Phil Goodwin with group, listening to Lifeline radio
Written by Phil Goodwin
To properly understand the impact of access to information through radio it’s not enough to simply read the case studies or rationalise how uplifting this technology can be. While it’s certainly logical that radio is a powerful tool and plays a vital role in empowering people in the developing world, there is a new perspective to be gained by hearing peoples stories, seeing how they live, understanding their concerns and their daily challenges.
I was privileged to spend a week in Rwanda among child headed households. I experienced a generation growing up not only in abject poverty – but also as orphans to HIV/AIDS, malaria and a horrendous and brutal genocide and civil war.
To place my own children of the same age as most that I met in this situation acutely highlights the contrast in our lives. Imagine for a moment, the hopes for your children that you might have as a parent – a good education, good health, a sound set of values – even simple basic manners. Imagine then expecting the same your children after being stripped of the privilege of safe, clean running water, access to light in the darkness or food security – and after having lost their parents through disease or mass murder on an unprecedented scale. To be alone and raising siblings under such difficult conditions when you’re 8 or 12 years old is something few of us can barely comprehend.
What I have experienced of these children was remarkable. Thrust into enormous responsibility at very young ages – to care for, feed, clothe and school their siblings, often selflessly. Those that I met, without exception, would make me proud were I their parent. More remarkable is that there is hope among these children where you would expect hopelessness.
I doubt that many will ever enjoy any real privileges, but there’s no doubt that their lives are being made easier by clean, dependable access to information through Lifeline radios. These radios have assisted these children more than I can properly describe. By providing sustainable access to information these children are learning how to sterilize their drinking water and about reproductive health and HIV prevention. They are learning their rights – especially those of women, where rape has been used so commonly as a weapon.
In a country so brutally divided only 15 years ago they are learning about reconciliation – how to live in unity with difference, how to trust others. I was struck as I left a school, being mobbed by a hundred children all keen to practice their English with a Mzungu (foreigner). A young girl asked me where I was from – I said I was South African. I asked her the same question; her reply was powerful and simple, and repeated by the others standing round. “I am a people – we are people”.
*Phil Goodwin is the Executive Director of Lifeline Energy’s for-profit trading arm, Lifeline Technologies Trading Ltd.
