HFTN has been working in partnership with the New Hope Centre in Bethany since 2003 and Project New Hope since 2005. With the growing and devastating AIDS pandemic occurring in Swaziland children are being orphaned at alarming rates.

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Our home in Swaziland, New Hope, has been receiving a tide of children and it would appear that this will be a trend for the future.  Dr. Elizabeth Hynd, who oversees the home, recently shared “that a gate has opened somewhere as children are suddenly being brought to New Hope from the north, south and east” of the country.  Each day seems to bring new faces to the home.

The children are being brought to new Hope by their guardians, relatives, and concerned neighbors who are desperate to find these children a safe home.  Many of the new faces at the home have no one, no place to go, and some live in huts by themselves because their parents have either abandoned them or died. These children are in a place of great risk as by themselves they are vulnerable, neglected and at risk.

This home serves as a model for other homes to be opened throughout this nation, as the finance becomes available to meet the tragic pandemic causing an increase of parentless children.

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PROJECT NEW HOPE

The New Hope Centre project is an ambitious and bold intervention to address the nation of Swaziland’s devastation.  The vision goes well beyond reaching the destitute children in order to clothe and feed the; it encompasses rescuing the nation through the development of future leaders … these same children being clothed, fed and educated.

“Project New Hope” has been formalized and implemented to reflect this overall objective.  A vision that would expand the current New Hope Centre facilities by scoping and establishing 7 other centres in strategic locations throughout Swaziland, thereby ‘covering’ the entire nation within its sphere of influence.  The target would be to house approximately 100-120 children at each centre.  The vision sees upwards of 1000 children being clothed, fed, taught and nurtured along the road of becoming leaders within Swaziland.

Swaziland – AIDS Crisis

Swaziland, with a HIV prevalencey rate of 38.8% (end 2003), is one of the worst hit countries by the disease. In fact, an alarming 56% of women between the ages of 25-29 are infected with HIV/AIDS in the country.

Dr. Elizabeth Hynd, who oversees HFTN Swaziland reports that “in some villages, we have seen an entire generation of adults wiped out by disease.  We have gone into communities where hundreds of children are completely abandoned and fending for themselves.”  She reports “in some areas we support one or two people of grandparent age who are caring alone for dozens of children because the intermediate generation has been wiped out.”

Swaziland, a small mountain Kingdom in Southern Africa, has an estimated population of 1,173,900 and in 2005 approximately 40.6% of the population was between the ages of 0-14.  Of this age group the number of abandoned children is increasing due to the social and economic pressures within the communities devastated by the HAV/AIDS pandemic.

Dr. Elizabeth Hynd, director of the New hope Centre in Bethany, Swaziland reports that the HIV/AIDS crisis in Africa “is a social tsunami unparalleled in the history of the world”  She continued to inform delegates at the AIDS in Africa conference, that “this is not speculation.  This is already reality.”