Survivors Fund (SURF) Newsletter - January 2022
News from Survivors Fund (SURF)
As we enter a new year, we are looking forward to extending our work into 2022. Despite the many challenges of last year resulting in-country from COVID-19, and internationally with the difficult funding climate, we are planning to build back stronger through rolling out a number of new projects, as well as continuing to scale existing work.
Through support from Clifford Chance, last year we were able to extend our COVID-19 Emergency Response Project (CERP), into a new Counselling Extension Response Project (CERP II) which is progressing really well, on which we report further in this newsletter. In July we kicked off another new project, a Youth Economic Empowerment Project (YEEP) which is beginning to scale up this year, and which we look forward to reporting on in future.
Though our funding from the UK Government was cut last year, we have managed to continue to sustain our work with AVEGA in the Western Province through new funding from the Addax & Oryx Foundation for our Empowering Vulnerable Genocide Widows in Karongi and Rutsiro Districts to Alleviate Extreme Poverty (EVKREP) project. This builds on the success of our Empowering Vulnerable Genocide Widows in Western Rwanda to Alleviate Extreme Poverty (EVWEP) project on which we receieved a score of A+ from the UK Aid Direct Team, which we higlight as well in this newsletter.
We are glad to report that the Network for Africa Big Give Charity Appeal which we featured in the newsletter last month exceeded their £24,000 target which will go towards supporting our AERG youth counselling programme over the year ahead, so thank you dearly to all supporters that donated to it. For those still looking for a cause to support in the new year, then the appeal of another one of our principal international partners, Foundation Rwanda, is still running. So please do visit their GoFundMe Appeal to donate to construct a house for Christine, one of the remarkable women genocide survivors that we support together.
Such work continues to be important at this time, as does your continuing support for it. So thank you in advance for doing so. And we take this opportunity to wish you a happy and healthy 2022 from all of the SURF team!
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Counselling Extension Response Project
Survivors Fund (SURF) has developed and delivered an array of mental health projects to support survivors over the past 20 years. Some of our mental health work is delivered through conducting counselling groups across the country through our local partner organisations. Due to the start of the COVID-19 pandemic last year, survivors were not able to commemorate the loss of their loved ones during the annual commemoration period. Because of the government’s stay-at-home and COVID-19 prevention measures, it was not possible for anyone to hold events, conduct vigils or gather within their communities to remember loved ones.
Consequently, this exacerbated traumatic disorders among many survivors and required extending access to additional counselling services. Individual and group counselling activities were impossible to deliver during the lockdown. This led first to the COVID-19 Emergency Response Project (CERP), and now to the Counselling Extension Response Project (CERP II). SURF, in collaboration with its partners and with funding from Clifford Chance through the Cornerstone programme is providing access to phone-based counselling and supplementary support to vulnerable survivors of the genocide, and related vulnerable persons, from the April 2021 through to July 2022.
The project focuses on three principal activities: 1) raising awareness about available psychological services and mental health issues that affect survivors, 2) providing access to phone-based counselling and hardship support for those in most need, and 3) monitoring and learning from the approach in order to improve emergency response to future situations. It is coordinated by Survivors Fund (SURF) in partnership with Ibuka, Association des Etudiants et Eleves Rescapés du Genocide (AERG), Association des Veuves du Genocide (AVEGA-Agahozo) and Groupes des Anciens Etudiants Rescapés du Genocide (GAERG). Each will be supported to retain a professional counsellor to provide access to services through a toll-free helpline, supported by 48 Peer Support Counsellors who are volunteers based in different communities who will receive additional training in providing basic mental health first aid, and will be provided with a stipend to be fully available and provide local follow-up.
The project is providing much needed mental health support and survivors are continuing to learn, and experience first-hand, that telephone counselling can be as helpful as face-to-face counselling. CERP II is reaching survivors across all age groups across Rwanda, including most importantly more remote places which cannot be reached by counsellors, particularly over the period of lockdowns resulting from COVID-19.
As of November 2021, over 7,000 calls have been answered throught the helplines, and 1,300 people have received direct support. This include making referrals to specialist institutions to provide additional support for over 250 more complex cases. In a random survey of callers to the helpline, we are particularly proud that over 70% are very satisfied by the service that the helplines have provided to them, and over 90% have recommended the service to others.
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SURF/AVEGA Project Scores A+
The Empowering Vulnerable Genocide Widows in Western Rwanda to Alleviate Extreme Poverty (EVWEP) project is a partnership between Survivors Fund (SURF) and AVEGA Agahozo providing holistic support to widowed survivors of the genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda and their dependents in the two districts of the Western Province, namely Rusizi and Nyamasheke. It was originally funded as a 30 month project from UK Aid Direct, the challenge fund of the UK Foreign, Commonweath & Development Office supporting civil society organisations to achieve sustained poverty reduction.
EVWEP was initially scheduled to run through to March 2022 with the aim to empower 1,050 vulnerable genocide widows and 4,000 of their dependents but due to cuts in the Overseas Development Assistance of the UK Government, the project was closed prematurely in July 2021, but still we were able to support 1,272 vulnerable gencode widows to access livelihood development training, psychosocial counselling, food security and sustainable energy measures, which in turn helped over 5,000 of their dependents..
This week we received the formal scoring of the project from the UK Aid Direct Team. The overall assessment is that the project has scored an A+ which translates into the outcomes delivered have exceeded expectation. The commentary we received on it is:
"The grant holder has demonstrated progress in key outcomes for 1,050 vulnerable genocide widows and their households, including improved food security and consumption, increased disposable household income, access to counselling and mental health support services, and more environmentally-friendly alternatives for cooking. Of further note was the successful approach to train community volunteers as key project implementors for the project. SURF successfully considered the risks around this and has been able to demonstrate how this approach has led to greater community buy-in as well as stronger sustainability for the project. The grant holder also provided some useful learnings and future adaptations for implementation, especially around setting up IGA with loans from banks."
"Although this project has faced an array of challenges, the project team has been able to adapt commendably well – working in consultation with the government, the SURF team was able to resolve the main issue of field staff being able to reach beneficiaries... Overall, despite these challenges, at the point of FCDO funding ending it seems evident that the project had made good progress towards key targets and seemed well placed to continue with an upward trajectory having laid much of the groundwork."
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Thank You
Our work would not be possible without your support. If you would like to give a donation to support our COVID-19 response, which we will keep open as long as our beneficiaries are impacted by the virus in Rwanda, you can just click on the button below, which will direct you to our donation page - through which there are several ways to give, including PayPal and directly on the page (via stripe).
We hope you are keeping well, and wishing you well for 2022.
Take care, keep well and stay safe.
Samuel Munderere
Chief Executive, Survivors Fund (SURF)
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