Ndali Lodge is actively involved within the local community providing development and educational support through Ndali Lodge Local Development & Education Ventures

Since 1996 Ndali Lodge has been situated in this beautiful spot we have become increasingly involved with our neighboring community. Aside from directly employing many people from the immediate area and being one of the more substantial customers of the local produce market in Rwaihamba we also strive to improve the lot of those around us through sponsorship, water-projects and affiliation with local schools.

We are aided in many of our projects by guests of the lodge who see their involvement as a fulfilling way of staying connected to their time in Uganda.

Donations made can be of a specific nature, for instance the sponsorship of a child through secondary school or a contribution towards the upkeep of any one of the schools with which Ndali is affiliated, or a general donation to the fund as a whole to be channeled where we feel it is most needed at the time.

As a contributor you would receive regular updates by e-mail keeping you abreast of how your donation is benefiting the recipients.

From January 2009 a small percentage of Ndali’s income from accommodation - $14 from each twin cottage and $10 from each single - goes towards our various ventures, so just by being here you are doing your bit!

Aubrey and some of the recipients of Ndali sponsorship at Fort Portal Senior Secondary School in 2009

Mbuga Primary school

At the end of Ndali's driveway there is a small primary school which, despite it's size and lack of facilities, attempts to educate nearly a one thousand children! Mbuga primary school is part of the Uganda government’s ambitious ‘universal primary education’ policy, whereby government builds and maintains enough primary schools to educate every child in the country and pays the teachers a salary. That’s the theory, anyway.

The absurdly high birth-rate in Uganda (the average woman has 7 children!) makes the UPE policy nigh on impossible to execute effectively, meaning that Mbuga, and many schools like it, do not get the funding and attention they require and the education and learning environment available to the pupils is considerably below par. Ndali lodge has affiliated itself with the school in an attempt to address some of their problems and ensure that the children come away having had some semblance of an education.

So far we have built a classroom, the one with the solar-system painted on it, contributed towards a staff room, forwarded generous gifts of school equipment from guests and accommodated a number of young volunteers from England who have added their limited experience to that of the existing teaching staff and given the children plenty to laugh at!

Pupils outside an old classroom

Aunt Susan’s Infant Primary School

In early 2007 a number of residents from Kabata and Rugembe, two of our neighboring communities, got together to discuss the over-population and low standards of the government-run primary schools. They came to the conclusion that an alternative was needed in the form of an affordable private primary school.

James Tibamarua was appointed director of the school and Susan Kyomukama head-mistress. A small plot of land with a few dilapidated buildings on it was rented for the cause and three teachers employed. The fees were set at 10000Ush per term per pupil. That’s about $6.50 per term, so just under $20 per year. By the end of the 1st year 53 pupils were enrolled – not quite enough to cover the rent and the wages, but a start. Early this year (2008) James and Susan approached me looking for support for their school. After being shown around the meager facilities and being fully aware of the over-crowding of the government schools in the area I was more than happy to affiliate Ndali with their endeavor.

James & Susan outside a classroom

The school facilities!

The playground

For the time being our assistance is limited to improving the existing facilities and trying to create a realistic learning environment. In the longer term we are hoping to find a completely different and superior site for Aunt Susan’s school and greatly increase the number of pupils educated there.

Ndali’s Sponsorship programme

Every year children complete their primary education at Mbuga primary school with adequate grades to continue on to secondary education. A few of those, whose families are able to afford it, do just that, but there are many whose situation makes it impossible. Most families in our immediate area live a pretty basic existence and the fees of even a modest secondary school are beyond their means. Countless children who, with further education, would benefit both themselves and their families are resigned to digging in the fields and living a subsistence life-style, more often that not reproducing prolifically and compounding the problem!

Fort Portal Senior Secondary school is based 26 km away in Fort-Portal town. It is a boarding school of comparatively high quality and the cost per child, including education, food, accommodation, uniforms and school equipment, is about $550 per year.

As of the beginning of 2008 Ndali is helping 11 children with their further education, from Ivan, who is 18years old and, after thriving for 5 years at Fort Portal Senior Secondary school has gone to Nyakasero school to study for his ‘A’ levels, to Rosette and Wilberforce who have just completed their primary education at Mbuga primary school and started at Fort Portal Senior Secondary School.

Children can also be sponsored through private primary school. Grace, who is 7 and has lost both of her parents, is benefiting from such sponsorship as she had little chance of thriving at a government primary school. She is attending St Paul’s school in Fort Portal. The generosity of her sponsor will give her a chance to continue on to secondary school and after that… who knows?

The Fort Portal Golf Prodigies!

Inspired by Daniel Fromer, a friend from Los Angeles and something of a golf fanatic, and by the extraordinary talent of the young caddies who carry bags and find balls at the Toro Golf club in Fort Portal, Ndali is also involved in sponsoring some of the latter. Titus, Frank and Andrew are young men from Fort Portal with great natural talent and no financial resources.

On a visit to Ndali Daniel lugged across the globe six sets of clubs, three of which we donated to the boys and the other three to the Toro club for them to hire out to others without equipment. All now artisan golfers, we provide funding for transport, accommodation and entry fees in competitions around Uganda for Titus, Frank and Andrew. The better the boys do the higher the chance they have of joining the national team. All three could possibly achieve that goal!

The golf sponsorship does not come out of the general Ndali Ventures fund – that is reserved for the truly needy – but is provided by myself and other friends or guests who have a specific interest in Golf.