08.05.2020

Mail from Tanzania

30 colourfully printed mouth and nose protection masks arrived today in the Wuppertal Mission House by mail from Dar es Salaam. Young mothers in Dar es Salaam have sewn them. They work in the project "Binti Mamas" (Teenage Mamas). The project gives hope to underage single women who became pregnant young. The owner of the "Binti Mamas" project is the Eastern and Coastal Diocese of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Tanzania (ELCT-ECD), a member church of the UEM. The members of the Corona Task Force of the United Evangelical Mission tried out the masks - with UEM or Binti Mama logo - right during their meeting today, Friday.

The social worker, Mwamini Charles Chuma, and Reverend Almut Birkenstock-Koll take care of this group of about 30 young women in Dar es Salaam. The North-South coworker of the UEM has been there with her husband Ingo since the end of March 2018. "We are improving daily, sewing three times a week", Birkenstock-Koll writes in her accompanying card. The two did not accept the UEM's offer to return home because of the Corona pandemic. They decided to stay in Dar es Salaam. Reverend Birkenstock-Koll also looks after the German-speaking congregation in Dar es Salaam on behalf of the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD).

At the beginning of April, the UEM board had set up a four-member Corona Task Force to coordinate the projects of the UEM's Corona Aid Fund of 1 million euros. In view of the immense impact of COVID-19, the fund is intended to support the activities of UEM members against the spread of the virus and, above all, to ensure the basic supply of people.