From hopelessness to hope

The bad news is that so many anti-poverty projects in Africa fail. The good news is that those who learn from the past are not doomed to repeat it, as a visit to a thoughtfully designed AIDS orphanage and development project shows | Marvin Olasky

CHISAMBA, Zambia— It's 7:15 Monday morning in a cement-block house near this country's major highway, the paved, two-lane Great North Road. Supervisor Peter Phiri, who worked at building that road for five years during the 1990s, is speaking to 40 employees starting their workweek in a country where AIDS, unemployment, and corruption are all rampant. They sit on planks held up by cement blocks in the building their own hands constructed, a house that will soon be home to 8-10 AIDS orphans and a widow.

Intense and energetic, Phiri tells them, "It's up to you, up to me, to choose. Pray to God to give you a right choice. Remember that without Jesus you can't accomplish anything." HIV statistics in Africa show that many have chosen wrongly. The well-documented failure of many government and big philanthropic projects shows that many would-be helpers have chosen wrongly.