The Alpha Ujuvi Collective acts to put an end to rampant sexual violence in DR Congo by supporting and empowering female survivors through education, vocational training, medical and legal aid, and awareness-raising activities.
The challenge(s) that the Alpha Ujuvi Collective is addressing:
Over the past decade and a half, girls and women have been systematically raped and sexually assaulted in DR Congo. Today, sexual violence continues to be used on a massive scale as a weapon of war by soldiers, ethnic militias and rebels to instill fear throughout communities—with an estimated 1,150 girls and women being raped in the country every day.
Because of widespread conflict, generalized poverty and stigma, girl and women survivors of sexual violence are left with few opportunities to seek treatment for the trauma to which they’ve been subjected – and even fewer chances to become empowered to regain a life of dignity.
The Alpha Ujuvi Collective is turning this tragic situation around for DR Congo’s girls and women by providing them with literacy and vocational training. Thanks to its programs, 200 women survivors of sexual violence are learning how to fabricate and sell baskets and wash basins. These skills will enable them to create an income-generating activity and earn the revenue necessary to take adequate care of themselves and their families. Economically empowered, these women can go on to share their income with their loved ones and community members: this positive involvement in their families and communities helps to break the stigma attached to victims of sexual violence and put a stop to their marginalization and exclusion. Women thus win the respect of their communities and are invited to participate in local decision-making processes, where they can promote peaceful dialogue and cooperation.
Educational and social reintegration services are also provided, at the Furahini Center for Education in Goma, to over 500 orphaned, displaced or destitute girls—girls who were not able to attend school before the age of 9 or were forced to abandon their schooling. The center aims to bring girls’ education to an appropriate level for their age and helps them to catch up in subjects that they were not taught owing to the disruptions of war, displacement, natural disasters or family difficulties. This remedial education program enables girls to fulfil their primary education in three years—half the time it takes on average!
The Alpha Ujuvi Collective would like to expand its educational and training programs to reach more girls and women who have had their potential limited by poverty and violence. However, the Collective lacks the financial resources needed to empower more of DR Congo’s girls and women to build safe, healthy, and prosperous futures.
You can be a changemaker!
You can support the Alpha Ujuvi Collective’s vital efforts to assist women survivors of sexual violence to build new lives by funding the educational and entrepreneurial endeavors of its members. You can also help the Collective to create generations of educated, empowered women by financing the fees of girls’ and young women’s school enrollment and professional training.
You can also get involved by reinforcing the Collective’s awareness-raising efforts, which aim to eliminate the stigma attached to victims of sexual violence and to put an end to the atrocities of gender-based violence. Your gift helps spread crucial information about the harms of gender-based violence within different neighborhoods around Goma—through pamphlets, songs, plays, sketches, and televised radio shows.
Finally, you can spread the word within your own circles about the Alpha Ujuvi Collective’s inspiring endeavors to build peace in DR Congo through the leadership of the country’s girls and women.
The difference you can make: the impact of your giving
Your donation helps DR Congo’s girls and women gain the knowledge and skills they need to create futures free of violence and conflict. Through education and economic empowerment, these girls and women will have more say in decision-making processes and will thereby be able to serve as essential leaders in the construction of a culture of peace.
Your gift helps ensure that DR Congo’s girls and women are no longer subjected to senseless, barbaric acts of violence, but are instead respected as key actors in the development of a nation—a nation capable of seeing the peaceful coexistence of all persons residing within its borders.
Relevant Country Data:
Capital: Kinshasa
Population: 67,757,600
GDP per capita: $290
Population living below $1.25 PPP per day: 59.2%
Infant mortality rate (probability of dying between birth and age 1 per 1000 live births): 112
Maternal mortality ratio (deaths of women per 100,000 live births): 670
Life expectancy at birth: 49 years
