Austin Andemani of Royal Life Saving Society Uganda writes:

100 years of scouting in Uganda was celebrated in August at Kaazi National Camping sites by Lake Victoria. The event brought together more than 15,000 scouts from Tanzania, Kenya, Burundi, Southern Sudan, DRC, Libya, Uruguay and the UK, with leaders and staff from many more countries.

Various activities took place at the event, including a water safety presentation by Royal Life Saving Society (RLSS) Uganda, whose team was also part of the rescue team.

Many of the participants gave their experiences related to drowning. A scout leader from Iganga told how someone was drowning and he was the only one in the area. Since he had no water safety knowledge, he could only throw a stick to the victim, who, unfortunately, died. A Rwandan scout told how he was almost taken by a river current, but was rescued by his friends using a cow’s rope.

Because the swimming pool was not yet in use and the nearby lakeshore was assessed as too risky, the RLSS practices were done on dry land. Many of the scouts and leaders appreciated the training, and have requested RLSS Uganda volunteers to go and train their scouts in their own districts, especially those living near bodies of water.

Funding is being sought to enable this to happen.