On missionary assignments, a reliable car or motorcycle is not a luxury or an optional extra – it is an essential working tool and a prerequisite for effective ministry. Missionaries do far more than simply preach the Gospel; they are often also organizers of social and humanitarian assistance. They build schools and hospitals, run feeding programs, dig wells to provide access to clean water, and support local communities in countless other ways. Reliable transportation therefore becomes one of their most important tools – without it, many of these activities simply cannot take place.

Although the village of Ambohinoarina in Madagascar has a population of 10,000, it is not even marked on Google Maps – the nearest identifiable locality is Mahazony.

We live at an altitude of 1,130 meters above sea level, and the nearest hospital, in Ambalavao, is 45 kilometers away. It takes nine hours to get there on foot, and as much as five hours by car because the road is in such poor condition and our vehicle is so unreliable!

– writes Sister Iwona Korniluk, FMM, a missionary in Madagascar.

To support the local community, the Franciscan Missionaries of Mary run a school and a health clinic in Ambohinoarina. They also evangelize by visiting families living in nearby settlements and praying together with them. The journey one way can take up to four hours and is extremely difficult, as it leads through rice fields crisscrossed by irrigation canals. Mud is everywhere and significantly slows down travel.

We sleep on straw mattresses, wherever our hosts arrange for us to rest. We eat whatever they prepare, and we suffer from the same insects that, making no distinctions, bite everyone alike.

There are only two vehicles in the whole of Ambohinoarina: the sisters’ Toyota, which is more than twenty years old, and a truck that purchases rice and vegetables from local farmers. The sisters’ vehicle is not used solely for transportation. It also serves as an ambulance, enabling them to transport sick and injured people either to their clinic or to the hospital in Ambalavao.

We had to arrange for the evacuation to the hospital of a man who had suffered a lacerated abdomen – he had been attacked by a bull. His intestines were protruding from his body. His friends held his abdomen closed using banana leaves and string, since they didn’t have any bandages.…

Another group of people who require transportation to the hospital are women in labor. Because the sisters’ clinic does not have an ultrasound machine, it is impossible to predict how a delivery will progress. The most common complications involve a baby being in an abnormal position or a labor that becomes prolonged after initially being planned as a home birth or a delivery at the clinic. In such situations, the patient must be transported to the hospital immediately.

The sisters’ vehicle, now more than twenty years old, is in need of a major overhaul, estimated to cost around €31,000. For this reason, the sisters have asked us for help in purchasing a new vehicle. Including the 40% import duty imposed in Madagascar, the total cost of the new vehicle amounts to €41,000.

How to Donate

You can support our project by making a bank transfer to the following accounts:

For $: PL 52 1600 1462 1847 3641 5000 0009; SWIFT: PPAB PLPK
For €: PL 41 1600 1462 1847 3641 5000 0013; SWIFT: PPAB PLPK
For others: IBAN: PL 79 1600 1462 1847 3641 5000 0008; SWIFT: PPAB PLPK
Reference: Purchasing a car for a missionary from Madagascar