New Newsletter Available

Our latest Together for Sudan newsletter is out. Crammed full of news about our projects and events. If you are not yet on our mailing list or receiving the newsletter by e-mail why not get a copy free from our website.

http://www.togetherforsudan.org/Documents/Newsletters/Newsletter_June%202013.pdf

From Cleaning The Office to Training to Become a Midwife

My name is Marry Adam Koko. I am a Nuba coming from the Haiban tribe existed in eastern part of south Kordofan state. I’m number seven in my family of 4 girls and 5 boys.  Unfortunately although I’m the only one in the family who has a Sudanese certificate, I was not able to enter University. It was necessary for me to go out and earn money to help my father. 

We settled in Khartoum Al-fitemab village and I did a lot of casual work to earn money and help my family before joining Together for Sudan organization as a part-time cleaner in July 2012. 

My ambition has always been to complete my studies to find a better job or to acquire skills to enable me to work professionally.

I learnt about the midwifery scholarship during my work for TfS. I decided to apply because the training would develop me socially and I know that in my area there is an urgent need for trained women. There is only one midwife in our area and she is always busy.

Some of our midwives in training with Lillian, Mary is in the middle of the back row, standing next to Neimat, our in country coordinator.

“I hope sincerely, if I succeed in completing this course, to work honestly helping my people in the village where I reside and if the situations permit I would like to go back home at Nuba Mountains to disseminate the knowledge and deliver health messages and to educate my people about the family health and care.”
Thank you Together for Sudan. Without your support I would never had this opportunity.

The 2 year training scheme is supported by the government but Mary could not have joined as she is poor and needs uniform, special shoes, a special scarf, a bed sheet and some hostel accommodation together with help with some transport costs and food. Our supporters are funding Marry and another 9 women in this way. Thank you for your generosity.

Peter Hullah
Director

Moving Forwards

Thank you, trustees of Together for Sudan for appointing me as your new Director. It is a great privilege to be asked to continue the remarkable work which Lillian Craig Harris and Alan Goulty have done in developing life changing projects for women in Sudan and South Sudan.

During the next two months I will be working closely with Lilian and Alan to prepare for a visit to our staff in both countries. In April we will travel  together to introduce me as the new director to our project leaders.

In the future, I see the role of Together for Sudan to be a partnership between generous donors, workers who are making things happen locally and the people who need help most. Developing this partnership in education will give us a renewed sense of purpose, building on the firm foundations of the past and responding positively to the challenges of the future.

This partnership will become even stronger as we listen carefully to the women who need us, try to remove the barriers to progress and plan quickly and act generously. Our first task will be to ensure that the projects which are running well are properly funded and well supported  in difficult times.

Through the generosity of our donors, there is so much going on which is life changing and my hope is that we continue to stay close to the women who are in need of educational support.

On our return from our visit to Sudan and South Sudan , Lillian and I will together write a news letter to introduce you to our friends in Africa and the hopes that we and they have for the future. We want to share more stories with you where Together has made a difference.

I have been a teacher and head teacher in challenging schools where pupils have needed education most and without education, talent would have been wasted.  I have seen first hand how education opens doors and makes a difference. As your new Director of Together for Sudan it is my dream that every education project and every Together for Sudan scholar should be Hopeful and I want Together for Sudan and our Partnership to be Hopeful in all that we do.

Thank you for your support and I look forward in Hope as working Together we grow stronger.

A New Director Appointed

Peter Hullah new TfS Director

The Trustees of Together for Sudan have appointed Peter Hullah, former Principal of Northampton Academy and senior educational advisor, to be their new Director, in succession to Lillian Craig Harris, who is stepping down for health reasons.  

Together for Sudan was founded in 1996 by Lillian Craig Harris in response to what Sudanese women told her about their need for education and health care services. Under her leadership Together for Sudan has supported over 250 Sudanese women to study at Sudanese and South Sudanese universities. It has expanded to undertake a range of other educational and health projects to benefit Sudanese women and children.  The Trustees are grateful to Lillian for all she has accomplished and she remains the Chair of Trustees.  Lillian says ‘I am delighted that Peter has been appointed. His energy, skills and experience will enable us to develop and expand our pioneering work.’

Peter’s first teaching post over 30 years ago was at a pioneering girl’s school in Uganda and since then he has been Chaplain of the King’s School, Canterbury and Head of Chetham’s School of Music in Manchester. He has also visited schools in Africa to learn at first hand what it is which makes a truly ‘Hopeful School’ for its students and for the community it serves. Before moving to Northampton Academy, The Rt Rev Peter Hullah was Bishop of Ramsbury in the Diocese of Salisbury.  He chaired the Salisbury Diocesan Link with the Episcopal Church of Sudan. 

Peter says, ‘It is a great privilege to be asked to work with such a committed organization, striving to make a difference for women in Sudan and South Sudan who find difficulty accessing education. I look forward to developing Together for Sudan’s existing networks which seek to offer improved educational opportunities for women in Africa where there is the most acute need.’ He will take up his post on 1st February 2013.  Peter has told the Trustees that he is encouraged by what the charity has already achieved and looks forward to the challenge of mobilising further support to enable it to expand its work.

Together for Sudan focuses its work on developing educational opportunities for women in the recently reconfigured countries of Sudan and South Sudan.  Alongside its educational scholarships for women, it supports literacy classes, self-help schools, HIV/Aids and eye care projects, working with local partners in one of the most challenging areas of the world. Our work is inclusive, alongside people of all religions who are committed to the education of women. 

Jebel Aulia

Izdihar reports from Khartoum on the latest eye care outreach at Jebel Aulia on 5th July.  Dr Nabila who regularly works with us examined 93 patients, prescribed medicine for 63, and recommended 9 for operations which carried out in the following week.  10 patients in all received glasses.

The TfS Eye Care Project

Meet just three of the people that Together for Sudan saw in this eye care outreach.

Mudathir Sefdin, 12 years old, has a squint which needs surgery

Fatima Fadul, 2 year old, came from Kosti city south of Khartoum.  She had trauma in her right eye and needed a scan which costs 250 Sudanese pounds

Nafahat Awad Almahadi is 10 years old.  It is difficult for her to see during the day.  She has been referred to Macca hospital for specialist treatment

Please help us to continue to help people such as these by making a donation to Together for Sudan, even a little can make a big difference. Please click here to learn more about making a donation.

A Special Opportunity

The forthcoming retirement of Together for Sudan's founding Director offers an opportunity for a qualified volunteer to take over the lead in our work to help Sudanese women and children.

Candidates should be flexible , patient, and courageous as well as able to engage sensitively with people in Sudan and South Sudan. They may be male or female and should have some experience of fund-raising, advocacy and liaison with donors.

They must be willing to visit Sudan and South Sudan at least twice a year (expenses will be paid). Working closely with TFS Trustees the new Director will promote, develop and administer a growing charity dedicated to the education and medical needs of marginalized women and children, which is supported by Friends Together for Sudan, a US charity.

The Director will be expected to work from his/her home or office for a minimum of 16 hours a week, reporting to TFS Trustees and keeping in close contact by email with TFS colleagues in Khartoum and Juba, managing as well as monitoring their work.

The Director will have considerable autonomy. (S)he should therefore have a good track record as a self-starter and preferably with some knowledge of Sudan and South Sudan. Willingness to adopt and take forward the ethos of the charity's founders will be key.

A more detailed description of the position can be downloaded here.

Interviews are expected to be held in central London during July 2012.


Applicants should send their details by June 20th to:

Malcolm Grundy (TfS Trustee),
4 Portal Road, 
York YO26 6BQ.   


 +44(0)1904787387        malcolm@togetherforsudan.org

Dear Friends

In recent months there have been major developments in both Together for Sudan’s work and in Sudan
itself. We remain Muslims and Christians working together in service to the poor and dispossessed, women and children in particular. But Sudan’s recent transformation into the Republic of Sudan and the Republic of South Sudan presents us with both difficulties and opportunities. Thousands of southerners living in the north have returned to their home areas and our office in Khartoum has been hard hit. Former Deputy Country Coordinator Victor and former TfS Accountant Minallah are among the thousands of people now living in Juba, capital of South Sudan, many with no proper housing or employment. Meanwhile, a significant number of Together for Sudan university scholars have left the north and re-registered at Juba University, hoping that Together for Sudan can continue to support them.

Arriving in Khartoum in early October, TfS Secretary Alan Goulty and I knew —despite the present TfS funding deficit – that we must answer the question “Should we expand our work to South Sudan?” During a brief visit to Juba, we called on contacts at Juba University, the Episcopal church and various international and local organizations. It was not, however, until we visited a recently set up organization dealing with HIV/AIDS awareness that I realized how well prepared TfS is to work in South Sudan. Editha, former leader of our HIV/AIDS Awareness Outreach in the Khartoum area, is now in Juba and eager to be re employed by TfS – as are Victor and Minallah.

Together for Sudan’s roots go back to a small group of Muslim and Christian women who sought to bring understanding and peace between the two religions and, seeing the number of minarets as well as churches in Juba, I decided that TfS will be right at home there.

With your support we can continue our work in Khartoum and environs and also begin work in South Sudan. To start with, we hope to find funding for more university scholarships as well as for women’s literacy classes and HIV/AIDS outreach. And already the indefatigable Dr. Nabila Radi who heads the TfS Eye Care Outreach in the Khartoum area is talking about an outreach to the South Sudan city of Wau.
November 2011

Lillian Craig Harris

Fr Giovanni Vantini

All friends of Sudan mourn the passing of Father Giovanni Vantini, for nearly 60 years one of the leading scholars in the rich field of Sudanese studies.  TfS Trustee, Herman Bell, has generously launched a fund in Father Vantini’s memory, to support the educational work of Together for Sudan. Contributions will be greatly appreciated. Donate on line here or go to our Donate page for other options. 

Herman has also written the following tribute:

Father Giovanni Vantini was inspired by the extensive history of Christianity in the Sudan and spent most of his life serving the people of the Sudan. He is remembered with affection by his Muslim and Christian friends and students.

Father Vantini was born in Villafranca di Verona on 1 January 1923. He was ordained a priest in 1947, trained in Arabic and sent to the Sudan. There he spent 58 years, teaching in schools established by the Comboni missionaries, working in parish churches and St. Matthew’s Cathedral (Khartoum), engaging in journalistic endeavours such as Assalam [Peace], a bi-weekly journal launched at the time of independence in 1956, and conducting research on the history of the Church along the Nile for most of the past 2000 years. In 2005, he published La Missione del Cuore - I comboniani in Sudan nel ventesimo secolo [The Mission of the Heart – The Comboni Missionaries in Sudan in the Twentieth Century] (Bologna). In spite of ill health in his final years he managed to achieve the publication of Rediscovering Christian Nubia (Khartoum) in 2009. He died in Verona on the 3rd of May 2011 at the age of 87.

His command of Arabic was a vital skill for the production of his Oriental Sources Concerning Nubia (Heidelberg & Warsaw, 1975), an important companion study to the historical and archaeological work in which he was involved at that time in the Nile Valley. He wrote one of his major publications in Arabic: Ta' rikh al-masihiyya fi-l mamalik al-Nubiyya al-qadima wa-l- Sudan al-hadith [The History of Christianity in the Old Nubian Kingdoms and the Modern Sudan] (Khartoum, 1978).

In the colloquial Arabic of the Sudan there is a relevant expression of condolence which is widely used:   al-baraka fiikum ‘Blessing upon you.’ Death reminds us of the great store of blessing that is available to us all. ‘Blessed be those who mourn for they shall be comforted.’

Saint Anna, mother of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
 Faras Cathedral.

Father Vantini was admired as a scholar and a man of faith. He was also a kind and generous friend. Even though the Canticle of the Creatures was composed almost 700 years before his birth by Saint Francis, the following verses still seem particularly appropriate.

Altissimu, onnipotente bon Signore,
Tue so le laude la gloria e l'honore
et onne benedictione.
………
Laudato si', mi Signore, per sora nostra Morte corporale,
da la quale nullu homo vivente po skappare,
………
Laudate et benedicete mi Signore et rengratiate
et serviteli cun grande humilitate.


Good Lord, most high and almighty,
To thee be praises, glory, honour and all blessings.
………
Be praised, my Lord, for our sister bodily death
From whom no human being can escape.
………
Praise and bless my Lord; thank Him,
And serve Him with great humility.

By Herman Bell - TfS Trustee.

Lambeth Palace Event Thanks

The Sudanese Ambassador attended

The TfS fundraising event at London’s Lambeth Palace was a major success – and also great fun. Lady Patey and Dr. Christine Green arranged the event with excellent support from Lambeth Palace.  Over 8,000 sterling was raised, some 4,600 during the auction of promises. The Barbershop Quartet, which has sung for us on several occasions, was another highlights of the event and I avoided creating a third highlight by not falling off the ladder which I climbed to give a short speech.  Together for Sudan is enormously grateful to Lambeth Palace personnel for their assistance and hospitality. TfS Patron Archbishop Rowan Williams was in Africa and thus unable to attend the event. 


Lillian's comments at the event


Read the report on our website

A Trip to Juba

During an early October visit to Sudan  Alan and I make a quick trip to Juba, now the capital of South Sudan.   Two of our substantive staff from Khartoum, including  Deputy Country Coordinator Victor, had moved to Juba and we hoped to check out how feasible it might be to expand TfS work to South Sudan. We were impressed by the vitality of the new state and the need for literacy training for women, HIV/AIDS Awareness outreach and other work  which would fit our projects.  Although TfS has at present no funding to begin working in Juba we would welcome all donations to do so!


Lillian Craig Harris

Donate to our work online here

Go to our Donate web page to see other options

Lambeth Palace Comments

Lillian Craig Harris, director of Together for Sudan spoke at our recent charity auction in Lambeth palace London. Her comments are replicated below.

11 October 2011

Lillian speaking at the event

Good evening and thank you for joining Together for Sudan for this fundraising event which is also a celebration of our service to the Sudanese people.  I am grateful to Together for Sudan Patron Archbishop Rowan Williams and his staff for inviting us here this evening even though the Archbishop is currently in Africa.

Many thanks are due as well to Dr. Christine Green and to Lady Patey for the many hours they have spent organizing this event.  And, of course, special thanks to Peter Arbuthnot, our auctioneer, and to member of the Barbershop Quartet who have sung for us on several occasions.  I am also grateful to fellow Together for Sudan Trustees Norman Swanney and Adrian Thomas as well as to Dave Lewis, the Together for Sudan webmaster, who publicised this event. And, of course, my great appreciation to all our helpers and supporters, especially you who are here this evening.

Together for Sudan has been a blessed charity since it began in the late 1990s.  Our educational and health care projects remain in great demand in the Khartoum area and in South Kordofan where we have a second office in Kadugli.  However, the charity presently faces severe financial difficulties as well as disruption of our work due to violence in South Kordofan. Our Kadugli office has been closed since early June due to fighting and subsequent looting of our office there.  We also face the challenge of recent loss of southern colleagues who have left Khartoum for South Sudan with the birth of that new nation.

Alan and I arrived in the UK yesterday after visits to both Khartoum, the capital of Sudan, and Juba, the capital of the new nation of South Sudan.  We are invited to begin work in South Sudan and even have there two former colleagues from our Khartoum office who would gladly work for us in Juba.  The needs and opportunities are enormous and we lack only the necessary funding. Today many people are reaching out to help South Sudan but relatively few are engaged directly with the critically important education of women and children.

Sudan’s present circumstances are the greatest challenge which Together for Sudan has faced in our more than 15 years of service to the Sudanese people. From the beginning – and at the request of Sudanese women – the work which became Together for Sudan has brought Muslims and Christians together in service to the poor. We hope to continue this work because it is a peace building gift which Muslims and Christians can give to one another. Our basic intent is to cross tribal, religious and social barriers in order to make peace by demonstrating that people of different faiths and backgrounds can work together to help other people in need.

This is who we are and what we believe.

In our present circumstances of combined peril and opportunity, I am reminded of my mother who was a missionary nurse and loved people of all sorts, mothers and babies in particular.  Mom taught me to look on, rather than look away from, the suffering of others.  When there were difficult times and seemingly insurmountable obstacles she would say, “Sometimes you just have to do it!”  And then she would get busy helping.

So what would she do if she were here today?  I think that she would reach out to desperate Sudanese women who long for education for themselves and their children.  Several years ago when I asked displaced women in Darfur what they needed they cried out “Teach us to read and we will help ourselves!”  With that mandate, Together for Sudan carries on although several of our projects are currently unfunded and the future is not clear.

Thank you for joining us at this critically important time for all Sudanese people.  It remains extremely important that we as individuals ask ourselves “Am I my sister’s keeper?”  And that we respond positively.  Thank you all for being with us tonight.  Enjoy!

LILLIAN CRAIG HARRIS, Director  .

Read about the event on our website here

News from Khartoum

Good news from Khartoum is in short supply these days.  But we were cheered by the success of our last two eye care outreaches in the Khartoum displaced areas just before the Eid.  A total of 265 patients were seen by our doctor and 43 referred to hospitals for operations, to be performed this month.  Thanks to Dark and Light, our generous sponsors for this project.

TfS Colleagues Go South

Together for Sudan’s friends and trustees join TfS field workers in mourning the loss of three colleagues who have decided to leave for South Sudan as a result of the 9 July division of Sudan into two countries. Deputy Country Coordinator Victor has already left for Juba and accountant Minalla and Messenger/cleaner Rina plan to leave as soon as transportation is available.  Our sadness at the loss of these valued friends and co-workers is overwhelming.  I ask the one God of Christians and Muslims to comfort, guide and protect all our Sudanese coworkers and supporters at this time of enormous change and uncertainty.      

TfS Kadugli Office Looted

Under pretext of an imminent air raid, TfS office guard Nazar was warned by soldiers to leave the Kadugli office.  When he returned some time later he found the office stripped of computers, furniture, safe, files and all other moveable equipment. Most other NGO and INGO offices had already been looted.  We are enormously grateful to Nazar for staying at his post as long as possible despite the threatening situation.   

The Nuba People return to war

Together for Sudan’s office in Kadugli has been closed since early June following an outbreak of heavy fighting in South Kordofan between government forces and the Nuba peole.  TfS Field Coordinator Ibrahim was evacuated by UNIMIS with other INGO Forum personnel and subsequently reunited with his family in Wad Medani.  He will work from our Khartoum office for the time being.  Kawther, a TfS university graduate, who was volunteering in the Kadugli office and Fatima, our cleaner/messenger have also reached safe haven.  Fighting continues 

Going Mobile - Text a Donation

From today you will be able to text a donation to Together for Sudan using your mobile phone. This great little innovation makes donating easier than ever before. We receive the whole amount of your donation and if eligible we can also receive Gift Aid from your donation.

Small amounts or large amount don't matter, please give what you can afford. The process is simple:

• Use any mobile phone
• Send a text to 70070
• Text this message with the amount you want to give - i.e. - TFSA01 £10
• Set the value to what you want to give
• Agree to Gift Aid if applicable

It's that easy. Please make a donation to our work and help us do more in Sudan. 

Yoga Challenge to Raise Funds for TfS

We (Mel and Han) have set ourselves the challenge to Practice Bikram Yoga for 30 consecutive days in aid of ‘Together For Sudan’.

For those of you who are not so familiar with what Bikram Yoga entails - Bikram Yoga is a style of yoga developed by Bikram Choudhury and which consists of a series of 26 postures carried out in a heated room that is 40C, each class lasting 90 minutes! We will be starting on the 23rd March and ending on the 22nd April! This will be challenging both mentally and physically for us, but we are absolutely dedicated and committed for such a worthwhile cause.

So dig deep everyone and get Sponsoring!
Click here to make a donation on Mel and Han's Just Giving web page

Our 2010 Annual Report and Accounts

The Charity Commission has acknowledged receipt of our Annual Report & Accounts for the year ended 31 Dec 2010. This completes the trustees' statutory duties for 2010. Phew what a relief !

If you're interested in seeing our report for Together for Sudan's activities coupled with our accounts for the same period look no further. A copy is here to view and share. It can be printed and saved for deeper reading. As you will see this year was not easy but showed that there is still faith in the work of Together for Sudan and much still to do. Make a donation online today and help us reach our 2011 goals. Donate to Together for Sudan online here

Open publication - Free publishing - More accounts

SUDAN AT A TIME OF GREAT STRESS AND GREATER HOPE

This is a difficult time for everyone in Sudan as well as for Sudanese abroad and people who know and love the Sudanese – northerners as well as southerners, easterners and westerners. Understanding and compassion is needed for all Sudanese as the referendum voting continues and as they face a new and uncertain future in its aftermath.


There are many concerns but among them is the plight of thousands of southerners who have congregated on the outskirts of Khartoum in the belief that their journey south would be facilitated by government, international or church efforts. This is not apparently happening sufficiently and major health and security issues could develop.

Together for Sudan has lost two of our five key colleagues in the Khartoum office. One hopes to return after the referendum but may not be able to do so. Nonetheless, we are determined to carry on as a charity dedicated to helping, in particular, women and children who are marginalized and in need of education. But major adjustments seem to lie ahead.

TfS remains dedicated to Sudan and to its multi-cultured and worthy people. At this difficult time of enormous change we hold hope for the Sudanese people and ask God to guide and protect them.

May peace and justice prevail,

Lillian Craig Harris

Director, Together for Sudan

HUNGER AND COURAGE IN KHARTOUM SHANTY TOWNS


  A December monitoring report on ten elementary schools in the deserts outside Khartum brought me to tears. In each of these schools TfS is paying salaries for two teachers and offering teacher training to all teachers. In return the schools – which are as poor and shabby as a school can get – allow ten HIV/AIDS affected children to study free. If you think this isn’t much on either side you are right. But little is better than nothing when you live on the edge of life. Listen to this:


Living on the edge !

 

Most of the 223 students at Equatorial School in Mayo are southerners but have remained in northern Sudan as they have no means to travel south. Among them are five orphaned brothers and many other children whose parents or guardians have died of AIDS. Another student, Tony, is 17, in grade 8 and interested in studying. However, as his father is dead and his mother “does not care for him” (I quote the monitoring report) he is homeless and sleeps on the street. The headmaster of Equatorial School asks TfS if we can pay Tony’s school fees next year if he fails this year, as seems probable. Our monitor could only reply that TfS, too, is uncertain of next year funding.

As I read this monitoring report today, several other tragic situations stood out, one in particular at Salama School in Khartoum South. David, age 18 and also in grade 8, is an orphan. He has two elder brothers and one younger sister and is dedicated to continuing his studies but is unable to pay tuition fees. This means that he will not be eligible to sit for the state basic school examination in March. More critically at the moment, according to the head master, David comes to school with no shoes, is often sick (faints) because of hunger and sometimes does not show up because he has no bus fare and, of course, no money to buy food. The head master wept as he described the tenacity of a boy who longs to be educated and may not make it, adding that there are many students like this but David’s situation stands out.

I have asked our Khartoum office to let me know the costs of school fees for Tony and David, two courageous and determined young people who are being pulled down by poverty and the effect of HIV/AIDS on their families. Would someone who reads this please help me help them?

See our scholarship project for AIDS affected Children

If you would like to help click here to send TfS a message

Lillian. 6 January 2011.