Enugu city is located in the eastern part of Nigeria with a population of about 407,765. The unemployment rate is 25.2% of the population. Enugu State is mostly grassland with scattered forest. The core of the state’s economy agriculture: sixty percent of the state’s workforce is engaged in farming. The principal cash crops grown are yams, corn, cassava, oil palms, cashews and rice. The farmers are merely peasant farmers that use local tools for farming and who would have done better with mechanized farming but are too poor to afford it.

 

There is no doubt that women are among the most marginalized groups in the world today. Traditionally in many communities in Nigeria widows suffer some forms of inhuman treatments at the death of their husbands as a mark of respect for their dead husbands. They are forced to shave their heads while mourning their husbands and if she has no male child she is denied access to her husband’s property. In some communities she is prevented from receiving visits from sympathizers, she is to wail loudly from time to time and kept in seclusion after the burial of her husband and in some cases will have to leave the husband’s compound. The traumas they suffer at the death of their husbands remain with them for the rest of their lives. At the end of mourning period, these widows feel dejected, rejected and frustrated and need some sense of directions to move forward in life. The DePaul Hope Social Center Enugu hopes to provide widows with microloans to assist them in trade and agriculture to enable them care for and educate their kids and live an independent life style.  

Our mission is to break the cycle of poverty through the provision of micro loans and capacity building of widows in the areas of agriculture, trade and skills acquisitions in computer and counseling for legal referral.

Our vision is to implement a sustainable program that will improve the quality of life of widows and their children through capacity building.