Looking Forward with Confidence: The First Female President of Tanzania

This week Tanzania mourns the death of President Magafuli. He died on Wednesday at the age of 61 after faithfully serving as President for the past five years. And on Friday, Samia Suluhu Hassan was sworn in as the new President, making history as the country's first female president. This mother of four has spoken publicly to encourage Tanzanian women and girls to pursue their dreams. Affectionately known as Mama Samia, she told the country this week "it is time to bury our differences and show love to one another and look forward with confidence." 

New President Samia Suluhu Hassan

This is our prayer for Tanzania. And this prayer includes women and children with albinism. May the differences be buried. We hope that as the women in the Upendo wa Mama ("Mother's Love") Group love and are shown love, they and their children will be able to look forward to the future with confidence. 

At The Hive, we are so proud of Penina and Rose who are looking forward with confidence to putting their new computer skills to good use! These two women have been working hard over the past year attending evening classes at local Wesley College. They have now passed the entire course working through all the modules on Excel, Word and much more! Congratulations to these two women for this fantastic achievement! We look forward to seeing how they can put these new skills to good use!

Rose working on labelling products at The Hive

Penina with two of her children

Jeni and Laurensia are also putting new skills to good use! They have been getting further training in tailoring skills. These two mamas have been the chief seamstresses for the Upendo wa Mama group, making batiki napkins, cushion covers and this past year, so many fabric face masks! They beaver away at the machines in the workroom in The Hive. Now they have learned to sew beautiful dresses and we hope will be able to increase their business and income. 

We also celebrate with Jeni the safe arrival of her new baby boy! She had a very difficult time this month ending up in hospital with post-labour complications, but we thank God she is home and well now.

Jeni last year with her baby girl born 15 months ago.

Laurensia

Laurensia sewing as others also work in the Hive workroom

Jeni and her gorgeous boy a few years ago! 

There is always something so exciting about learning new skills! Two other mamas who did not have the opportunity to go to school, are about to start literacy classes. Other mamas would like to continue with further study with English (Amisadai did a fantastic job teaching weekly English classes while we lived there). We look forward with confidence!

But please keep the women in your prayers. This month as we have been fundraising in the UK, they have been really struggling in Tanzania. It has not just been labour complications for Jeni. Two other mamas have been in hospital; one of them struggling with diabetes, the other is still in hospital and not doing well. Another mama has had to travel to be with her oldest son (with albinism) to care for him as he is very ill. Aikande's little girl was very ill for three weeks and was also hospitalised. Another is about to give birth and we pray for a safe labour and a healthy baby. As well as the serious health issues, there is the struggle to care for their families, the medical expenses and the loss of income through not working. 

Yet, in all the struggle, the hope for the future is there. On the wall of the workshop, the group has mounted the words of Psalm 90:17 "Let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us, and establish the work of our hands for us. Yes, establish the work of our hands." He is our hope. And through The Hive, we hope that others will be able to receive help and training. We want to be able to help and support particularly women and children with albinism, but others in the community too. 

Taken last year at the wedding of Elisha (EI) who has helped the women as they seek to develop small business and income-generating projects at home.
Next to Aikande on the right, notice Laurensia and Jeni in the beautiful dresses they made! 
Penina and Rose on the left.

Amisadai, Louisa and I again want to thank all of you who have helped to support The Hive and to see these women able, as their new President says, to look forward with confidence! (There will be more from the girls soon ... but they got a little buried in English assignments and Rhetoric speeches this week!) 

With 10 days left of our Fundraising month, we are now only about 10% short of our goal! If you would like to help The Hive, please see our Fundraising Page here! 

And if you would like to get a little glimpse into and behind the scenes of The Hive, here is a little video slideshow of the mamas at work!