News

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.

Low rainfall this summer meant that many saplings, planted as part of our tree-planting project, didn’t survive.

The project depends on children in their last three years of school being given a sapling to look after, with prizes for the best. The photos show enthusiastic school children queuing up for or planting their replacement saplings.

We hope you will join us at our 2012 Gala to raise awareness and funds for Ashanti Development, and enjoy an evening of beautiful ballet and music.

A stroll down the canal

Abhijit Roy and his SpecSavers shop sponsor the neighbouring villages of Mpantuase and Nkwabrim in Ghana’s Ashanti Region.

On a 50:50 basis, Ab and his staff have donated enough money to provide the villages with one latrine per household, to train them in health and hygiene, and to work with their existing organisations (elected village council, chief and elders, water and sanitation committee etc) so they are strong enough to maintain the improvements when Ashanti Development are gone.
The villages are mega-grateful, and when Ab visited recently they made him a chief. So from now on, those in the know call him ‘Nana Ab.’

White Arrogance – What the Africans say about what the Whites think of them
e-book by Antonella Sinopoli, in Italian with links to original articles in English.  4.10 euros

Antonella Sinopoli is a journalist and documentary maker as well as being founder of Ashanti Development Italia.   Her latest work, White Arrogance, is an ebook which aims to highlight prejudices spread by the Western media about the African continent.

Published by Quintadicopertina, the text is based on direct evidence from the web, blogs and social networks.  It is part of a collaborative publishing project by organisations active in human rights and freedom of information (website reference to Ping the World)

White Arrogance will be available soon in ePub, PDF and Mobipocket and at Amazon and all major on-line stores.  Antonella is generously offering half the profits to Ashanti Development.

Awanya village will benefit from volunteer Paul Kalinauckas’ project to raise £5,000 to Develop A Village in Ashanti.

Somehow or other, Awanya has learned the connection between hygiene and disease, and is desperate to have household latrines for the whole community. It’s now ringing two or three times a week to see how much money has been raised so far. Please contribute – £10 is enough – by going the Crowdfunder website.

Penny spoke recently with Zoe Cunningham from Central London community radio station Zone One Radio about our Adopt a Village programme. Listen to the interview below and get in touch if you’re interested in getting involved.