The children of Busagazi need us to pay attention

Solomon Mwebya and Bashir Sentamu

As large parts of the world reach toward life beyond lockdown, a forgotten group of children stuck on a remote island off of Uganda are fighting to survive.

It’s a blindly sunny day in Busagazi, a parish in Uganda. Rising water levels, a frequent side effect of the climate crisis, have cut the island — and all of the people who live there — off from mainland Uganda. Children play in burnt orange plains, running in and out of windowless buildings. Among them are six-year-old Bashir Sentamu, 7-year-old Wilson Kapimpini, 10-year-old Anisha Namuleme, seven-year-old Innocent Mugabi and 8-year-old Yokosani Maiso. They are together because they can’t go home to their parents. They’re orphans. Their parents died from AIDS or drowned in the lake they work in. Those whose parents are alive still can’t go and stay with them, because they struggle to feed themselves — let alone another hungry mouth. These children have lived together at their local community school, since birth, learning English and Maths and helping to grow vegetables in their garden.

Some of the children and teachers, before Covid-19 existed

Usually, 500 children attend the school. Now, just 100 remain — those who are orphaned or those who were dropped off by parents…