Goats for San people

A BRITISH charity has been playing a rather unusual Santa to San people thousands of miles away in Namibia.

Traditionally nomadic hunter-gatherers, the tribe, these days, are forced to eke out a living as farm labourers and have little by way of possessions. Now the Catherine Bullen Foundation (CBF) is stepping in to improve their lot by giving goats to families living on the edge of the Kalahari Desert of the Omaheke Region.
The charity’s ‘Give a Goat’ Christmas appeal involves individuals, seeking that elusive something different for their loved ones, donating £35 (about N$400) for each animal.
The idea has certainly struck a chord with CBF supporters, because cash to cover the cost of 50 goats has been raised.
Trust chairman Roger Bullen said: ‘While were there the last time we were taken to some San settlements to see how they live. Komeho, our non-governmental organisation in Namibia, is doing a scheme where they give five goats per family. And we said we would instigate something similar when we got home. Now it is a runaway success.’ Donations for goats can be made until the end of this month.
The goat project brings to a close another busy year for the foundation, which started as the Catherine Bullen Memorial Trust following the death in Namibia in 2002 of Roger and Linda Bullen’s 22-year-old daughter.
Catherine, then a fifth year medical student at Bristol University travelled with a fellow student to Namibia to go on a safari prior to taking up elective placements in Zambia and Tanzania. Two days into the safari, she became ill with a virulent strain of gastro-enteritis. Despite valiant efforts to save her, she died in Oshivelo near the Etosha National Park.
Her parents, family, friends and supporters started a trust in Catherine’s memory and worked tirelessly to fund the erection of a medical clinic at Otjimanangombe in the Omaheke Region and a 4×4 ambulance for the local hospital. – Witham Times