NIGEL Chapman, the former director of BBC World Services and current CEO of Plan International, has recently visited different community development projects supported by Plan International Egypt and implemented in co-operation with the community development associations and the Egyptian governmental entities. He started his visits by checking on the community-based rehabilitation programmes for children with disabilities in the area of Ezbet Khairallah in Cairo, which provides rehabilitation for those children in order to reintegrate them back in society and enable their positive contribution through training them both physically and verbally and offering various crafts workshops such as painting, drawing, ceramics and designs. Nigel has seen the challenges that hinder the achievements of the programmes, which is mostly represented in the weak number of enrollment of children with special needs due to their parents' neglect and unequal treatment. Nigel also toured the Village Savings and Loans Association Programme, which aims to empower girls and women in Ezbet Khairallah. The programme is mainly based on forming a group of women, who start saving with one another through buying shares ranging from LE1 to three and saving them in their self-managed group. Later on, they are able to borrow from this money according to their needs. Nigel concluded his tour by visiting a vocational training centre for street children in the Egyptian Association for Community Development in the Fostat area in Old Cairo. It is a daycare centre for training and rehabilitating those children of both genders on different handicrafts such as jewellery designing, pottery, ceramices, clay and bead and mask crafts, which are all sold for the benefit of those children.
