A Discussion with Protus Lumiti, Chief Manager, Nyumbani Children's Home, Nairobi, Kenya

With: Protus Lumiti Berkley Center Profile

June 9, 2016

Background: As part of the Education and Social Justice Fellowship Project, undergraduate student Khaliyah Legette interviewed Protus Lumiti, the chief manager of the Nyumbani Children's Home in Nairobi, Kenya. In this interview, conducted in June 2016, Lumiti discusses the importance of providing care beyond merely medical needs for children living with HIV to ensure their holistic development and future success.
Could you please state your name and title?

My name is Protus Lumiti. I’m the chief manager of Nyumbani.

What are some of your responsibilities in this position?

As the chief manager of Nyumbani, I have to make sure that all of the operations are in place and implement the policies created by the board of directors and any expectations from the government on running children’s homes. Also, I liaise with the government on issues related to the government, and other partners who are involved. Then I also deal in public relations, with the people who come to find out what we do. I give them the information that’s necessary. I ensure that I follow up on every child here and that they are getting the necessary support and care that they’re supposed to get: medical, general care, and education. I also check on those who have left the home to ensure their needs and welfare are still up-to-date.

What are some of the greatest challenges you face in your position?

Running a children’s home, especially a home for children with HIV, is not very easy. It’s a challenge in itself. The challenge begins with dealing with the children themselves, because they are coming from backgrounds where they are rejected. So when they come here, our aim is to make sure they are accepted. So my role is to make sure that all of the staff are really positive and accept the children as they are, without labeling them.

Secondly, the needs of the people living with HIV are quite big. Since this is a home, I have to make sure they are getting adequate care in terms of medical care, nutritional care, and psychosocial support, which is a holistic approach to care. It is a challenge to fulfill all of that holistically. There is a tendency to focus on medical care and leave out the other components. So my role is to make sure all these components are given the same weight.

Another challenge that we face is enabling the children to cope with their lifestyle. They don’t have any parents remaining. So we become like their parents, their mothers and their fathers. And again, it’s not easy for them to listen to us, especially when they reach adolescence. They ask us many questions. Our role is to deal with those questions. The other aspect is that once they have grown up, they have to move on. As a home and as an organization, we have to make sure that when they move out of this organization, they are well equipped to live in the society as any other citizen. We have to train the staff and counsel the young adults who are moving out so that when they are out there, they do not lapse in terms of their medical intake and their lifestyle.

We rely on donations to run the home, so to keep it running, we have to make sure that money comes in. Sister Mary [Owens, Nyumbani's executive director] does a lot of fundraising, and people have been very kind to help us over the years. I have to make sure that when anybody is coming in as a potential donor, whatever interest they have, I am able to answer their questions. Getting enough funds to run this home is not easy, but we’ve never closed; we’ve kept it running continuously for the past 22 years.

Death used to be a big issue; children would come here, live here, and die here. But that’s not as much of an issue at the moment because now they are taking medicines, so they are living longer, and they are stabilizing in the community like any other person. So it’s no longer a big challenge.

The other final challenge is helping those who have come here and grown up go to college and get jobs. Employment in Kenya is a challenge; you don’t just finish college and get a job. It is even more difficult for these children, who are stigmatized because of their HIV condition. One thing we do is we incorporate them into our system. We employ them, to enable them to get into the society and work like any other Kenyan, and we lobby for their employment. We have to say: “I know this child. He has grown up at Nyumbani.” And so you’re already exposing this child who has HIV. Stigma become a big issue. That’s the biggest challenge we have in the community as they move out: stigma and discrimination. It is also important to stabilize them in the outside world. They have grown up here in their comfort zone, and it is not always easy for us to really follow up after they have left.

And then finally, there is the sustainability aspect. Having relied on donor funding, we have not reached that level yet where we can say we are self-sustaining. We have to keep on asking the donors to continue to support us as much as possible. Education of these children is very expensive. We have sponsors, but the sponsors will not cover 100 percent of the cost. They may only cover tuition. Performance in school is also often compromised, and these kids may not perform like other healthy Kenyan children because of their medical condition.

What are some of the greatest successes you face in your position?

The Nyumbani Center has progressed steadily over the past 22 years. We have seen it grow and expand progressively. We have never closed. So I rejoice at that; that is a success story. Secondly, children are living and surviving longer. In 1992 to 1993, we were shortsighted in the way that we looked at these children on a short-term basis. We thought they would come here, and we would feed them within the short period of their lifespan. We didn’t think they were going to live into adulthood. But now, we see them growing into adulthood, and to me that’s a success story. And the adults who are growing up taking their medicine and going to school have normal lifestyles, and they are living stable lives. A few of them are settling now, having their own families and children—who are healthy. For me, that’s a big success story. Many are going to colleges and universities.

We also do family tracing. When the children come here, we trace their family heritage to find out where they came from. And when we find the family, and reunite that child with the family, we feel a great gratification and satisfaction. They came here because they were rejected, but we trace the family and go out to meet with them and counsel the family, and the family hopefully accepts the child back—a positive acceptance. Personally, I feel those are really happy moments.

With donors, when Father [Angelo] D’Agostino [Nyumbani's founder] was alive, he had quite a large network. The good thing is that those networks are still willing to help the organization. Sister Mary has kept in contact with the supporters of this organization. The government is opening up and learning from the best practices that we do, and supporting the care of people living with HIV. Policies have been formed. We are on panels and boards and working teams of people who are developing programs in this country. So again, I see that as an achievement in our sector where we take care of people living with HIV.

Why do you see this holistic approach as so important for the children living here?

A holistic approach to the care of children, even people who are living with a medical condition, is very important. If you look at one aspect, such as medical care, then you label the person as a patient. And that’s not our approach. Our approach is to look at it holistically. This is a person, a human being. No wonder the name “Children of God” was very crucial—that’s why the founders of this organization called it the Children of God Relief Institute. They are all children. And if they are children of God, we have to look at them all around. We can’t look at them in terms of medical care only; we have to look at them as whole people whose needs have to be fulfilled. So that philosophy has enabled us to look at all the components equally.

When you look at these children playing around, playing in the field and having happy moments, you don’t realize they have HIV. So why should you focus on their medical care only? If you walk into a school, there’s no way you can identify who has HIV and who doesn’t. They are equal to any other Kenyan students or children. So stressing one of the components was not our focus. We also try to recreate a family atmosphere, so the child feels stable. In a normal family setup, the life skills are ingrained in the day-to-day activities. You don’t even take it as a lesson. Your mom tells you: “Go and bring this,” and you just go. It’s just part of life. Here, we have to ingrain that in our training and enable them to have the basic life skills that they need, and that’s why we model it on a home and a family unit.

I think a holistic approach to the care of any person with a medical condition is a calling, a need, and a focus that we cannot avoid. Because the moment you deal with one aspect alone, the other parts suffer. We may not be perfect in every aspect of our care, but the attitude of holistic approach to the care is what is very crucial, and it will allow these children to grow up grounded. If I am only dealing with giving out food, then the children won’t have spiritual care and won’t have any idea of God the creator. If I’m only dealing with medicine, then what about the other components? If I’m dealing only with medicine, I’m leaving them to physically play in the playground, but I am not giving them the ability to feel their creator of this universe. I will be failing. And that’s why holistic approach is very necessary, so the child grows up grounded, like any other person. And we are seeing that. When the time comes, I am sure they can be leaders of this country, because they’re grounded and given an adequate upbringing for that.

How did you first get involved with Nyumbani?

I trained to be a Catholic priest, so I worked with a number of organizations before I came here. In the last organization I worked at, I met the founder of Nyumbani, who was looking for someone who could help. So I told him my background in dealing with children, the communities, and setting up community development programs, so he just suggested that I come and work here for a while. I was assigned to several activities and I did well, and that sort of enabled me to continue. So I never went back to become a priest, but my training gave me a grounding of how to handle facilities like this. My orientation of working with children and people was my light, because even if I was ordained, I wanted to work with people and focus on their spiritual development, and also see how they are fitting into the community at large as human beings, and not just as spiritual components. When I came to Nyumbani, Father D’Agostino wanted me to continue this.

What do you find to be the most rewarding part of working here?

I get to see these children develop, which was my initial philosophy: to see people evolve from one step to another in their development and growth, and not just stay where they are. If they are poor, enable them to come out of that poverty. If they are dry spiritually, give them spiritual support and let them move to the next level. So when I came in and I really saw these children evolving from the state where they were rejected and abandoned because of their medical condition to one where they are improving and normalizing their lives, that’s the fulfillment and compassion that drives me to be here. If they’re happy, then I’m happy. I would have left a long time ago, but when I see these kids, I add another few years. It’s basically the children and how they are progressing in their lives that keeps me here at Nyumbani. If it was just management and money, I don’t think I would be fulfilled.
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