills training to help reintegrate them into mainstream society. But the key to all our work here is our family reunification program where we work with the girls' families with a view to reuniting them and forming stable home environment."
The project has worked with many girls since it began, all of whom have either been reunited with their family, are now in work, or have been equipped with skills to achieve. In every case, all of the young women are off the streets and now have hope for the future.
Since 2004 Oasis Zimbabwe has also provided training and technical skills to help churches in poorer suburbs of Harare set up preschools for the orphans and vulnerable children in their communities. To-date twenty-two preschools have been established through the program and over 700 children who would have previously not been able to afford preschool education are now receiving a proper foundation for school.
Across the world Oasis is about providing hope and opportunity for people and communities. Nowhere is this more apparent than in Zimbabwe where in the face of despair, Oasis works to help Zimbabwe's next generation usher in a brighter future.