Families
Together
Families Together is the foundation of all of our work. We are planning to extend
our work with families. We will now be working with families living further
south in the country around Elbasan. This has been made possible by the recent
additions to our team of Christine and Roy Debenham. Christine and Roy lived
and worked in the area for ten years and have now decided to put their experience
and knowledge to supporting ICA.
As well as this development we have agreed with the local Mayor in Bajze that from employees working in the commune’s social services office will be responsible for distributing the direct payments to the families in the area.
This is a really important development. It’s a demonstration of the importance the Mayor and his team place on the work we do – and brings his team closer to the day-to-day difficulties faced by the families we help. It also means that Bashkim Bashllari, our director in Albania, will be able to devote more time to seeing that we extend and consolidate our work generally. And most important of all it means that we will be able to concentrate our efforts on helping families overcome the day-to-day and long term difficulties they have to confront.
Consolidating
health and disability work
In recent years we have worked with health worker teams and health educators,
supporting them by providing additional funds for medicines and small items
of equipment, and training expertise. Recently we set up a successful appeal
aimed at helping people with disability – specifically for the first phase
people who need wheelchairs. So that we can help the maximum numbers of people
we have decided to form partnerships with established local charities. The ones
we have met so far are desperately short of funds and so working together will
ensure that work will continue.
For example, Vangjelia and Nasi Duka run a day centre for people with learning
difficulties in Tirana – this is part of a network of centres throughout
Albania. Nineteen people visit the centre and a further seven people are visited
at home. Originally set up by Mencap, this is an excellent centre. Its foundation
is one of love and care with lots of projects such as handicrafts and artwork
and with regular visits to places of interest. It is well run too, with attention
paid to creating a pleasant and pleasing environment and the maintenance of
proper accounts.
One of the beneficiaries of the centre is a young woman who as well as having learning difficulties is profoundly deaf. Mencap no longer works in Albania. To give an idea of the financial problems this centre faces, the annual utilities bill is around £1200 and they need about £1 per person per day for food – the total annual cost is around £8000. By working with Vangjelia and Nasi we will help them maintain their invaluable work. In return we will draw on their expertise to support the families we work with who are touched by mental disability.
There are two organisations we have met who help visually impaired people. The Blind Association has a branch in Elbasan. Gasmund and Luan, the centre’s two managers, help about 700 people and some of the users of the centre themselves contribute to its work. A smaller organisation uses a church room as a centre for teaching Braille, English and crafts and wants to expand. The founder also wants to extend the work to include computing. With our centre experience we will make a good contribution to this effort. But the main points are that both organisations deserve as much help as possible and the work they do is directly important to the families who are our central concern.
Which leaves, of course, the wide area of disability we addressed in our New Year Appeal. As you will see from our appeal letter we have already made some progress.
The little boy we featured in our appeal letter now has his wheelchair and we
have purchased an electronic chair for Tom Lulash who lives in a village called
Aliaj, plus eight other people. Meanwhile we have had meetings with a firm in
Vore that makes wheelchairs. We have always wanted to source the chairs in Albania
and in the longer term we still plan to do this. The recent appeal to our private
donors proved to be successful but our applications to Trusts have not so far
achieved any favourable response.
Consolidating
work with returnees
Three years ago we supported an organisation dedicated to training health workers.
It gave a priority to women who had returned to Albania after having been trafficked;
also some of the health workers involved with our medical support programme
have in the past suffered from being trafficked. How can this work with trafficked
people be maintained?
Bharda Alimetaj, the Director of a group based in Librazhd, whose aim is the establishment of a rehabilitation centre for women in need states that ‘the distinctive feature of the region that gives rise to trafficking is the economic situation’. She writes that it is the high rate of unemployment, sub-standard housing, low incomes and lack of legal migration opportunities that leads to women being trafficked to neighbouring countries like Macedonia. In fact the victims are more likely to be trafficked within Albania’s national boundaries to other parts of Albania. Mrs Alimetaj aims to rehabilitate socially, emotionally, and intellectually not only those women who have been trafficked but also the many the many who have been abused within their homes, by providing them with skills such as catering so that they will be able to find legal work to enable them to escape the ordeal of abuse and trafficking that has been their lot so far.
We feel this kind of work fits well with our work with economically and socially disadvantaged families who are at risk of trafficking and so our general aim of community development will become ever more effective.
And
meanwhile . . .
We have not said much in the newsletter about the centres in Bajze and the
town 15 kilometres further south Grishe, but we can report that Bajze continues
to do well by offering an after school meeting place where children can socialise,
have fun playing the computer games and where their parents and others can make
international and national phone calls, and make use of the Internet resource.
Students also make use of the centre as part of their college work. Grishe is
also doing well and both centres are now providing the important community service
while covering their costs. The annual attendance at the centres is around 30,000
per annum and we offer advice to around 15,000 per year – this covers
advice on financial problems, education and general family matters.
We
are already planning a Development Tour for 2009, scheduled for 25-30 April.
We are planning to follow up the tour with a more in depth visit to Elbasan
that will last until 4 May. The visit to Elbasan is designed to give the opportunity
to gain familiarity with the area and the work we are planning to do. The tour
will be available as part of a single package or it will be possible to choose
one or the other. Please let us know if you would like more information at this
stage – and if you are interested, please let us know
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