Nigeria Trip Report

[ukeme okon]

 

Activity: Frontier Process

 

Location:Uruk Otong Corps (AISW Division)

 

Date: 13th July-4th August 2011

 

Objectives:

• To build young people's competence on HIV/AIDS
• To build young people's experience around Psycho-Social Support for OVC
• To build the leadership competency of the youth in responding to issues affecting their communities
• To expose the visiting youths to immediate application of facilitation team approach. 

The frontier process is categories into three (3) sections;

• Orientation (2 days)
• Frontier Process (19 days)
• Debrief  (2 day)

ORIENTATION

During orientation, the following topics were facilitated to enable the participants interact freely with community members and disseminate Correct Information on HIV/AIDS

• Facts about HIV/AIDS
• Stigma/Discrimination
• Importance of Voluntary Counselling and Testing
• Integrated mission
• Facilitation team approach
• Community Counselling Cycle
• Psycho-Social Support for OVC

Frontier PROCESS Activities:

 

ADVOCACY VISITS:

Advocacy visits were conducted to the under listed churches and community leaders alongside Captains A & S Oton – the host DYO (Corps Officers Uruk Otong Corps/Divisional Youth Officers Akwa Ibom South West Division) to solicit for support, mobilization and participation in the activities

• Chief Sampson - Village head Uruk Otong/Ikot Ebok Community
• Pastor F.T Ebebe – Pentecostal Assembly
•  Elder Pastor E. Inyangunwam – Christ Faith Church
• Qua Iboe Church
• Government Primary School, Ikot Arankere

 

The cabinet member in turn appreciated the team and The Salvation Army for its good work and for sending such a dedicated young people to their community.

As part of community contribution towards frontier process, Chief Sampson promised to mobilize his cabinet for an interactive session with the team and decide on how and when the team will meet with the larger community.

The church leaders promised to mobilise their congregations for an interactive forum with the team on HIV/AIDS on agreed dates and days respectively.

AWARENESS AND SENSITIZATION

The team met with the local officers of Uruk Otong Centre comprising Uruk Otong Corps, Nto-Okon Corps, Nkwot Corps, Ikot Akpan Eyo Corps and Ikot Ibekwe Society to create awareness on HIV/AIDS and the effects of HIV/AIDS in their communities.

HIV/AIDS sensitization was conducted in Uruk Otong Corps after the Sunday Holiness Meeting and the team also briefed the comrades on the work of the frontier team in their community. There was question and answers on HIV related issues during the sensitization.

The team sensitize the Community chief and his cabinet on HIV/AIDS and also inform them that Akwa Ibom state is rated second after Benue State with the highest number of People Living with HIV (PLWH) in Nigeria.  Thus there is need for their participation in addressing the HIV/AIDS issue in their state.

During the frontier process, the Division had her Junior Miss Rally. The frontier team were invited and they sensitized the young women on HIV/AIDS. Over 200 “junior miss” were in attendance.

Community Visit:

The Frontier team went in to the community to build relationship with community members asking them strategic question on issues bordering on community development, health matters and assessing their level of knowledge on HIV/AIDS. These enabled the team to know the concerns and strength of Uruk Otong community. At the end, the team also shared their previous frontier experiences with community members.

As the frontier team lives and moves around the host community, young people with vision for their communities and conviction about response for change were identified. These young people were invited and engaged to participate alongside the frontier team in the programme. As the work progresses, the team kept on expanding as more local young people were engaged and included in the programme.

KIDS CLUB FORMATION:

The facilitation team went to the Government Primary School, Ikot Arankere to form a kids club and the school authorities were so glad to welcome the programme. During the session, the team shared information about HIV/AIDS with the pupils

There was a kid’s club formation in the community, where children from the community were gathered, and were facilitated on how to be good children. Some vulnerable children were discovered during the interactive session and were counselled.

Over 200 children were present at the kids club.

SPIRITUAL EXERCISE:

There were spiritual exercises to strength and equip the youths for the work in the community. These include: intercessory prayer, identification of spiritual gift, praying the bible, prayer working, personal and group devotion and spiritual warfare.

On one of the occasions, the team prayed under the rain, walking into the street of the community interceding on behalf of the community.

TEAM BUILDING:

22 youth were in attendance, and 12 out of the 22 willingly volunteered themselves to form the team that will carry on with the creation of awareness and sensitization in their community when the visiting team had gone.

The following topics were discussed during the interactive session;

• Effects of HIV/AIDS on young people
• Their Roles as youth in the community towards HIV/AIDS

A game called “Human Chair” was introduced to stimulate their interest and brain storm on challenges faced while playing the game. After the game the participants reflected on their experiences while playing the game. Here are some of their comments:

 “I will start making the right choice”………Gift

“Lets take the bull by the horn”………..Sunny

“I will start taking every necessary preventive measure”……….Titus

“My community will be enlightened with information gathered”………Israel

 

STRENGHT DISCOVERED IN THE COMMUNITY

Care

• Parents want a better life for their children.
• Hospitality
• Unity
• Care for the less privileged by their relatives.
• Tolerance for each other.
• Youth are ready to embrace development.

Vision

• Quality education
• Behavioural Change among the youth.
• Creation of job opportunities.
• Provision of electricity

Concerns

• Lack of good roads
• Lack of electricity
• Lack of hospital
• Lack of Voluntary Counselling and Testing
• Inactive leaders (there is a wide gap between the leaders and the led)
• Disobedience among the youth
• Some people don’t believe in the existence of HIV/AIDS
• No standard market in the immediate

Lessons learnt

• The true facilitation team can work by going out of the building and integrating ourselves with the people not staying in-door to tell the whole world that we do a lot.
• We learnt that we could achieve the transformation in the lives of people when visiting and stimulating them for change
• People can respond to their needs if properly channelled. 

Debrief

The team from the territorial headquarters arrived at Uruk Otong on the 1^st of August, in company of Major Oyesanya, the Divisional Commander of Akwa Ibom South West.

What was done during debrief?

The frontier team debriefed the leaders on what happened during the frontier process.

• Introduction
• Frontier calendar
• Thematic analysis; the strength chart
• Discussion forum with the community leaders and its members ( using the concerns discovered in the community)
• Action plan

The team presented all the above activities to both the leaders of The Salvation Army and the community members.

 

Visit to the Palace

The Social Secretary, TFT and LFT members visited the palace to give the report of the 3 weeks frontier process. At the palace, Captain A. Oton started the meeting with a short prayer, he introduced the team, while the Community Secretary introduced the chief’s council and the pastors from other churches also introduced themselves.

The Social secretary appreciated the chief and the community members for their support

The concerns discovered were later presented to the community. The facilitator started by appreciating the community for its effort. These concerns were discovered during the SALTs Visit (community and home visits).

The Community Secretary spoke on behalf of the community. In his response, he said that all concerns identified were true about the community but the community has no means of solving them because of poverty and they are far from the government. He sited example of an abandoned primary school project started by UNICEF. The foundation of the school building has been laid but there was no money for the community to complete it.   He requested that The Salvation Army should help them facilitate the concerns to the government

In response by the Social Secretary, he told them that the community can solve their own problem by having a forum for community members; old and young come together to deliberate on their issues, prioritise them and device a simple means of meeting the needs. He went further to say that The Salvation Army can provide technical know how and facilitate the community discussion. The team later shared some experiences with the community on how people from other communities have been responding to issues affecting them.

In conclusion the community secretary responded that he had been challenge by the experiences shared by the team and social secretary. He promised to take a queue from there in solving their problems.

 

QUANTITATIVE ANALYSIS

No. of Homes Visited:                     31

No. of Churches Visited:                 7

No. of Children Reached:               294

No. of Youth Reached:                    416

No. of Men Reached:                      81

No. of Women Reached:                91

No. of Kids Club Formed:               2

No. of policy makers Reached:      13

No. of Advocacy Visits Conducted: 5

No. of School Visited:                      1

 

This is the trip report of the just concluded frontier process (Salt Visits) in a local community.

Pls kindly read and make comments.

 

Thanks

 Ukeme Okon 

[ukeme okon]

Hi Laurence,

Thanks for the response and good that i now know what people will want to read in the report. The Palace is where the Village head (Chief) stays.

 

Thanks once again.

 

Warm Regards

[Laurence Gilliot]

Hi Ukeme,

 

Thanks for sharing the report. I think for the next trip report it will be useful to write the main points instead of the whole report. For instance, I'm interested to learn more about what you have learned in terms of facilitation.

What is 'the palace'?

 

Cheers,

 

Laurence

[ukeme okon]

Dear Rituu,

Thanks for your comment. The strenght chart is a tool that guides the facilitator on after action review (reflection), which includes the CARE, CHANGE, HOPE, TRANSFER AND LEADERSHIP. As a facilitation team, we belief that every community has potentials.

 

Warm Regards

 

Ukeme

[Rituu B. Nanda]

Thanks a lot for sharing Ukeme. What is a strength chart?