As soon as the Christmas and new year’s holidays are over and people are back at work at “Caritas Eswatini” and the offices of the “Diocese of Manzini”, long queues used to be seen at the Caritas office. The reason was always the same: people were looking for help to pay the school fees.

In the past, the bishop of the diocese would welcome each person at his office and listen to their needs.

Later on it was decided to involve Caritas Eswatini in the listening and identifying the most desperate cases.

One one side it helped us know the poorest. On the other side, people had to come twice. First to be interviewed by Caritas and later on to receive some help from the bishop himself. The project, in fact, has always been linked to the bishop.

Today, people no longer come to our offices in Manzini. Identifying the poorest is in the hands of “Parish Caritas”.

Each Parich Caritas selects between 10 and 15 children from their area. A copy of their school results and school banking details are sent to the Caritas national office who pays online for about 20% of the schools fees of each one of them.

It would be ideal to pay for the full amount but our funds are limited. The goal is to help these families to start the year while the gather the rest of the money needed.

We are grateful to all those who have made this project possible.