As Uganda ranks amongst the top African Countries receiving refugees, humanitarian agencies have had to work harder each day to support the ever growing number of refugees and ensure their well-being. Today, Uganda is home to 1.3 Million refugees from South Sudan, majority being mothers and children. Since the on-set of the refugee influx in July 2016, Uganda Red Cross has been at the fore-front of this refugee response providing key services that include provision of clean and safe Water, providing Hygiene and Sanitation facilities, social mobilization for disease outbreak and control, registration, restoration of broken family links, distribution of relief Non-food items among others.

Uganda Red Cross is prioritizing the most vulnerable groups of people who have been named “persons with special needs”, their families and communities in all the refugee settlements in West Nile.  Faunta Angila, 67 years old lives in Imvepi refugee settlement. She survives on support from the different humanitarian actors in this operation. Faunta is crippled. Her neighbors have offered to support her with basics of life only when they can. She got into Uganda through the help of South Sudan Red Cross Volunteers who carried her to the boarder where she got into a bus to Uganda. As a survivor in a family of 8 people, Faunta recalls how her close people died during the war.

Today, as part of support given to persons with special needs who are also a category among “the most vulnerable”, Uganda Red Cross volunteers visit Faunta for different reasons. While distributing relief items, they find her home because she can’t get to the distribution centers within the camp on time. Without a wheel chair, Faunta takes about 1 hour to cover a ten (10) meters distance. She is however a social person, very soft spoken and warmly shares her heart with strangers.

“Faunta is one of the many persons with special needs whom we care for. Most of the time we find them at home because of mobility challenges. She is always happy especially when we have to visit her and bring her basic needs like soap, blankets, tarpaulins, water treatment tablets, jerricans, among other things.  She considers her self-blessed to have visitors who care for her and this is something she mentions to us each time we come.” Says Jennifer, a Uganda Red Cross Volunteer in Imvepi settlement. 

“I am very happy. I want to thank Red Cross people for loving me the way I am. They make me forget where I came from and what I went through. I can’t walk so they sympathize with me and bring my necessities here. I will always remember Red Cross because even in Sudan, it is Red Cross people who rescued me.” Faunta speaks as she takes a deep sigh. While selecting the most vulnerable, Uganda Red Cross considers pregnant and lactating mothers, the disabled, blind, child headed homes, the elderly and any category of people who can’t make ends meet by themselves. They are given basics of life as part of psychosocial therapy that helps to build their social esteem and dignity.