Life in Mbale, Eastern Uganda is hard. The economy is weak, and infrastructure is poor, with access to education, healthcare and clean water inconsistent and unreliable.
Most of the people living in Mbale are internally displaced, having fled conflict and civil unrest in Northern Uganda and South Sudan. Other families have suffered the effects of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, and outbreaks of tropical disease.
The Nick Maughan Family Foundation is actively involved in developing and financing infrastructure projects in the Mbale district in collaboration with its operating partners at Harpenden Spotlight on Africa and PEAS.
We are building schools and medical facilities to give the local people the infrastructure that they need for a better future, and we are very grateful to the Ugandan government for the great help that we have received in doing so.
Hefin Rees KC, Chair of Trustees of Harpenden Spotlight on Africa, has said: “It has been a real privilege to work with the Nick Maughan Family Foundation on the construction of our schools, maternity centre and other medical facilities in some of the most deprived areas of eastern Uganda. The foundation has provided invaluable financial support, as well as having sent its founder and others out to Uganda several times to help on the ground in a very practical way.”
The NMF Riverside School is a secondary school with capacity for around 1,250 children that will open its doors to the first students in 2023. It includes a state-of-the-art IT centre that will teach valuable technology skills, dormitories for children who need to board, sports facilities and a beautiful learning environment.
There is a significant disparity between enrolment rates in primary and secondary schools in Uganda. Census data indicates that just 10% of primary school students proceed to secondary school. The government and the charitable sectors are working hard to improve this, pursuant to that goal we are funding and building secondary schools like the NMF Riverside School.
The NMF Maternity Centre is a new medical facility specialising in childbirth, infant and women’s health that opened in the summer of 2022. The facility is the first of its kind in the region, and will serve to hugely improve the maternal health outcomes of the region.
According to The World Health Organisation, Uganda has one of the highest maternal mortality rates in the world. However, this new facility plans to dramatically improve the safety of childbirth by providing dedicated pre, post and neo-natal healthcare to mothers and babies in the area.
The maternity centre is conveniently located next door to the NMF Medical Centre, a drop in all-purpose health clinic. Currently, the only health centre in the Namatala slum is overwhelmed with patients. Providing another designated health centre in the region will help to ease the high pressure for healthcare services and have a transformative impact on the lives of local residents.
