Assejeba Projects and Initiatives

Preschool built in Batwa village for 200 children (Batwa, Hutu and Tutsi). We provide uniforms, school supplies, and tuition. This project promotes the integration of Batwa children and puts an end to segregation.

We have a dream to have an institution that includes all levels from Preschool, Primary school, Secondary school and even University.

In Burundi, more than 80% of the people live off of farming. Hunger, malnutrition and famine still exist due to the Batwa being stripped of their lands. We offer Batwa people their own land and support to plant, grow, and tend crops. Assejeba helps the Batwa find arable lands, get a shelter, select seeds, and fertilizer so they can grow and harvest crops.

For the first time, people are growing crops year-round. Ongoing work examines the best ways to utilize these ancestral lands for the greatest benefit.

With National ID cards, people are legally recognized as citizens. This has been a historically difficult right to obtain due to extreme prejudice against the Batwa and lack of literacy. ID Cards help Batwa have access to services, to more fair trials, to legal representation, marriage, and equal rights.

Gahombo - Sitting on a steep hillside, Gahombo is the smallest of the three villages. As the village with the most need, Assejeba chose them as the first village to receive brick houses when this funding became available in 2021.

Ndava - With sweeping farmland and a little preschool started by Assejeba, Ndava has special expertise in clay pot making.

Mwendo - Closest to a population center, Mwendo is the largest of the three villages. Assjeba started a multi-classroom primary school in the village center.

Batwa people are highly skilled craftspersons who make stunningly beautiful pottery formed from the land itself in a tradition passed down orally for thousands of years.

We support their small enterprise along with other crafts, textiles and more.

The Batwa can sing and dance even when they have nothing to eat, when they are angry or when they are happy: it is the same. We are teaching these songs and dances to our visitors as well as our children and we have a desire to make videos about these songs and dances that could be broadcast all over the world.

Batwa are often unjustly jailed simply because they do not have a National Identity Card due to the fact that they cannot afford it. They often spend a lot of time in jail and do not even have a lawyer to plead their case and can even be robbed of their property for lack of someone to plead their case. Assejeba often helps them by giving advice to help them understand their rights, and to support funds for their legal representation.

Vacation youth camps with students from different areas for mutual encouragement.

We conduct training seminars for Batwa leaders and the Batwa themselves on human rights because we have noticed that the Batwa have very little knowledge of their rights compared to other segments of the population. We also do training about the fight against AIDS, without forgetting people who think that Batwa cannot contract HIV/AIDS. We also insist on the fight against drugs as well as gender-based violence.

Assejeba constructed the King’s Hope School to benefit and integrate Batwa children with the broader community.