The Safe Abortion Action Fund (SAAF) which is hosted by IPPF was set up in 2006 in order to support grass-roots organisations to increase access to safe abortion. One such organisation which received support under the last round of funding is called Lady Mermaid's Bureau. My name is Masitula. I’m a single mother of two sons and I'm a sex worker. I live in Nansana Wakiso district, it is near Kampala. Every evening I travel 10 kilometres to Natete, a Kampala city suburb where I am a sex worker. I got pregnant after a client refused to wear a condom. I attempted to abort using some unsafe abortion practices but I was unsuccessful. I now have a two-month old baby whose father I do not know. My eldest son is seven years, he is in primary school. The other one is two months. I became a sex worker after a friend advised me that this job can provide me with some income. My husband left me six years ago for another woman when my eldest was only one. He doesn’t give me a single penny for taking care of his son. I used to be a teacher but the income is little. So I have been a sex worker for six years. There are many problems for sex workers here. One is with the police. The police catch us, take our money and sometimes force us to have sex. The other problem is that those men who buy us, some of them don’t pay. They just use us and they don’t pay. It affects me because when you go to work and you don’t get any income, it is bad. They use you for free. And I don’t have anyone to take care of my kids. So sometimes I don’t work I just stay at home because no one will take care of my kids. I live only with my children. I don’t have anyone else. Sometimes I have to take my baby with me and if I get a job, then I give him to my friend until I finish. It is difficult with such a little baby but there is nothing I can do. I don’t even know the father. He just forced me. He said that he will not put on a condom. So that is why I tried to abort with herbs, but it didn't work.They caused me a lot of pain and I was about to die. I didn’t go for a safe abortion because with this government of ours, it is not easy to go to the hospital and tell them that I want to abort. You just go and tell them that you want medicine for ulcers. But Lady Mermaid's Bureau, supported by SAAF, has helped me and other sex workers. When you call them they come immediately. When you are sick they take you to hospital. In everything they are good. When I get some problems, I just go and tell them. They do what other people can’t do. It has changed my life because I now have a friend. They are my friends. I take them as part of my family because I don’t have any family. My father died, I don’t have a mother and my husband left me. They are my family now. Abortion should be legal and also sex work because it is a job. We don’t want to do it. It's just because we don’t have anything else and that is why we do it. So the government should also take us as human beings. No one treats us as human beings. And to prevent women from having unsafe abortions the government should provide people with jobs and factories to work in. So that they don't have to do sex work because it affects these girls, and some of them are like me. We don’t have jobs, you go and look for a job, you don’t find the job and you just find yourself doing this sex working job instead. Stories Read more stories about the amazing success of SAAF in Uganda

The Safe Abortion Action Fund (SAAF) which is hosted by IPPF was set up in 2006 in order to support grass-roots organisations to increase access to safe abortion. One such organisation which received support under the last round of funding is called Lady Mermaid's Bureau. Joanne is a sex-worker who has been involved in the project run by Lady Mermaid's Bureau, funded by SAAF. "My name is Joanne, I have been a sex-worker for two years." Joanne was abused as a child and became pregnant at a very young age. She was forced to leave school with only a primary education and could not speak English very well. When she moved to Kampala from her village she was told she could get a good job but she had nowhere to stay and ended up becoming a sex-worker in order to support herself and her two children. While sex-work offers some financial support, the fact that it is illegal and that gender inequality is high in Uganda make sex workers very vulnerable to rape and violence. "The problems are very many. Men don’t want to pay. Someone uses you but he does not want to pay. We are being beaten, and there's a lot of stress and competition."   "There is a lot of competition between sex workers. Sometimes you go on the streets and no man is going to buy you and you end up not earning a single coin. Other times, when that man buys you, he tells you the money, you negotiate when you go to the lodge the man does not pay you. That is the most hard thing because you need to feed your children, but someone does not pay you. The men beat us when we are in the lodges. They are rough, they don’t want to use condoms, you tell him to use a condom, and he does not want to use a condom. So they end up infecting you sometimes. My other sex workers most of them got infected through that. We are even being raped by policemen sometimes. They come on the streets to chase us away and if we stay on the streets to work, the policemen force you. When a policeman arrests you, he takes you to a police station because you don’t have money. He asks what you can offer if you want to leave jail. You will say, "I have nothing I don’t have money." So the only thing you can do is to have sex with him. Then he will release you. Women cells are not the same as the ones for men - sometimes you are there alone at night. So police cells are being used to rape women. He has not paid you so that is rape - he has just forced you. There are many women who got pregnant because of this rape. Even me. I have had two abortions." Joanne used local herbs to terminate her pregnancy which led to complications. Then her friend told her about Lady Mermaid's Bureau and they referred her to IPPF's Reproductive Health Uganda (RHU) who were able to help her. Since being involved with Lady Mermaid's Bureau Joanne has been taught English and computer skills and has also got access to contraception and legal support. She thinks that both sex-work and abortion should be legalised in Uganda to reduce the stigma that leads to violence and abuse. "At times men don't respect us as sex-workers. Because it is illegal they abuse you. If they legalise it, it will be good." Stories Read more stories about the amazing success of SAAF in Uganda