Prime
How far has Ekisaakaate come seven years later?
Nnabagereka Sylvia Nagginda inspects a banana peeling exercise by some of the particants at one of the Ekisaakaate holiday camps. FILE PHOTO
Started in 2007 by Her Royal Highness Nnabagereka Sylvia Nagginda, Ekisaakaate is an annual children’s holiday camp. The camp’s goal is to foster young boys and girls into rounded and handy individuals who can appreciate both cultural and modern values. There has been a growing concern especially from parents that youngsters nowadays are rebellious, so Ekisaakaate was looked at as an antidote whose goal is to refresh boys and girls aged six to 18 years.
Assessment
Susan Nalwoga, the spokesperson for Ekisaakaate believes the programmeme has achieved 70 percent of their set objectives.
“Our programmeme has reached out to a big percentage of children countrywide.
“Not only have we reminded the children about the existence of cultural values, we have managed to put these values into practice at the end of every session,” Nalwoga explains.
She explains that the 30 percent which they have not attained is largely due to the fact that some of the children who go through the programme relapse to their bad habits.
Rogers Nsiima, a businessman says although his 15-year-old daughter has attended the programmeme three years in a row, it has only had temporal influence on the teen.
He says, “she has been attending Ekisaakaate events for the past three years.
Whenever she returns from these sessions, she assumes good behaviour for about a week only to resume her bad behaviour.”
The single father of two points out that his daughter hates taking part in house chores and is not hospitable to guests.
Andrew Adrian Mukiibi, the head of trainers at Ekisaakaate who also doubles as the programme manager at the Nnabagereka Development Foundation states that such instances happen because parents do not harness what their children have learnt from the camp.
“It is important for parents to continue following up their children even after they have left the camp. It is wrong to think that the child will change overnight just because they have been attending the Ekisaakaate,” Mukiibi emphasises.
Nalwoga says over the years, they have been receiving overwhelming positive responses from parents whose children have participated in the camp.
Joseph Ssendagire, an assistant administrator with the Judiciary is one such parent. He sent his daughter, Josephine Twemanye for this year’s programme at Trinity College Nabbingo and is overwhelmed by the change in his daughter’s attitude after the session.
“She is so helpful with house work and is quite respectful to everyone,” he explains.
Asked what she learnt during the programme, Twemanye, a pupil at City Parents Primary School says, the whole experience opened a new world of opportunities for her. “I learnt new Luganda words, how to cook certain traditional dishes like luwombo and weaving mats”. The 11-year-old only hopes that the programme can be made longer because the two weeks training is not adequate to cover everything.
Tangible change
This camp which annually takes place during the first two weeks of January, empowers these youngsters with life skills under the guidance of volunteers. “We use the services of over 100 personnel annually,” Kabuuza says.
He adds that they do not allow the children to carry edibles because the fee is inclusive of snacks and meals. As part of the activities of the programme, they ensure that the children entrusted under their care have balanced diet meals. He says when the children are left in their care, “at the beginning, they are comfortable wearing their jeans and shorts, but after a week at the camp, you see the girls switching to long skirts and the boys enthusiastic about wearing trousers.
Game Plan
Kabuuza says ekisaakaate has expansion programmes in the offing which include setting up a permanent home on a 25 acre piece of land in Sissa, located off Entebbe road. Asked how they choose the host school, Mukasa Kabuuza, a board director of the programme says all schools that are interested in hosting the holiday camp apply beforehand.
“We normally encourage them to pick up application forms immediately after the event has been closed for that particular year,” he adds. A high level of security, good accommodation and easy access to water are some of the major factors that they look out for before choosing the school.
One thing remains clear about this programme, they are all about addressing all the children’s needs adequately. However the organisers should aim at involving parents in future retreats so as to achieve a achieve holistic change in children’s nurturing.
Selection of participants
Mukaza Kabuuza, a board director of the programme says they annually receive thousands of applications from children who want to be part of the programme. He said this year, they received over 2,000 applications but could only take on 600 children. Of the 600, a hundred were non Baganda.
Kabuuza emphasizes that the criterion for selecting participants is based on a first come first serve basis. Asked why they didn’t take on all the applicants, Kabuuza said they would have loved to but because of the limited resources they could not.
He adds that those selected to participate in the camp are allowed to carry clothes of their choice with mandatory two long skirts for girls, and two black trousers for boys.
A white shirt is a must for both sexes.
