About Abaana

The Committee

Chairman: Gary Beattie
Secretary: Scott Baxter
Directors: Sally Baxter
Charity Ref No: XR23 866
Company Reg: NI33 513

Abaana is a charity run by four full-time workers, two part-time  and many volunteers, for the benefit of less privileged people in Africa. The word "Abaana" comes from a language found in the country of Uganda (East Africa) and means "children.” Most of our work is geared towards children in Africa, but not exclusively. Abaana was set up in January 1998 and aims to show young people that through sacrificing a little time and money, they can also get involved in making a difference. Abaana hopes to share the love of God in a practical way with those who need it most. Young people and some not so young take part in sponsored events, barbecues and fun nights to raise money to support the worthwhile causes. All support is welcome no matter how young or old you are.

We are encouraging you to take up that challenge and get the people involved in your area. If you would like to represent Abaana where you live, read through this site for ways in which you can promote our work. We can supply you with sponsor forms and power point material so that you can get your church, youth group, school or any other group involved.

Staff based in the U.K.

Scott Baxter

Scott Baxter, the founder of Abaana, is working full time giving presentations in churches, schools and anywhere else that invite him. The goal is to motivate, challenge and empower especially young people to make a difference. Scott would love to come to your group (of any age), so please feel free to contact us about arranging a date.

Scott wants as much of the money raised as possible to go to the children. You can also support Abaana by supporting Scott in his work.

 

Fiona Baxter

Fiona Baxter, (formerly Stewart) joined Abaana as Child Sponsorship Co-ordinator in May 2004, allowing us to develop in this area. We now sponsor over 900 children in Uganda and 20 children in Zambia.

 

Tania Kelly-Baker

Tania started with Abaana in June 2006 as our Volunteer Co-Ordinator. Abaana depends highly on many volunteers for various fundraising events & activities, in our shop, and for those willing to travel to Africa with one of our teams. However as Abaana continues to grow Tania is always on the look out for more helpers willing to make a difference. If you feel you could help in any area please let Tania know.

Amanda McConkey

Amanda is from Antrim and got involved with Abaana in 2005 by going on one of our teams to Uganda.
She joined us in February 2007 as Administration Assistant and helps with the daily running of the office.
As a fast growing charity, we have ever increasing amounts of correspondance to keep up to date along with incoming donations. Amanda also helps with the administration that goes along with sending teams out to Africa to get involved practically in our projects.

Staff based in Uganda

John Kiboneka

John is a full time worker in Uganda; his work involves finding and managing our projects and child sponsorship.

Jesca Kiboneka

Jesca again is one of our full time Ugandan workers. She helps keep accounts up to date alongside working with the Street Children in our Street Reach program in Kampala.

Faith 

Faith is full time working in Uganda alongside John and Jesca in the areas of Child Sponsorship and Street Reach.

 John Kennedy

John joined Abaana in the summer of 2007 and is our full time School's Officer.  He is responsible for ensuring that our schools are running at the highest standard possible.

How did Abaana start?

Scott's Story: I have never really liked my story being told, however if it helps to encourage other people, then maybe it should be told! This is really a story of simply following your heart and letting God do the rest. One thing I have learned is this: if God can use a 19 year old to make a difference by starting Abaana, then God can certainly use you. I have no super talents but God gave me a passion for children in need, and since then he has equipped me to fulfil his purpose for Abaana.

In 1997 I had the opportunity to visit Uganda. Soon into my trip I met a six year old girl called Mary. During a service I attended, Mary started to jiggle. At first I thought that she was just enjoying the music, but when the music stopped Mary carried on jiggling. I leaned forward and saw that she was distressed so I asked an African lady to take her to the toilet. After the service I learned that Mary didn't need to go to the toilet. There was actually a four-inch worm crawling about in her underwear. She had probably drunk the eggs of this worm by drinking from a poor water source. What other choice did she have if there was no access to clean water? I also learned that the worms only come out by themselves for one reason. Overcrowding! There were too many worms inside Mary and not enough food. Mary went on simple medication and within two weeks, all the worms were gone. If Mary had not received medication she would have died from malnutrition. To think that Mary would have died from drinking water made me mad. I knew I had to do something.

One day as I was painting a new school built by the charity I was with, there were interviews being held for a free education course. The interviews took over three days and 100's of children waited patiently with their parents. Unfortunately there were only 30 places available. For years I had taken education for granted. I never really saw school as anything more than an inconvenience. This made me feel pretty selfish. The next day many of the rejected children came back hoping to get into the school. For two weeks I watched these children come back only to be turned away. I wondered how I could help. After counting the money left in my account, I worked out that I had enough to support five children for a year to go to school. The next day five children walked up to the school. This time they were not turned away. I visited the homes of these five children and was touched by how little they had compared to my luxury.

I returned from that trip to Uganda in the summer of 1997 a changed person. I had many questions and few answers. Why had I not heard about the need in Africa before? I mean I had heard, but there was no urgency. How can it be that so many people in Africa are dying yet so few people are doing anything about it? Why don't people care?

It was out of these experiences that Abaana has grown. At the heart of Abaana it is my prayer that we will all learn to give, and give sacrificially. Ghandi once said "There are enough resources in the world for everyone's needs, but not enough for everyone's greed!" At Abaana we want to encourage people to give out of love, whether that is to your next door neighbour, the homeless guy on the street or to the 1 billion children who live in poverty. The heart of Abaana is to help people see that being a good steward of things God has given us - our time, our talents, our relationships, our money - has to be taken in a global context.

Thank you to everyone who has ever donated, volunteered, raised money, encouraged, prayed and caused Abaana to grow. You have helped change the lives of 1000's of African children and their families for the better. As we celebrate our 10th Anniversary we only want to double our efforts and bring more hope to Africa with help from people like you.

A Challenge

When you look at the life of Jesus do we see much resemblance to the church today? When the people outside the church look at you do they see much of Jesus? If I were to ask your neighbours what could you learn about Jesus from looking at your life what would they say? I believe that as church we are not that bad at evangelism. We organize a lot of events and do a lot of hard work with sometimes get very little results but with our all round efforts we do all right. However, I think we miss the whole point if we view evangelism to start and end with a week of mission or a Sunday night service. How will any person really believe you when you tell them that God loves them and cares about them if you never show it? How will the homeless person ever see Jesus until he has met him, and how will he ever meet him when we care more about our soaps on TV and getting home before the dinner gets cold. If I was to sum up Jesus life in one word it would be "service." He came to serve. We too are called to serve, but most of us are still serving ourselves. If we want to truly see our friends and our families come to know the Jesus we know, then we had better start living a life that will reflect Him.

Scott Baxter