Partnership News

The story of the partnership between Uganda Girl Guides Association and Guides New Zealand

Young Leaders in Action in the Ugandan Girl Guides: Recognising the importance of bringing more young leaders into the Association, the Uganda Girl Guides Association (UGGA) decided to form a strong core of young leaders at their headquarters, and to create an Internet cafe and meeting space to support them within their headquarters. 

At the same time, the UGGA fostered the creation of a group called UGGROPHA, consisting of both men and women with HIV/AIDS seeking to empower themselves to support others suffering from HIV/AIDS. These two groups worked together to improve the conditions of the UGGA headquarters, strengthen the association, and to prove their capabilities and commitment to reach out to others through social action. 

A personal visit from a member of Guides New Zealand (NZ) provided further encouragement to the groups, and led to an application for Mutual Aid being picked up by New Zealand.

What were the greatest challenges and achievements of this topic, project or activity?

 
Before the Mutual Aid project was sponsored by Guides NZ, the Association had minimal funds, no paid staff, just one computer, and no running water. Despite these obstacles, there was clearly much determination to resurrect the national headquarters, to improve their situation, to create social action projects, and to find ways to improve the image of Guiding. 

The two groups - the young leaders together with the UGGROPHA group - with support from national personnel, succeeded in renovating much of the headquarters building and taking steps to setting up the internet cafe and meeting rooms. 

Reconditioned computers were ordered from ComputerAid UK, paid for by Mutual Aid funds raised by Guides New Zealand. Just a few weeks later, the Association was tossed into turmoil by the sudden death of their Chief Commissioner. Eventually, a new national council was formed, new officials were appointed, and progress resumed on the projects started by the young leaders and UGGROPHA. Even then, there have been more obstacles such as lack of ongoing funding for necessary equipment and a leaking roof, but the vision has remained strong for the young leaders and the national council.

What advice would you give other MOs who are planning to embark on a similar scheme?

If at all possible, there needs to be a personal link made between the two Mutual Aid partner associations. What can be of critical value to the project is for there to be someone from the donor country who has seen the circumstances of the recipient country, who can relate those realities to the members of the donor association and thereby ’champion’ the project within the donor country. 

Ideally, Mutual Aid partnerships should be based on a real relationship of some sort. At the very least this should be through sharing of information between the two associations, but even more effective is having a personal connection and direct involvement at some level between members of the two associations. This may require some expenditure from the donor country but the investment is well worthwhile. 

Above all, good communications are needed between both countries with a readiness to be open and realistic about the intended project, its potential pitfalls, resources needed, timeframes, and costs. Many projects in developing countries will take much longer to complete than the donor country might be used to, and thus it may be better to ’chunk’ the project down into smaller segments that can be evaluated and reported on as the project proceeds .

Who should MOs contact for further information about this topic?

Member Organizations can contact either the Chief Commissioner of UGGA, Consolata Niwagaba, or Mary Dawson, International Team Leader, Guides NZ.

What made you choose to support this project?

I was heading to Uganda with a friend of mine who was working on a non-Guide project with a colleague from Makerere University. Because at that time I was a substitute member of the Bd, I’d written ahead to the UGGA to say I would be there for a few weeks and would be happy to work with them on anything that they might find useful. I never heard from them so asked my friend’s colleague to hand-deliver my letter. 

A delegation from the UGGA turned up to meet me a few days after my arrival, looking rather nervous (it turned out that they were concerned that I was there to ’close them down’!) and requested me to run some workshops for their newly formed young leaders’ group and their HIV/AIDS group of young people. One thing led to another and I ended up doing various other things, including learning about their plans and hopes for using their HQ which included the Internet Cafe and meeting space for young people.

UGGA and I put the Mutual Aid proposal together and I contacted our then International Advisor by email to see if Guides NZ would be prepared to respond to their proposal. The answer was yes, especially as I’d been involved with them. Next step was to source some PCs. One of the UGGA personnel had heard of ComputerAid UK so we put together a proposal to them for 21 PCs. Needless to say, none of this was particularly easy given that the UGGA had no internet access, no phone, and no money. 

It turned out to be easier for me to progress this application to ComputerAid once I got back to NZ, by getting WAGGGS to agree to be the conduit of the GNZ Mutual Aid money to ComputerAid. All that went very smoothly and the PCs arrived in Uganda very quickly - taking the UGGA by surprise somewhat. The PCs had to be put into secure storage for a time and UGGA had to really think how to cope with the next stage and how to get more money, in the midst of all their upheaval caused by their CC dying etc.

How did you raise the money to support this project

At the GNZ end, the $12,000+ had already been raised by units carrying out a huge range of fundraising activities, over the previous two years. When we pick up a Mutual Aid project, we already have money raised to put to it, and the country then goes on raising money for whatever project is next chosen.

For the UGGA one, I brought back information on the country and UGGA; the UGGA sent over some photos of the young leaders renovating the headquarters; then all that went out in an information package to unit leaders.

How does taking part in the Mutual Aid scheme benefit the Association and its members?

I think Mutual Aid has a very strong profile in GNZ, as it’s been around for a long time and GNZ has been a constant supporter. We try to limit the number of other projects for which girls/leaders are asked to fundraise, so it doesn’t get lost amongst other requests. Leaders are pleased to have a ready-made project of a Guiding nature to focus on in their international programme and the fact that this project had a focus on young leaders was attractive.

How will you use the report?

The report will be useful in that we will probably put a summary of it, with photos, in our national magazine, and in our regional and zone magazines. A brief update which I presented at our national AGM was well received and several trainers have asked what scope there might be for GNZ to send over a training team to Uganda to support them in whatever way might seem useful. It is highly likely, given the progress of UGGA, that GNZ will pick up their new proposal for staff salaries - as long as we can focus on the outcomes related to strengthening the involvement of young leaders.

In addition, the GNZ Board has given approval to an application being submitted to the Voluntary Agencies Support Scheme which sits under NZAid (our goverment overseas Aid Scheme) to become a registered NGO and therefore eligible for 1:2 or 1:4 funding. This work already done by UGGA with our support will assist our application and hopefully benefit the UGGA further. A big piece of work to get eligibility for Guiding New Zealand but hopefully well worthwhile.