A refugee before she reached her first birthday, Little Acts founder Charlotte Barthazar is committed to giving back to the community, both in her new home (Alberta, Canada) and where she came from. Despite graduating with a B.A. in Social Sciences and obtaining a very full-time job in North America’s second-largest homeless shelter, she has continued to work overtime and at additional jobs to support her family in Malawi and to develop new initiatives to help camp residents create businesses that will help them to support themselves, with a focus on young women and single mothers.
Benie lived in Dzaleka Refugee Camp in Malawi for 11 years. She came to Canada through World University Service of Canada (WUSC), sponsored by There is Hope Ministry and is currently finishing a degree in social work at the University of Manitoba. As a firsthand victim of war, she is deeply concerned with the well-being of refugees and other less privileged populations across the globe and is an important contributor and sounding board for all Little Acts efforts.
Michael’s parents fled for their lives to Uganda where, somewhere along the way, he was born a refugee. He is a London-based pastor, an entrepreneur and a social trainer who dreams of becoming a lawyer. He is actively developing programs to aid those who face the same challenges he did growing up amongst the prejudices that many hold against those with refugee status.
Gabriel, the youngest team member and our Dzaleka Project Coordinator, was forced with his family to relocate to Dzaleka refugee camp in 2015. He is a gifted science student and a natural leader, and is active in several community organizations, volunteering and teaching other young people. His dream is to attend university and study science but he is also a poet and writer and is a great addition our team as an on-the-spot correspondent within the camp.
Born in Butare, Rwanda, Bosco was forced to flee due to the 1994 civil war in. His family sought refuge in Burundi, Tanzania, Kenya and Malawi, where he was able to complete primary school and succeeded in obtaining a scholarship to study at the University of Winnipeg in Manitoba (Canada).
Emery Ndayizeye was forced to flee the Democratic Republic of Congo when war broke out. Part of the on-the-ground team in Dzaleka, he says that the experience has been an opportunity to reach out to the community while doing his job in order to help the many vulnerable people who need shelter, basic needs and other necessities.
Pascal B. Munezero is a businessman dealing in agriculture products. He enjoys using his skills to contribute to the dynamic business that happens every day at M’gona village in Malawi.
A former asylum-seeker and refugee, Marie Claire believes that when you love someone, you cannot watch them starve and die of hunger or watch them suffer when you have the cure.
Remy Gakwaya is a force majeure in Dzaleka Refugee Camp. After losing his parents to fighting and fleeing Burundi at 15 years old, he arrived in Dzaleka in 2008 and didn’t waste any time learning the skills that would soon transform him into the founder of the Takenolab learning center for information and communications technology.
Dana is a musician, producer, designer, web developer and writer living in rural Québec, Canada. She specializes in working with not-for-profit organizations, primarily in the cultural sector.
