Six members of the Leigh Rotary Club visited Gyetiase last week to inspect the work Ashanti Development had done for them at Bimma Village. They seemed well pleased with the 108 household latrines, the kindergarten and food processing plant, the free school dinners, the farm support scheme and school playground they had funded. For its part, Bimma was delighted to see them and held a grand durber in their honour. The festivities culminated with Barrie Coates, the moving force behind the project, being made a Chief of Development.
Here in Gyetiase, Dave Banks is working as a teacher-trainer to the Junior High School. He’s volunteered for one year. He’s doing a fabulous job (see the forthcoming Ashanti News) and we’d love to find some TEFL teachers or other teacher-trainers to support him.
We’re also glad to have Ruth and Sheila with us. Ruth is a nurse, who worked in Mampong Hospital many years ago. She is rather shocked to see the changes there have been since then.
We visited the sites of all our active projects, including Awanya to see the new latrines financed by a Crowdfunder project, and Aduntam, to see the clinic, financed by Ashanti Development Italia. The Adutwam Chief told us “how happy the community is with what is happening and with all the developments.”
We also visited new villages, and now have a list of 26 who would love to be sponsored. Prices for the baseline survey and household latrines for these villages (we ask donors to finance these before anything else) range from £1,500 to £65,000. More information will appear under the Develop A Village page of this website.
The two couples who jointly sponsor Dadiase and Mpenya villages are also with us and work on the baseline and household latrines for these villages will start soon. In the meantime, the sponsors are busy setting up a jewellery-making business and investigating ways of providing them with clean water nearer to their homes.
Background to everything is the forthcoming General Election. This particular election is crucial to the country’s future. The current uncertainty is causing havoc in the villages where we work, and where people of one political party are often unwilling to work with the other.