Maltese nationals make up over 60% of people who sponsor Ugandan orphans through a Romania-based NGO.

The founders of Help one chid thrive told The Malta Independent on Sunday they have no idea how this happened, but put it down to the generosity of the Maltese people.

The NGO is tasked with taking care of orphans and needy children living in the small village of Idudu, in the East African country.

The group was founded by Veronica Anghelescu and Mugoya Swaliki.

"Perhaps Maltese people are more generous, more inclined to help, which is something I have noticed," Anghelescu said during an interview with this newsroom.

"All that the children want is to exist. They want for somebody to see that they are there, that they exist and that they matter," she added.

Anghelescu said Maltese people have made up the majority of sponsors since the beginning of 2020, something which she says happened by “pure luck”.

The Maltese donors include actors, football players, teachers and school directors. Their comments on social media about the NGO have encouraged other Maltese people to join this noble cause.

 

The beginning

Anghelescu says it all began in 2019 when she came across a post on Facebook. An African man was asking if any English-speaking person would consider writing to his village so that children could practise their English reading and writing skills.

She eagerly participated in the pen-pal experience, which has nowadays turned into a hobby. Some months later, she received a letter from a five-year-old girl. Also enclosed in the envelope were photos of the girl holding the letter she had written to the village.

"The child was holding the letter in her tiny hands and she was as thin as the envelope. I was shocked at how malnourished the children were, how little they had to eat and the conditions they were living in. I came to realise that the problem required much more than sending letters. They needed so many things.”

Describing this moment as an “epiphany”, Anghelescu says she felt tasked with the huge responsibility of helping these children by finding ways of sending money so that they could buy food and other necessities.

 

A leap of faith

Anghelescu knew that she needed the help of her African colleague Mugoya Swaliki to get things started.

She sent him money for the first child, which he used to buy food. Seeing that the experience went smoothly, she decided to do this every month, later also supporting a second child. Veronica also started to share her experience on social media, hoping it would encourage others to help.

Her social status in her community as a well-respected teacher and musical instrument player proved fruitful and requests started pouring in. Veronica was transparent about the process, publishing receipts, paperwork and photos showing that the food was reaching the children at the village.

In 2020, Anghelescu and Swaliki decided to register the NGO under the name Help one child thrive, both in Romania and in Udidi.

While the organisation is non-profit, it is not eligible from tax deductions related to the transfer of funds from Romania to Uganda, leaving Anghelescu to cover them from her own pocket. She says, however, that frequent donations to the NGO help cover the administrative fees.

"Stopping is something I will never do as that would mean that there would be 457 children with nothing to eat,” Veronica says.

 

The challenges

Anghelescu said the most frustrating challenges are not financial but rather related with the process of interacting with people. The type of connection that the organisation has to establish with sponsors has to match with their expectations of the whole experience.

She says that donors sometimes ask her why the child they are sponsoring does not smile in the photos she sends them. "There are so many reasons why those children do not smile. First of all, they are orphans. Secondly, they lost everything in life, they do not have a place to sleep, they do not have enough food, they cannot go to school, they do not have dolls or football boots. And they start working from a very young age.”

She says that she would never force a child to smile for a photo.

Another situation that she describes as saddening is that some people decide to quit their sponsorship without any explanation. Telling a child that they no longer have a sponsor is the most heart-breaking part, she says.

"It is very hard on the children, who look up to their long-distance parents as their guiding stars. They grow very fond, very attached."

 

The near future

Speaking about the near future, Veronica says Maltese sponsors are always inviting her to come to Malta, but she is not very fond of travelling.

This year might be different, however, as she and Swaliki are looking into the possibility of bringing the children together with the legal guardians to Malta to meet their long-distance parents.

Travelling will only be possible after they figure out the complicated legal pathway they need to take for the children, as they do not want to risk the children’s safety.

 

 

Veronica Anghelescu, together with Mugoya Swaliki, would like to take this opportunity to thank the Maltese community for their continuous efforts in sponsoring the children of Idudu as well as their generous donations