Ufahari Girls
Rescue, Restore, Rejuvenate
Empowering Young Girls
Our Vision
At Ufahari Girls, our vision is to create a safe space for girls that is free from sexual abuse and commercial sexual exploitation, and to provide them an opportunity for education.
Our Core Values
1. Compassion: We don’t cower from people’s suffering, we are motivated to help relieve their pain.
2. Stewardship: We want to be faithful to use every resource to serve those in our care
3. Upholding dignity: Every human being has intrinsic value no matter their circumstances or their level of vulnerability.
4. Christ centred: We are motivated to love and care for others out of obedience to Christ who has redeemed us from the curse of sin.
Our Story
Ufahari girls was born out of a girls’ fellowship called ‘Kingdom daughters’ at St. Nicholas C.O.U, Kalerwe in 2012. Our vision then was to create a safe space for teenage girls to be empowered and to help them deal with menstrual poverty. We used this platform to provide reusable sanitary towels to the members and to promote menstrual hygiene to the neediest girls in the community.
However in 2015, our attention evolved to reaching girls who are either victims of sexual abuse or at high risk of facing the same. This started when we learnt that the father of one of the girls attending our monthly meetings was sexually abusing her, and her step-mother was not intervening. We helped find a safe home for this dear girl and after a year, she was reconnected with her biological mother.
Since 2015, we have helped several victims who have previously suffered from horrendous acts of abuse. We have helped children as young as 5 years old to receive treatment and to pursue justice through legal support. We have provided scholarships and created safe spaces for them to receive both psychological and pastoral care.
In 2018, we were registered officially as a charity in Uganda and we have used several platforms to champion the cause of girls through our several initiatives within the community and surrounding communities.
Rescue and Restore
The goal of this program is to rescue young girls from sexually exploitative situations, offering them health, education and legal services in a supportive and caring community, so that their dignity is restored and they can envisage a different future for themselves.
Activities:
1. Negotiate with parents or caregivers of children at risk, offering them options of: scholarships for boarding school; pregnancy crisis centres; or safe homes
2. Offer or refer girls to health and wellness services:
- Medical treatment
- Psychological counselling
- Pastoral care
- Support groups (e.g rape survivors, teenage mothers, crotchet, dancing, tailoring, beading)
3. Support girl’s continuing education:
- Advocate for placement of girls who have ‘dropped out’ of the school system
- Cover school fees where necessary
- Facilitate life-skills and livelihood workshops in partner schools
- Menstrual hygiene campaigns
Rejuvenate
The goal of this program is to use media and the performing arts to raise awareness and speak boldly against all forms of violence against children/girls, so that the community returns to its core values of caring for children, and individuals are activated and mobilised to speak up for abused children.
Activities:
1. Write, produce and/or present plays, poems and songs to raise awareness on sexual abuse. We recorded “Omwana wa Afrika” in 2020 and published “Scarred - One in Four,” a collection of poems about the effects of sexual abuse.
2. Facilitate community workshops on topics such as children’s rights, trauma and healing etc.
3. Host events/challenges to create awareness
4. Evangelism in schools, and community through our ‘Smiling events’ and outreach programs.
5. Dialogue with community leaders.
Hear More
Podcasts
Check out these podcasts to hear more about Racheal, our founder and director, her story, and the hope that she and Ufahari Girls are bringing to Uganda.
https://podcasts.apple.com/ug/podcast/fearless-protector-racheal-mutesi/id1564089451?i=1000639884042