Anthea Nicholls

In 2003 I heard about Edwin, an AIDS orphan in Kenya, who had completed high school and wanted to go to university to study law, but had no means to do this. I began corresponding with him and decided to at least support him to start. As time went by his phenomenal determination and ongoing success kept me involved and eventually he began to call me 'mum'. I found him to be a remarkable young man, determined one day to be a human rights lawyer.

He completed his first degree under difficult circumstances. As a country boy he now had to live in Nairobi and travel by bus to university. At one stage he was getting up before dawn to make the journey one hour, rather than two. At another time he became seriously ill and needed his living allowance to buy the drugs that saved his life. At another time, after elections in Kenya, Nairobi became incredibly dangerous. He passed all his exams and graduated.

He then survived a difficult year looking for work until he was able to start studying for the necessary diploma at the Kenya School of Law and complete his pupilage. He was admitted to the bar on 28 March 2012.

Again he began looking for work and found that in Kenya even a degree wasn't enough to ensure good work. Unless you were also from the right families or had the right connections you were going to struggle in jobs where you were endlessly exploited.

He persevered in one such job, for a newspaper company, for several years and was, at last, thrilled to get a position as a state prosecutor in the rural city of Meru. However even here he had to work for the first 3 months without pay. Without my support he wouldn't have been able to keep the position. When he and his colleagues did get paid it was a survival salary.

It became clear to him and to me that without an MA or PhD he wasn't going to get any further. By now he had a small daughter but couldn't marry as he couldn't support a family. I was about to retire, and it would have been financially difficult for me to go on supporting him. I tried to help him get an overseas scholarship but when our first attempt was unsuccessful, I decided I could make one more contribution. He calculated what it would cost to do a course-work MA through the University of South Africa (in Kenya), including his living expenses. I agreed to this, letting him know this would be my last contribution as I would be retired by the time he completed his MA.

Edwin was overjoyed. He enrolled early in 2015 and has worked phenomenally hard to complete the first year. He sits his first round of exams in February 2016. He has to submit his thesis by the end of 2017 and he is confident he can do this. However during this year the Australian dollar has declined steeply, and his expenses have risen. He calculates that he will need another 1,000AUD to finish, but I know this means he would be living in incredibly straightened circumstances. He would really need at least another 2,000AUD.

Given my own financial situation, I am looking for a way to try and raise this amount, and a little more, to enable Edwin to get one step closer to his goal.

The full amount (minus Pozible fees) will be given to Edwin, to enable him to complete his MA degree.
The fees for the last three units will cost 200,000KES ($2,725) but he also has to obtain study materials and cover his living expenses. The money raised through Pozible will be a contribution to these costs.

Edwin has already overcome incredible challenges, including the one's I've mentioned above. That he managed to get through all of his exams without having to repeat, despite all, is a tribute to his remarkable determination.