Caritas Slovenia has teamed up with Argentine Slovenian priest and missionary Pedro Opeka to build a new primary school in Madagascar as well as to provide school meals for children attending schools already built by Opeka's association in the country with the financial support of the Slovenian Foreign Ministry.

The support will enable them to build a school for 550 children and provide school meals for over 5,300 pupils for three months.

The project started after Foreign Minister Tanja Fajon promised aid to Opeka as they met in December 2023 when he visited his parents' homeland. The ministry is contributing just over €320,000 to the project this year.

"If there is no school, there is no progress. If there is no school we don't know how to coexist," said Opeka, the 76-year-old missionary who has dedicated his life helping the poorest people of Madagascar. "I thank Slovenia and all Slovenians for this wonderful gift for our children here in Madagascar," he added.

Caritas Slovenia is the ministry's multi-annual strategic partner in international humanitarian aid. This year they are also working on projects for humanitarian aid in Ukraine, the Gaza Strip and the Antilles.

Between 2021 and 2023, Caritas Slovenia carried out 15 emergency response, rehabilitation and reconstruction projects in Ukraine, Moldova, Madagascar, Haiti, Ethiopia, Syria, Turkey, Malawi and Morocco worth €1.9 million, according to ministry data.

Under the new partnership signed in August this year, the ministry will provide at least €1.3 million to help Caritas provide emergency humanitarian aid in countries affected by natural and other large-scale disasters, along with other donations.

Opeka was born in Buenos Aires to Slovenian parents who fled Slovenia due to atrocities in the aftermath of the Second World War. He has been working as a missionary in Madagascar since the 1970s, initially as a priest and Vaingaindran and later in the capital Antananarivo.

He is the founder of two humanitarian associations, Akamasoa (Good Friends) and Antenne Akamasoa, which operate throughout Madagascar.

During his time at the mission, more than 4,000 houses, as well as schools, health clinics, sports halls and churches have been built, providing jobs, education and meals to more than 500,000 Malagasy.

More than 25,000 people live in the Akamasoa communities, which are designed so as to involve the residents and users in the communities' construction and development. Thousands of children attend schools built by the two associations.

However, each year Opeka must secure generous donor funding to enable Akamasoa to continue its mission. "I'am not begging. I'm just asking for justice so that we can help these people who work," he told reporters as he visited Slovenia in December 2023.