Extraordinary Opportunities

A Letter from Jim McGill, mission co-worker serving in Niger

Winter 2024

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Dear friends and family,

Greetings from Niamey, Niger! It is good to be back again with our friends and partners from both Christian and Muslim communities. It has been especially gratifying to reunite with the Eglise Evangélique de la République du Niger/Protestant Church in the Republic of Niger (EERN) Water, Sanitation and Health (WASH) team.

Mr. Ato Kwamena Senayah and myself at the Mole Conference.

While there have been many frustrations from being away from Niger for more than a year, there have in turn been several extraordinary opportunities that became available that could never have happened had I remained in Niger. Trips this summer to Malawi and Madagascar are on the top of that list, and a visit to Ghana has been added as well. After I had been granted permission to return to Niger, I booked a ticket as is required to be able to apply for the Niger visa. Visas are taking longer to obtain than before, and so the booked date passed before the visa was ready. Providentially, when the Niger visa did come, I had just enough time to be able to obtain a visa from the Ghana consulate so that I could attend the Ghana Mission Network (GMN). PC(USA) granted permission for me to attend the GMN so that I could meet with Presbyterian Church leaders and hear about the churches’ WASH efforts throughout Ghana.

A second reason that I wanted to visit Ghana was to be able to meet the group of Ghanian WASH professionals working on typhoid transmission who have been working with the Centre for Global Safe WASH (CGSW) of Emory University. Together, the CGSW and their Ghanian counterparts are working on tools that quantify transmission pathways for typhoid within Accra – which is exactly the work we have been planning for the area surrounding Galmi Hospital in Niger. When colleagues from Emory introduced me by email to Mr. Ato Senayah, a member of the Ghanian / Emory team, he invited me to attend Ghana’s Annual WASH Sector meeting, which was being held in Ho, Ghana (several hours northeast of Accra). When I asked Regional Liaison for West Africa, Rev. Joshua Heikkila if I could work out a way to get to the conference, he informed me that he had already had plans for us to arrive in Ho on the morning of the opening day of the conference. I was able to attend two days of the conference, in which Mr. Senayah introduced me to WASH professionals working in all aspects of WASH from throughout the country. We were able to share knowledge and experiences, and I left encouraged to begin incorporating their learning into our interventions.

Participants in the Ghana Mission Network at the Presbyterian Church of Ghana, Greenwich Meridian Church (built very near the Prime Meridian), located at Tema, the port city for Accra.

After leaving Ghana, I was greeted back into the country by friend, colleague, and former international Peacemaker Maitre Issaka Moussa, who serves as EERN Secretary for Foreign Relations. The coup d’etat had left Maitre Issaka jobless, as he had been the Secretary General of the Niger’s Constitutional Court. After a few months of staying at home, Issaka was given a position as the Director of Personnel and Supplies of Penitentiary Institutions, a position Issaka considers to be providential as prison ministries have long been one of his passions. He has been serving as the chairperson of the Niger Prison Fellowship International for several years.

People are asking if there have been changes within the country during my absence. There will be a few differences in my working situation within Niamey, with most of those differences resulting from changes within our partner church rather than changes from the new government. Regarding the changes in the government, there is an increased military presence within Niamey, which leads some people to believe that there is more security and more controls in place that are making Niamey a better to live. Others talk about the increased military presence as being very negative – they are uncomfortable with the increased security. Some say that life has improved, while others say that life is more difficult now than under the previous government. Does any of this sound familiar?

EERN WASH has continued with the 1 Evangelist/1 Well programme, the Simple, Market based, Affordable, Repairable, Technologies Center (SMART) trainings, the Menstrual Health and Hygiene in EERN Schools programme, and the Urban Sanitation programme. While these programmes have continued during the past year, we are expecting to expand them in each area. We will also be establishing the typhoid prevention programme with Galmi Hospital, first by choosing a couple of pilot communities that have high rates of typhoid infection, identifying how typhoid is being transmitted, and then blocking those pathways through introducing improved WASH. EERN WASH is planning to send a very capable member of the WASH team who lives in Maradi to Accra to learn from the Ghanian/Emory team. They will learn the SaniPath Tool from the same team that designed it. Food is one pathway for typhoid transmission, and the team in Accra is going to be testing street food within the next two months. Our WASH team member has been invited to participate in this survey. and upon his return, to then teach all that he has learned to others as we begin the work to eliminate typhoid in Niger. Again, yet another unexpected, yet extraordinary opportunity has been made available to support the work of EERN WASH.

As always, we request your prayers for the people of Niger, as flooding and sanctions continue to add challenges to everyday living. The EERN is grateful for your prayers and efforts to remain informed.

Jim