FAQ’s
General
How do you ensure all the funds go directly to the project?
How do you know that the projects are effective?
Each project is costed in detail by our partner in Cameroon. These budgets are sent to our supporters/funders and as soon as the funds are received into our account, every penny is forwarded to our partner NGO in Cameroon – and work on the project commences.
Do you operate in other African countries?
Where in Cameroon do you operate?
Schools
How much does it cost to build a school?
A secondary school project with the same, or similar, facilities but larger classrooms would cost approximately £35,000.
These costs can be scaled up or down according to the number of classrooms required.
Why doesn’t the government pay for the schools to be built?
Quite often we have found that, in communities where we have built three classrooms at a school, the Government will add another two or three classrooms later on.
Who provides the teachers?
Who provides the teaching materials?
What contribution do the communities have to make?
Humanitarian response
How has your work been affected by the war in Cameroon?
As the war intensified, entire villages were burned out across the two regions, with many Cameroonians killed. Many IDPs fled the violence and set up communities in hard-to-reach forest areas and others moved to shanty towns within other cities in the francophone areas, in order to escape the horrors of war.
Despite the extremely dangerous situation, SHUMAS has been able to access these isolated and destitute communities and ascertain their needs. With our focus still clearly on children being able to access education.
What is the war in Cameroon about?
Known as the Anglophone crisis, the war between the government and separatist fighters has been active since 2019.
What began in 2016 as peaceful protests by Anglophone lawyers and teachers against the central government’s placement of French-speaking judges and teachers in English-speaking courts and schools, including a systematic erosion of Anglophone Common Law procedures, deteriorated into a violent conflict and humanitarian disaster after the government used disproportionate force. President Paul Biya’s military is now battling armed separatists, including opportunistic bandits, while civilians are helplessly caught in the crossfire.
The lawlessness includes a multitude of war crimes: indiscriminate shooting, burning, mutilating, torturing, kidnapping for ransom, and raping unarmed civilians. Hospitals, schools, humanitarian aid, humanitarian workers, and an airplane have all been targeted.
Separatists demand that the Northwest and Southwest regions (previously a UK colony) become a new country called “Ambazonia,” and they are using increasingly violent methods and higher levels of weaponry.
What is an Internally Displaced Person (IDP)?
Internally displaced people (IDPs) are people who have been forced to flee their homes because of conflict, violence, persecution or disasters, however, unlike refugees, they remain within their own country.
Since the start of the Anglophone Crisis in 2016, an estimated 841,500 children have been forced out of school in the Northwest and Southwest regions of Cameroon. As the crisis escalated into war, there has been massive displacement of people to the relatively peaceful urban areas of Bamenda, Buea and other cities in the francophone regions. According to the UN Office for the Co-ordination of Humanitarian Aid (August 2021) 52% of these displaced people are women and 44.5% are children (86,472 girls and 95,031 boys).
Is it safe for you and your team to operate in the areas of war?
The areas of conflict are confined to specific areas in the Northwest and Southwest regions which we have been unable to visit for a number of years. We take advice from SHUMAS who manage our logistics on the ground as to areas which are safe for us to visit. Large parts of the country are safe and we’re able to visit most projects without any challenges.
Health and water
Why do you build health centres and water projects?
Our main focus has always been on increasing access to school for all children in Cameroon, we quickly realised that children were only able to attend school if their whole family was in good health – otherwise they would be kept back at home to work the farm and keep the family fed. In these cases, family income would fall so low that the payment of health centre charges and school fees would be impossible.
Health centres in the remote villages are desperately poor and unhygienic places with little or no equipment. Many women have no antenatal care and consult ‘traditional healers’ when there are problems. This results in high infant and maternal mortality and many live births do not get registered, leaving these children disenfranchised for the rest of their lives.
We have also been able to fund new community water projects, providing access to clean drinking water to whole communities, including schools, in areas which are very susceptible to water borne diseases like malaria, typhoid and cholera.
How much does it cost to refurbish a health centre?
It costs approximately £15,000 to rebuild or refurbish a health centre that already exists.
How much does it cost to provide equipment for a health centre?
It costs approximately £8,500 to equip a centre with essential equipment.
How much does it cost to build a water source?
Currently these borehole projects cost £9,000