Below is the text of the speech given by Dr. Sahr Yambasu at the launch of the new Irish Aid funding package for Christian Aid in St Patrick's Cathedral, 8 March 2007.

First I would like to say that it is a privilege and pleasure to be here for this event with Christian Aid and Irish Aid.

Last time I travelled to Sierra Leone, I overheard a visitor say ‘They still have a long way to go….’ This phrase started me thinking.

• Who charted the journey & chose the destination?
• What measurements did s/he use?
• With whom or whose progress is s/he comparing us?

‘Progress’ - to say the least – is an ambiguous state of being characterized by advantages and disadvantages.  Yet all peoples and societies desire it and work for it in ways they know and are best able to.

So, to those who say my country and people have a long way to go, I would say, we have already come a long way, thanks to the resourcefulness of our people and to the support organizations like Irish Aid and Christian Aid have been giving us.

We have come from 10 years of brutal conflict and its profound devastating effects on the physical and social fabric of Sierra Leone to over half a decade now of relative peace with towns, villages, communities, and individual lives being successfully rebuilt.

In many cases around the country this has meant:

• The rebuilding of homes, schools, health centres, community markets and stores
• the reconstruction of roads and bridges
• the return to farming to produce much needed food for local consumption
• the organizing of civic, peace-building, gender awareness and human rights education activities in communities 
• the provision of much needed loans through micro-finance schemes for women who desire to run their own businesses 
• the building and equipping of community skills training centres for the empowerment of young people
• the raising of awareness about HIV/AIDS through diverse forms of education. 

Christian Aid, with the help of Irish Aid, has been very instrumental in this journey of my people away from destructive behaviour to life-giving and nation-building activities.

With the help of Irish Aid’s Multi Annual Programme Support [MAPS I] funding, Christian Aid has been able to work with Local NGOs to better the life situations of many communities in my country.

The District from which I come is a case in point. Returning from refugee camps in Guinea and totally dependent on food aid  a few years ago, today, and because of MAPS funding support channeled through Christian Aid and her local partners in the forms of basic farm tools and seed rice, my people live entirely on food they themselves produce on their farms. Cocoa, coffee, and other cash crop farming is also helping revitalize the local economic activity.

In the Freetown and Bo areas of Sierra Leone many families have witnessed their fortunes changed for better because a mother, wife, sister, daughter, or grand-daughter has been enabled, through a micro-credit scheme run by one of Christian Aid’s local partners, to engage in market trading and is now able to cater for the daily needs of her nuclear and extended family.

These are just 2 of many good examples of the results of the involvement of Irish Aid and Christian Aid with my people in their journey out of abject poverty.

And these are no mean achievements in my country where an intervention or lack of one could literally spell the difference between life and death for many.
People often ask me what hope there is, if any, for a country like mine which faces what seems to be insurmountable political, social, and economic challenges.  And I tell them, ‘a lot of hope’.

Hope, first, in my people and their indomitable spirits.

I say that because when I visit my country and travel to different parts, I see not a despairing people, but a people full of enthusiasm, desire, and determination to rebuild their lives, homes and communities.

On a recent visit to a village, I was introduced to two young men who have given up a whole year’s work on their farms so as to co-ordinate work on building a village community meeting house, community store, and health centre.

I know a lady – a poorly educated herself – who, after seeing the needs of her community for a primary school to educate its children and discourage them from drug-taking, single-handedly built a community school, went back to college to better educate herself, while still helping educate the children of her community.

There is a young man – a minister in the government in Sierra Leone – who left a good job and comfortable lifestyle in England, to go and serve his country after the war. I witnessed this man dropping all his sleek city engagements one day to go and support n initiative for youth training and employment at a very short notice in a remote rural area.

I know of a priest who asked to be transferred to a rural appointment where others would not choose to go. His reason? ‘To be with and work with the most disadvantaged of his country.’

These and many other people like them, including leaders of Christian Aid’s partners, are the hope of Sierra Leone.

Then there is another source of hope.

It is hope in the generosity of the international community which continues to support us in our times of need.

In this respect, and on behalf of my people in Sierra Leone, I’d like to take this opportunity to sincerely thank Irish Aid, Christian Aid, and all other peoples and organizations that continue to so generously aid us in our time of need. 

Without you we would not be where we are today.

Thank you. Together, we can work to transform many people’s life experiences and situations for better.
 
I have no doubt that MAPS II funding is going to go a long way towards helping many in my country to help themselves.

Let me finish with words whose author is unknown, but which, nonetheless, expresses something which I believe is invariably true about human search for meaning in life.

I sought God
My God I could not see;

I sought my soul
My soul eluded me;

I sought my brother
And I found all three.