<p>As some of you might be aware and others will be surprised to know I am Chairman of a UK Registered charity that supports a South African charity called The Kusasa Project. It was founded by a friend of mine in Franschhoek, Western Cape who felt he couldn&rsquo;t enjoy his fabulous surroundings knowing that there were people who were living in abject poverty and whose future is extremely bleak.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p class="p2"><span class="s1">The Kusasa Project (<a href="http://www.thekusasaproject.org/"><span class="s2">http://www.thekusasaproject.org/</span></a>) means a brighter tomorrow in the local language Xhosa. &nbsp;Our target is</span> the children who live in makeshift shacks with cardboard walls and dirt floors, ramshackle farm cottages and a variety of other overcrowded substandard dwellings. They are surrounded by poverty, the ravages of HIV-Aids, alcoholism, illiteracy, domestic violence, sexual abuse, regular and early death and often the despair which comes from being in an environment where the present is painful and the future bleak. Our aim is help these children of the Franschhoek valley&nbsp;by positively impacting their lives,&nbsp;by offering them an educational opportunity, assisting them to read and develop social and sporting skills, by investing in the school&rsquo;s infrastructure, elevating the standard of teaching and introducing libraries where the shelves are actually stocked with books. We are trying to develop a long lasting infrastructure that allows these children a fighting chance to break the poverty trap.</p> <p class="p1">&nbsp;</p> <p class="p2">I visited South Africa for the first time in 2006 with my family. I took my children then aged 14, 12 and 9 to one of the Xhosa schools. When I mentioned to my&nbsp;boys that we were going to play football with the local Xhosa&nbsp;pupils, they complained,&nbsp;they&nbsp;didn&rsquo;t have any football boots. You can imagine their&nbsp;surprise&nbsp;at their arrival when they saw&nbsp;their team mates had no shoes at all yet were just pleased to play.&nbsp; At the Xhosa school my daughter Celine, met a girl her own age. &nbsp;They got on very well, both&nbsp; bright, happy, eager and curious, two smiling young girls who seemed very similar but whose future expectations were vastly different. Asive is one of 13 children. Her father died of Aids and her mother is an alcoholic.&nbsp;&nbsp; The Kusasa Project is trying to give Asive and other children a chance to break out of the downward spiral they are in through education. Since then,&nbsp;my eldest son, now 19,&nbsp;has spent part of his Gap year assisting&nbsp;the teachers in&nbsp;one of the schools. Not only did it give him a tremendous experience of life but the children he met have inspired him.</p> <p class="p1">&nbsp;</p> <p class="p2">He has therefore&nbsp;challenged me and his brother to accompany him this summer in his climb of the Kilimanjaro in aid of The Kusasa Project and specifically in order to raise the &pound;10,000 we need to establish the pre-school nursery. I am donating the cost of the climb and equipment for me and my two boys and 100 percent of the money we raise will go directly to the pre-school nursery.&nbsp; &pound;10,000 is a lot of money but any donation however small or large would be gratefully received by the smiling children of the Franschhoek Valley. If you do nothing else please have a look at the website and if you want to see our work in action let me know and I will happily arrange for you to visit our activities and show you&nbsp;where your money is going to be spent.</p> <p>&nbsp;</p> <p>&nbsp;</p>