Mikinduri Children of Hope

MIkinduri Children of Hope is having their annual Mushroom Compost Sale on Saturday, May 31st from 9am - 1pm at 423 Mount Edward Rd.  The compost will be available either bagged or in bulk.  For more information please contact Ted at 566-2976.

New program director in place in Kenyan village after program’s consultant murdered

BY MARY MACKAY THE GUARDIAN

After a tumultuous few weeks, the Mikinduri Children of Hope (MCOH) Foundation is back on track with a new program director for the village of Mikinduri in Kenya.

There was much sadness and confusion in the wake of the tragic loss of the MCOH program’s Kenyan consultant, Silvanos Otieno, who was murdered on Christmas Eve in the driveway of his Nairobi home.

Fortunately, Joseph Kathiwa had already been hired as the program director by a selection committee before Otieno’s untimely death.

This put minds at ease with regards to the continuation of MCOH’s many projects in this rural African village.

“(It’s essential to have) someone hands-on in the village, somebody who can literally go and check out feeding programs, check out the wells, work with the sewing centre, monitor the bookkeeping, etc. And that’s what Joseph Kathiwa’s job is,” says MCOH president Ted Grant of Cornwall, who flew to Kenya as quickly as he could following the loss of Otieno.

Not only was Otieno’s death a tragedy in that a fine man, husband, father, son and friend was lost to all who knew him, it sent MCOH into a tailspin.

The foundation no longer had their trusted man on the ground in Kenya and the people of Mikinduri were fearful of the fate of the many projects that were underway in the village.

It was crucial that Kathiwa had just been hired, but someone from MCOH had to go Kenya to facilitate the introduction of this new co-ordinator projects.

And as part of the recent partnership with a Canadian child sponsorship program called Christian Childcare International (CCI) the first step was that the foundation hire a project director to work as a liaison within the village for the child sponsorship program.

Kathiwa was to go to Mikinduri on Jan. 3 to start the CCI project but the tragedy on Christmas Eve changed everything.

Unfortunately, the day before Grant’s flight was to leave, violence in reaction to the recent election in Kenya broke out in fierce force, causing concern for his safety.

“(But) I felt it was important for me to be there to show solidarity with Seline (Otieno’s widow) and her children,” he said.

“I thought it was important to show solidarity with the people on the (Mikinduri Community Development Committee in Mikinduri) that had committed themselves with making this thing work with Silvanos.

“And also equally important was to, if you can imagine being Joseph having only being in the village once and now to go in the village and say, “Hi, I’m Joseph. What’s my job and who are you?’

“So I wanted to be there and introduce him by positioning the various issues and projects and people and the various politics are far as I understood them to be. And having done that it was the absolutely right thing to do.”

It is tradition that Otieno be buried in his ancestral land but the riots and ongoing tribal tensions made travel by land impossible.

“As it turned out another organization came to the table, the organization that he was consulting for and they paid for a flight to fly his body (to his ancestral land),” Grant says.

They also ensured that Otieno’s wife and children could attend the burial.

“They had no choice,” Grant says.

“It was dangerous. I mean the people were stopping cars and pulling people out of cars and if they were of the opposing tribe it wasn’t pretty. It was dangerous.”

Due to the danger and tight schedule of meetings in Mikinduri he could not attend but instead paid his respects during a memorial service in Nairobi.

A fund created to help Otieno’s family has raised about $3,000, which will be used for school fees for his children.

His wife is continuing with her plans that she had made with her husband before he died to return to computer school.

With Kathiwa in place, Grant is looking forward to the child sponsorship program moving ahead in Mikinduri.

“Our partnership with CCI is a great step forward for the destitute children,” he says.

“It is our hope to have 500 kids sponsored within three years, wow!

“We’re going to have 75 kids sponsored by the end of March and in that village can you imagine what that means? It’s huge!”

Mikinduri co-ordinator murdered [The Guardian]
Silvanos Otieno killed in Nairobi robbery

On Christmas Eve, the Kenyan co-ordinator for the Mikinduri Children of Hope Foundation was murdered. Silvanos Otieno was killed in a robbery in Nairobi in the evening of Dec. 24, 2007.

Mikinduri is a small, poor, remote Kenyan village in eastern Africa. The foundation’s aim is to relieve poverty in the village. It has a dedicated group of volunteers based on the Island. Makena Ambassa, who was born near Mikinduri and now lives in P.E.I., initiated the MCoH foundation in 2003.

Ted Grant, the foundation’s president, is now in Kenya trying to help Otieno’s family — his widow Seline and their two children. He’s also there to meet with the foundation’s new program director, Joseph Mathiwa.

In an e-mail to Guardian reporter Mary MacKay, Grant said Otieno’s death was not related in any way to the work of the MCoH.

“(It’s) just a senseless act (of) violence to someone who did so much good for other people,” he wrote. “Silvanos was our valued ally who acted as our consultant and who was the leader to the village of Mikinduri. This is a huge loss as he was an incredible man.”

Although this is a “serious emotional setback” to the foundation’s projects, they will nonetheless continue to move forward “with as much care and speed as possible,” he wrote. “Everyone involved is determined to carry on in the spirit in which Sil would have wanted us to.”

Grant said he’s positive about the foundation’s new Kenyan co-ordinator. “Joseph will be a very good man. He is completely different from Sil, but has the same keen interest in moving the project forward, especially in Sil’s honour.”

This is the story by CBC African correspondent David McGuffin that aired Wednesday, December 5th, 2007 on The National. The story was taped during the October 2007 mission (we originally indicated it would air in November).

Below is an interview with Makena Ambassa, who helped found MCoH. This aired locally on CBC News Compass the following night, December 6th, along with David McGuffin’s story.

CBC Radio’s Karen Mair will be featuring and interview on Island Morning with the travellers to Mikinduri. She has interviewed Ted Grant, Dr. Bill Allen and Jessica McKenna. It is supposed to air tomorrow morning sometime between 6:30-8:30am (mostly likely between 7am and 8am). The interview should be posted to the CBC PEI website as well.

One other update: We indicated the Mikinduri story will air on The National this Thursday, November 1st. We have since learned that is the likely date, but it is not set in stone.

Jess McKenna reports from Mikinduri that a crew from CBC taped a segment about the work of MCoH. A four-minute story is scheduled to air on The National this Thursday, November 1st (10pm Atlantic). Members of MCoH were interviewed while they conducted vision, dental and medical clinics. Please tune in, and spread the word.

UPDATE: This story may not air on Thursday as indicated above. Thursday is still likely, but it could be a later date.

Jessica McKenna is sending reports on the latest MCoH mission to Mikinduri.

Hello everyone! It is day 9 in Kenya and it is fair to say that it feels like home! The villagers and people could not do anymore to make us feel welcome. Ted, Karen and Marilyn tell us that we are spoiled this year and blessed with a warm shower and toilet. We were on the road all day yesterday starting with touring the dispensary, the sewing center, 3 schools and the wells. It was an experience on a whole different level and the group seemed to enjoy what they saw. We were welcomed with open arms and songs and smiles everywhere we went and have a lot of photos and videos that we are more then excited to share with everyone! The weather is great. Hot during the day and rains like cats and dogs at night…..keeping a lot of us awake! Ha. We are tentatively planning a visit with a CBC African correspondent, David McGuffin, who is interested in doing a story on what we are doing in Mikinduri. He is planning on coming here on Monday and spending a few days with us while we are performing the clinics. If the story does take place, we could have the opportunity to be aired on The National. It is exciting news and we are looking forward to see what is going to take place. We are on the road today, heading to a place called Sweet Waters where we will be experiencing a camp out and safari. We will be busy but it will be a personal enjoyment busy getting prepared for our clinics next week. We miss you all! Hope things are as great at home as they are going here! Take care and talk soon!

Phil Handrahan was a member of Mikinduri Children of Hope’s November 2006 Tour Group. He wrote a series of dispatches from the field he called Kenya Morning Report. You can read the first one here (use the links at the top of each page to navigate to Phil’s next Kenya Morning Report).