
WOODRIDGE associate pastor Fr Ladu Yanga is hopeful his prayers and those of many others may soon be answered and his ailing mother can be flown out of war-ravaged South Sudan for medical treatment in Uganda.
Fr Yanga said he had spoken to his mother, Kolorina Martin, in the nation’s capital Juba recently.
“Security has improved enough in Juba for us to consider flying my mother out from the airport to Uganda,” he said.
“My mother is also able to get up a little and walk around with the aid of a walking stick.
“This is much better than when her back pain was so severe all she could do was lie around.”
Fr Yanga said it was hoped to get his mother to the airport as early as Friday, February 7.
“The plan is to get her there by taxi along the best possible roads as she is still in considerable pain,” he said.
“She should really be transported by ambulance but the way things are in Juba this would be almost impossible.”
Fr Yanga fought through government red tape last year to have his mother present at his ordination in St Stephen’s Cathedral, Brisbane.
Last month, his sister Angela and others had to carry his mother 15km through Juba’s then-dangerous streets at night on Christmas Eve to get her to hospital.
Due to fighting in the city at the time, the hospital could do little but supply painkillers for her chronic back condition.