The Guardian, one of the leading global news sources, published a photo gallery about our home this week. It shows British rowers Richard and Peter Chambers, winners of an Olympic medal in 2012, carrying 20 litre jerrycans up the slopes of Lake Bunyonyi hills. Minus a rather unneccessary and vague mention that girls collecting water are “at risk of attack” (such an attack could potentially come from local boys but is certain to make some readers believe we are in war or insecure or something) it is a lovely story. It is, of course, also a stunt to help a British Christian charity help Diocese of Kigezi help local communities help themselves. Commendable.
But since the Gorilla Highlands initiative is about economic and cultural transformation, we need to ask a deeper question: why don’t our communities simply help themselves? The photos show a big concerete water tank, however, simpler tanks could be made at a fraction of the cost. Houses here could all have gutters yet they don’t.
Is it all about men not caring about something that is considered a woman’s duty? Or is the problem deeper than that?
featured photo: British rowers Richard and Peter Chambers, 2012 Olympic silver medallists, getting a taste of rural life; photo by Marcus Perkins/Tearfund