Cephas
Meet 8 years old Cephas from Hennga Village on the Zambezi Islands on the boarder with Zimbabwe.
He was born with an undeveloped left leg from the knee.
At the edge of four his father Patson took him to UTH in Lusaka where he was amputated.
He was then given an artificial leg which he used for two years.
Because he is growing the leg became small and could not use it anymore.
For the past two years he has been using his knees as a mode of mobility.
His father Patson heared of Health Help International in Monze and offered himself to walk on foot from Henga
village which is about 300 kilometers to Monze.
It took him three days to reach here carrying Cephas on his shoulders.
The first thing he did, when he was told I was the man he is looking for, was to take off his shirt to show me the
bruises on his shoulders because of carrying his son Cephas.
I had to ask the clinical officer to treat him before we sat down to listen to his story.
We provided food for him and Cephas and then sat down to talk.
Narrating his story all he wanted was to hand over his son to us for keeping and educating him,
because he has no resources to do that.
I told him frankly that we had no legal mandate to adopt children at the moment and the only thing
we could do for his son was to give him cructhes and a wheel chair.
Cephas and his father
I also promised him that I would look for money to buy him a new artificial leg.
In terms of school I advised him to find a school near his village because as far as I was concerned Cephas is normal like any other child except that he has one leg. With the crutches and wheel chair given to him, and the possibility of a new artificial leg, this would make a big difference in his life and he could lead a normal life, like any other child.
We provided K300,000 transport back and food for himself and his child.
