{"id":9110,"date":"2012-04-18T09:22:55","date_gmt":"2012-04-18T09:22:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.faceofmalawi.com\/?p=9110"},"modified":"2012-04-18T09:22:55","modified_gmt":"2012-04-18T09:22:55","slug":"friends-of-mulanje-gives-brighter-future-to-5000-orphans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/2012\/04\/18\/friends-of-mulanje-gives-brighter-future-to-5000-orphans\/","title":{"rendered":"Friends of Mulanje gives brighter future to 5,000 orphans"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.faceofmalawi.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/IMG_3591-300x262.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.faceofmalawi.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/IMG_3591-300x262.jpg\" alt=\"\" title=\"IMG_3591-300x262\" width=\"300\" height=\"262\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-9112\" \/><\/a>A humanitarian campaigner who helps thousands of orphans in Malawi claims the country\u2019s new president will mean she can travel to Africa without fear of arrest.<\/p>\n<p>Mary Woodworth, 47, of Walmer Bridge, near Preston, has battled to provide accommodation, education and support for 5,000 orphans through charity Friends of Mulanje Orphans in her native Malawi.<\/p>\n<p>Over recent years, Mary claims to have been continually thwarted in her work which culminated in her being arrested and jailed in July 2010, accused of various offences.<\/p>\n<p>But after president Bingu wa Mutharika\u2019s recent death, Joyce Banda was sworn in as his successor to become the southeast African country\u2019s first woman leader.<\/p>\n<p>Mary said: \u201cThis changes things a lot, it is just wonderful.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cPeople feel they have been rescued, he was oppressing them and, instead of crying, it is a relief.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe did not listen to anybody, he just wanted to argue and quarrel with everybody.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cHe just wanted Malawi for himself and not for the people.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Mary\u2019s troubles came to a head in 2010 when a businessman linked to the former president occupied land she owned which was used to grow vegetables for the orphanage.<\/p>\n<p>Mary won a court battle to have the land reinstated to her but she was arrested after returning to the land and thrown in jail, accused of a string of offences.<\/p>\n<p>The case against her collapsed and she fled the country amid fears mobsters would attempt to kidnap her.<\/p>\n<p>But Mary is confident the future is bright for her charity and the country as a whole.<\/p>\n<p>She said: \u201cAt the moment in Malawi it is just crisis. They are queuing for sugar and it is produced in Malawi.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt will be much better now. Joyce Banda . . runs a charity and gives money to the poor.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A humanitarian campaigner who helps thousands of orphans in Malawi claims the country\u2019s new president will mean she can travel [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":9112,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[252],"tags":[2096,2097],"class_list":["post-9110","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-non-profit-organizations","tag-friends-of-mulanje-orphans","tag-mary-woodworth"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9110","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9110"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9110\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9110"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9110"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/new.faceofmalawi.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9110"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}