By Isaac Lema, Dodoma, Tanzania (June 2015)
In May of 2014, the Iringa municipality (the team’s home base) received guests from Bahi district in the Dodoma region. The guests came to learn about and share experiences in fighting new HIV transmissions. UCE, as one of the stakeholders, participated in one of the meetings. Leaders from Bahi appreciated the UCE activities. They invited the UCE team to visit Bahi district and deliver the UCE message in all the secondary schools. Since that time, the UCE team has kept in touch with them. This year, 2015 the UCE team managed to go to them.
Bahi district is among the new districts in Tanzania, located in the Dodoma region. Dodoma is the capital city of Tanzania. There are three highways which pass through this district, including Iringa highway. Iringa highway was recently paved, and this connected the Dodoma region with our southern highland zone. Kondoa highway also connects Dodoma with the northern zone, and Singida highway connects Dodoma with other central zone regions (the lake zone and the western zone). This put Dodoma at high risk of new HIV transmissions. In 2012, the HIV prevalence in the Dodoma region was 2.9%. So now we are getting a jump on this, and by the grace of God we will spread chastity across the highways instead of HIV.
The UCE team travelled to the Dodoma region on the 12th of April 2015. Due to the geographical location of the district, the UCE team stayed at Dodoma town. This made it easy for the UCE team to reach all the schools. Some schools were located in faraway places, whereby the UCE team would have to return to Dodoma town then start another journey of about 50 – 80 kilometers on a rough road to reach them. The team managed well enough, although some roads were bad, which led to three flat tires. Many schools were located far from each other, hence the UCE team managed to reach a few schools per day. However, the UCE team woke up early so that they managed to reach more schools. All secondary schools are government schools, there are not any private schools in this district so far.
One of the challenges that the district was facing is that many students, mostly girls, leave schools and travel to the cities such as Dar es Salaam or Arusha to work as housemaids. Moreover, some students leave school work as shepherds, especially boys. Early marriage is also another challenge, where the parent(s) will arrange for their daughter to get married in order to receive a bride price, which for them is wealth. Another challenge is the long distance from schools to the residential areas of students. Many of them walk more than two hours to reach their respective school. As a result, many students join form one, (9th grade) but few reach form four class (12th grade) or graduate. One headmaster said that in his school 130 may join form one, but when they reach form IV there are only 40 students.
On 13th April 2015, the UCE team travelled to the Bahi district office. The district executive director received the UCE team very well. We had a chance to explain the vision, mission, activities and achievements of the UCE program in changing and saving lives of many youth in Tanzania. The District ED was very impressed to hear that and she directed us to the district education officer, who assigned some people (Mr. Christopher Lusinde, Mr. Andrew Colman and Mr. Raymond Gasper) to accompany the UCE team on their outreaches (So that they may also learn from us). Since all the headmasters were informed about the UCE team coming to their schools, we found the students were mobilized and ready for outreach without wasting time.
After one week of outreaches, Mr. Renatus Benges, the UCE Club Patron from Ikafara Secondary School, joined the UCE team in Dodoma with the purpose of teaching and encouraging other teachers about the importance of the UCE message and UCE Clubs. The UCE team was so blessed to have him with the team for several days. He shared his testimony of how UCE helped his school. He said, “This is the fourth year after UCE the club was introduced in Ifakara girls secondary school. From that time till today we have not received or having any case of students getting pregnant. Moreover in terms of discipline UCE has done so much in helping students to focus on the future life hence they don’t misbehave.”
One headmaster was so grateful to the UCE team. He encouraged his students by pointing to the UCE team saying that although the team is young they already have college degrees and good jobs. He said, “If you want to achieve your goals you should abstain and study hard. When the UCE team came here this morning, I thought they are just wasting our time and we were busy preparing for district executive officer visitation. I thought if I was the one to decide I could have hindered them to deliver their message to you. But because they were accompanied by Mr. Raymond, I kept quiet. Now I have realized if that happened, I would have lost a very unique message with and a very rare chance to get it. Please, UCE I welcome you again and again to help my school.” The UCE team conducted outreaches to all (20) district secondary schools, Bahi, Mwitikira, Chibelela, Mtitaa, Ibugule, Magaga, Chikopelo, Chikola, Ilindi, Zanka, Msisi Juu, Ibihwa, Mpamatwa, Kigwe, Mundemu, Lamaiti, Chonama, Babayu, Mpalanga na Chipanga. About 2420 students were reached and 2044 (84.5%) students male 964 and female 1082 committed themselves to chastity. The UCE team returned to Iringa on the 22nd of April 2015. The UCE team returns all Glory to God in Jesus name.
