With funding from USAID, we’re working with the International Committee of the Red Cross to get disabled people into wheelchair basketball in South Sudan. James Stittle from Papercut Pictures has been making a film about The Lions and Tigers, a team playing in Juba. We caught up with James to find out how the sport is making a difference.

“I went to South Sudan to find a positive story.
I was inspired to go there by my friend who had been there during South Sudan’s independence in 2011. I didn’t want to show a negative story about refugees, war, famine and hunger as is generally depicted in the media. So we started looking for something that would sum up the country’s history, but also show positive change. Wheelchair basketball has had a massive impact on the players’ confidence, happiness and the way they see themselves in the society they live in.

Every person we spoke to on the team absolutely loves the game – it’s the highlight of his or her week.
For many, it’s a reason to leave their homes and meet up with other people in a similar situation. It’s great for them physically, as well as mentally. It’s helped them come to terms with their disability and shown them that they can still do things and lead a full life.

All of the players have their own inspiring stories.
The captain of the team, Gatluak, lost his leg due to a landmine. He was taken to a refugee camp in Kenya in the late 90s where he had surgery and was rehabilitated – that’s when he started playing basketball.

Imagine returning to your own country but having to start a completely new life.
Gatluak met up with some of the other players in the same refugee camp where they decided to start a team once they got back to South Sudan. But when they returned, most of them had no homes and no jobs and in some cases they returned to no families or friends – something most of us will never have to experience.

A lot of the players have done very well and got themselves jobs.
Wheelchair basketball has given the players a certain amount of pride when it comes to their nation, as well as hopefully providing them with further opportunities. There is still a stigma attached to being disabled in South Sudan, so a lot of people don’t see disabled people as being equal. For many players, I think basketball is their way out.

They would love to make it to Rio 2016.
The chance to represent their nation at an international level is their dream. It’s their way of doing something for their country. Sadly, the Government just doesn’t have the money to be able to fund them – that was one of the problems with going to London 2012. But if Gatluak knows what he’s talking about, they’ll dominate and become world beaters.”

Watch a trailer of James’ Lions and Tigers film

Find out more about Motivation’s sports wheelchairs

We’re very excited about our new partnership with EquallyAble, a foundation based in Virginia in the USA.

Just like Motivation, the team at EquallyAble focuses on helping disabled people live full, independent and healthy lives.

EquallyAble are funding 100 Motivation supportive seats for children with cerebral palsy in Uganda.

This is wonderful news – as these supportive seats are life-savers.

We have two types of supportive seat: the static Moti Start for very young children and the active Moti Go for older children.

Without the right support, children with cerebral palsy are frequently left lying on the floor. In the very worst cases, they die a slow and painful death – from malnutrition, respiratory problems or pressure sores.

When a child is fitted with a Moti Go or a Moti Start, the transformation is dramatic.

They take a huge developmental leap.

Because they’re no longer using all their energy trying to sit up, they start making eye contact and communicating with their families. Their posture, breathing and digestion improves immediately. As they get stronger and healthier, they learn to feed themselves. They even start going to school. Find out how a Moti Go has helped Lillie and her mum Jo-An by watching our photofilm.

EquallyAble aren’t stopping at 100 chairs.

With their ’1000 Wheelchairs in 10 Countries’ fundraising campaign, they’re aiming high! We’re delighted to be helping them make it all happen, and we’d like to give them a big thank you for their support.

If you like this photo of Richard, who coaches wheelchair basketball for our inclusive sports project in Uganda, you’ll love this little clip of him describing how the sport has changed his life.

We’re about to launch an initiative giving businesses the chance to sponsor sports wheelchairs – meaning more people like Richard will have their lives transformed by sport. Watch this space!

When Peter from our Kenya office visited Motivation HQ a couple of weeks ago, we grabbed ten minutes with him to find out about his work, his inspiration and his hopes for the future. Read more below or listen to Peter here.

Can you tell us a bit about your background?
I’m qualified in prosthetics and orthotics but I’ve been focusing on wheelchair services for some years now. I joined Motivation three years ago and my first role involved supporting other organisations with their wheelchair services. I would visit and give them advice about assembly of wheelchairs, the production floor, the assessment, fitting and follow up of wheelchair users – essentially what is covered in the World Health Organization’s wheelchair guidelines.

So what’s your role today?
Today I’m working as Motivation’s Africa Regional Manager. A typical day starts with a meeting with my Kenyan team who I share an office with in Nairobi. There are three of us. We agree on our plan for the day and discuss any meetings or visitors coming in. Then we settle down to our work. For me it’s supporting the team on the ground, to understand what’s happening in Uganda, Zimbabwe, Malawi, or the eight other countries we have programmes in.

What’s exciting in your job right now?
I’m really looking forward to the new racing chair. For quite some time there has been no low-cost racing chair, so I’ve seen people with disabilities taking part in the Nairobi marathon in everyday chairs. This means the race isn’t so competitive because it’s all about the quality of chair you have rather than your skill. So the new chair is going to be a big plus. It will really help develop sporting activities in this country. The first batch of racing chairs should arrive in February, and we are all very happy about that.

Tell us about someone who’s inspired you.
There is a lady called Salome here in Nairobi. She sustained a spinal cord injury when she fell while carrying water on her back. When I first met her, she was very badly seated in an inappropriate wheelchair. The organisation that gave it to her hadn’t fitted it correctly or thought about a pressure relief cushion. When Salome came to us, we fitted her with an Active Folding wheelchair and it really has transformed her life. She is able to get out of the house – she’s out there earning a living. She’s positive and active and doing things with her life. Salome is an inspirational lady.

What are your hopes for Motivation Africa in the future?
From Cape Town to Cairo, I would like to see wheelchair services that meet the World Health Organization guidelines, with people getting the right chairs. That is the key to it all.

If you follow us on facebook or twitter, you’ll probably know this already: along with Shelterbox and the On Course Foundation, we’ve been chosen as a beneficiary charity of this year’s Telegraph Christmas Appeal. And very excited we are about it too!

Over the last 20 years, the Telegraph’s annual appeal has raised almost £22 million for a range of charities. So this is a wonderful opportunity for us to raise much-needed funds for our work with disabled people around the world. It’s also going to do wonders for our profile, raising awareness of Motivation among hundreds of thousands of readers.

The Telegraph will run stories about us from now until the end of January. They’ve kicked things off with an interview with our co-founder David Constantine. If everything goes to plan, stories from Uganda, Tanzania and Afghanistan will follow, as well as an interview with Motivation’s very own Paralympian, Jen Howitt Browning. Watch this space!

You can donate to the appeal here.

We’re in awe of Victoria Brignell – and we imagine you will be too when you read about her remarkable quest to fundraise for us! We asked Victoria to write about it and, happily for us, she accepted.

“When I was six years old, I became paralysed from the neck down as a result of a tumour in the spinal cord in my neck. I’ve discovered at first hand how important it is for a paraplegic or tetraplegic person to have a wheelchair that meets their needs. Sadly, although 100 million people worldwide require a wheelchair, millions of them do not own an appropriate one.

This autumn I decided it was about time I did something to support Motivation’s vital work. My aim was to raise as much money as I could. The question was – how?

Two things eventually inspired my fundraising method. While I was watching the Olympics and Paralympics opening ceremonies, I was intrigued by the parade of countries, some of which I had never heard of before. Where on earth is Micronesia, for goodness sake?

Then, a few weeks ago, media coverage of the American presidential election campaign reminded me of a news story which happened 13 years ago. George W Bush was once famously asked in a TV interview to name four international statesmen and, for whatever reason, was unable to do so.

Together, these two things gave me the idea for my Motivation fundraising – a sponsored memory test. I resolved to memorise the names of all the heads of state and heads of government of the 193 countries that make up the UN. This meant the total number of names I had to learn was 336! Soon all my friends, relatives and acquaintances found an email from me in their inboxes asking for sponsorship to undertake this crazy endeavour. I think I approached everyone I know apart from my postman.

For three weeks, I revised the names whenever I had the opportunity. I work full-time, serve on the local board of a housing association and do voluntary work for a human rights charity, as well as having an active social life, so it was sometimes tricky to find spare time to devote to what I called my ‘Motivation Memory Challenge’. I’m very grateful that Elizabeth II is queen of 15 other countries as well as the UK. That meant I had 15 fewer names to learn!

When the dreaded day of reckoning finally arrived, I tested my memory by printing out a list of all 193 countries and attempting to write the names of the head of state and head of government beside each one. I did mark the ‘exam paper’ myself but I also sent it to two friends I had press-ganged into providing independent verification of the result.

So what was my score in the end? Well, I correctly remembered the names of 256 people out of the 336, which is 76%. If we include the names that I did remember but then slightly mis-spelt (eg writing Christina instead of Cristina or Dimetris rather than Demetris), the figure rises to 273 or 81%. I was hoping to achieve a mark of at least 90%, so I was a bit disappointed. On the other hand, I was relieved that it was not a complete disaster. The day before the test I wasn’t sure if I would make it past the 50% mark.

The weird thing is that I remembered names like the king of Bhutan (Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck) and the prime minister of Kyrgyzstan (Zhantoro Satybaldiyev) but forgot ones like the prime minister of Guyana (Sam Hinds). My memory obviously works (or doesn’t work) in mysterious ways…

Many of the people I approached were incredibly generous and I’m delighted to say that the final amount raised was £1,081.00 (including Gift Aid it’s £1,335.00). I feel lucky that I became a wheelchair-user in a prosperous European country where disabled people have rights and choices. I hope that my ‘Motivation Memory Challenge’ has made a small contribution to improving the lives of paralysed people elsewhere in the world who are less fortunate than myself.”

Calling all our readers in India!

December 21st this year will see Bangalore hosting an international conference on disability equality and accessibility.

The conference is being organised by Choice International UK and IndiaCSR. Motivation India is delighted to be an official partner.

The conference will recognise the achievements in disability equality to date in India, and it will look at the challenges the country still faces.

It will bring together people from all over the world to share ideas, innovation and creativity to help create a more equal, inclusive India.

The conference promises to a unique forum for sharing personal experiences of tackling disability inequality as well learning from the experiences of others.

Everyone is welcome. To find out more and to book a place, go to the conference’s official website.

We fired some questions (some serious, some silly) at our new colleague Ben Humphrey, who’s coordinating our sports and peer training programmes.

Tell us a bit about you and your work pre-Motivation.

I always wanted to work in sport. I started off a coach and then I found my niche: sports development. Sports development is about using sport to change people’s lives for the better. People with disabilities are much less likely to take part in sport, so they miss out on all the benefits. My most recent job was about raising levels of participation and improving the standard of life of people with disabilities in Swindon – through wheelchair basketball, wheelchair tag rugby, trampolining…

So what brought you to Motivation?

In 2009 I went to Malawi with the University of Gloucestershire to work on a sports development project and I came back with an itch – I wanted to travel. When I saw the job at Motivation advertised I thought, ‘Wow – it’s got sports, it’s got development and it’s got the opportunity to travel!’ If someone could have written a job description for me, that would have been it!

We like your enthusiasm! What part of your new role are you most excited about?

Visiting our disability sports project in Gulu, Uganda. I’ve got a good idea of what’s going on behind the scenes but I want to see the project being delivered – I want to see the games and the smiling faces and the difference it’s making. When you’re filling out paperwork or applying for funding, sometimes you forget what you’re doing it all for. So I can’t wait to get to Uganda to see it first-hand.

If you had to pick one song as the soundtrack to your life, what would it be?

Feeder’s Just A Day. That’s the one I always listened to before a big race when I used to race competitively. On my first day at uni I remember listening to it in the car park, thinking ‘Come on Ben, it’s just a day!’

Which five guests would you invite to your dream dinner party?

Stephen Fry – he’d be the social glue, the master of ceremonies. Adam Hart-Davies, who rides a bike everywhere and presents Local Heroes – I think he’s a really interesting guy. Then I guess one of my sporting heroes: I’d like to speak to David Weir because I think it’s incredible that he can win a 200 metre track event and then the marathon. That blows my mind. John Lennon and Graham Coxon from Blur, my favourite band. Hmm, I don’t have any women. Well, if David Weir can’t make it, let’s have Jess Ennis.

And finally…your most embarrassing moment?

I was pretty emotional at my leaving do for my old job, and I was nervous too because I knew I’d have to do a speech. A visually impaired person I’d worked with came along and asked me who was sitting around the table. So I went round and I got to Maria… and I couldn’t remember her name. I’d worked with her for five years but I went totally blank. Maria, if you’re reading this – I hope you’ve forgiven me!

In the UK and want to find out about disability sports clubs in your area? Ben recommends Parasport.org.uk

In London last week, we were delighted to chat with Paralympian Timothy Harabe, a power-lifter from Papua New Guinea (PNG).  Timothy uses a Motivation Rough Terrain wheelchair, which was provided to him by our friends at Motivation Australia and PNG’s National Orthotics  Prosthetics Service.

What’s life like back in PNG?

I live far away from the city where the roads are not good. I have my own business selling goods at the market. Every afternoon I train. Sunday I rest and go to church.

This year was the first year people in PNG with a disability were included on the electoral role to vote. Change is happening back home – the rights of people with disability are improving.  Policy is being developed for equal employment opportunities in the workplace.

How does your disability affect your life?

When I was a small baby, the doctor gave me an injection in my leg. When I tried to walk I couldn’t, so I had to use crutches.  This wheelchair is my first. With crutches I can only cope with short distances. Now I can go much further.

What’s your London 2012 experience been like so far?

The Athletes Village is like a five star hotel! I enjoy London very much. I really like London Bridge and my favourite place is Parliament House.

Watching the British winning in wheelchair racing is a massive eye opener for us. I think we have people at home who could compete and do well if they had the right equipment.

What do the other athletes think about your wheelchair?

Other athletes like it. They ask me, “Where did you get it from?” I tell them, “Motivation”. A girl asked me, “Why do you only have three wheels?” I told her, “this wheelchair is a four by four – it can go anywhere!”

What are you expecting when you go back home?

People will be proud and will want to talk with me and ask me lots of questions about my disability and experience. I hope lots of people will be inspired to take up sport.

Will we see you at Rio 2016?

I hope so. Our president has already indicated it will not stop here. When we go back home, work will continue with other athletes who didn’t qualify. I will motivate them with my experience.

What does sport mean to you?

Sports has changed my life. It makes me very happy.

Timothy competed on Monday 3^rd September, achieving a personal best of 160kg in the men’s 75kg weight category. Well done Timothy!