Opening GADHOH-Brikama nursery school project
14 November 2009
The Brikama Branch of the Gambia Association of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing
(GADHOH) has recently inaugurated a newly constructed Nursery School supported
by two Netherlands based organizations, namely Foundation Buganala and the
Friends of Effatha.
Speaking at the inauguration ceremony held at the school ground, Madam Bintou
Cham, the Honorary Mother of GADHOH-Brikama Branch, thanked the donors for what
she described as a noble gesture.
Madam Cham said the day is a special and historic one and that it was not by
accident that a school for the deaf and hard of hearing is built for the people
of Brikama and its environs. She said it is rather the love of humanity that
motivated the Lions Club Balk Tusken Mar on Klif of Netherlands to sponsor the
construction of the school for deaf children in Brikama. This project, she said,
is part of the decentralization efforts of GADHOH to cover the whole country.
According to Madam Cham, one of the problems that our world, including Africa
and the Gambia, suffers is mind poverty.
"No matter how materially rich we are, as long as we remain mind poor, we will
remain to be totally poor" she said.
She also described illiteracy as the greatest friend of poverty and stressed the
need for efforts to be made educate and empower people to overcome poverty..
For her part, Madam Marieke IJsendoorn, the chairperson of Foundation Buganala,
noted the importance of the date, 11-11 or 11 November, as a special day for
GADHOH and also equally a special date in the Netherlands.
Madam IJsendoorn narrated the history behind why this date is important to both
the event and her country. She explained that many years ago, in the year 316, a
baby boy was born and was named Maarten; that he grew up as a clever boy and
clever man with great social feelings and positive behaviour; that on a very
cold winter days he would tore his own coat into two to clad a poor old man who
is sitting out in the snow without putting any heavy or protective clothing. She
said this Maarten was always very concerned about the poor children and that as
a philanthropist he was always giving out vegetables, bread etc to the neediest
in society. This philanthropist Maarten, she said, died on the 11 November, 397.
She said the Lions Club Balk Tusken Mar en Klif of The Netherlands financed the
construction of the buildings and that her organization, Foundation Buganala,
was coordinating the project. She thanked the staff of Brikama GADHOH branch for
their support and commitment.
Mr. Karamo Sanyang, chairman of GADHOH Brikama Branch and also the Headmaster of
the School, disclosed that the school was constructed at the tune of 2.4 million
dalasi.
He said the school is the first of such facility for disable children in the
region and then called on parents of children with the disabilities of being
deaf and hard of hearing to send them to the school.
Pateh Baldeh