Get by 40 cents per day!

From 3 to 14 april 2013 Henk Füchs, then President of the Foundation Mission Homefront of the Deanery of Weert, visited Lilongwe in Malawi. This is the working area of Father Jo Kuppens from Weert. A gift made this trip possible. 

The Foundation is for several years creating a new policy plan for the next 10 years. This is partly motivated by the fact that the secularization in Europe and also in Netherlands as a result of which there are less and less sisters and priests to draw the mission countries. The still active priests and sisters slowly reach an age that they can no longer continue with their work. The Foundation, that exists 57 years has therefore taken a new path to try to be able to continue to support the third world. The hard work of our missionaries from Weert does not have to stop when they can no longer work. Therefore, Henk went to Lilongwe to look into what Father Jo Kuppens is working on and how this can be continued. 

Immediately upon arrival at the airport you see the poverty of the local population. On the way to the missionary station of Father Jo I see many people walking down the road with bundles of wood, branches or even food on the head. On the way to a market in order to earn money or trade it with food what they themselves do not have. The day after arrival I went to a nearby school. It's the Easter holidays so there are almost no children at the school. In the premises I see no school benches and also no books. On inquiry shows that elementary school children all on the ground should be. Only the highest classes have a bench. Books are often not available and when available than only 1 booklet per 10 children. A week later I visited another school: a total 3000 children with classes of over 200 children. Most groups were sitting outside on the grass with a portable blackboard of 1 by 1 meter. I see not one child with a book in hand. As soon as they see me they fly towards me and they want their picture taken. The teacher has her hands full to get them. At the secretarial services it immediately strikes me that there were no computers: "we do not have them and internet is also hard to get, it’s really expensive and often a bad connection".

 No school benches or books                     Some old computers 30% defect

Power cut

Every day the power is off for a few hours. There is not enough electricity produced and therefore they “distribute” them by sometimes shutting down some areas. I've experienced this several times during my stay and especially after the evening clock it’s very dark. At the center Father Jo is working on a lot of information about the country, the government and its citizens. During the quarterly meeting of the staff, the electricity was also turned off when I heard that in January on average the people had only 40 cents per person per day to spend. Inconceivable! Naturally malnutrition is the result and that is also reflected in the research of employees. The government has at one time determined that a man needs per day in 2400 Kcal. In January, there were regions where only 936 Kcal had eaten. Less than half of what they need.

Family in front of their house, the woman on the right has food allergies

Perspective

I ask Father Jo Kuppens what the future will look like here. He says, “You have seen the number children in the schools, the population is growing rapidly here and this country has barely products to export or to make money. All these people cannot get enough food. Education with those few computers that you have seen are not enough to train enough people with a reasonable prospect of work. We shall therefore first have to do something about the training. That should be better and more of this age. And yes the Government must also change. There is too much corruption. You saw that in the buildings and cars on the road. The new policy plan of the Foundation fits well in the situation: schools from Weert coming in touch with schools here. We can learn a lot from each other. Also companies and the hospital can seek connections with us here. There is still much to do, but there is surely perspective for a smaller group of people here, who are assisted by you, Weert and Europe. But again, we can also do much for Europe and Netherlands. The churches here are crowded that you have seen on Sunday, 3500 people of whom 1100 children who visited 3 H. Masses. The number of vocations is still increasing. Who knows you will soon get a chaplain or pastor from our country!”.