During this week’s UK-Nigeria meeting we covered a variety of topics ranging from waste plastic recycling to water and sanitation and e-learning.

Below are the summaries of these varied discussions!

These were the sobering words of John Dada and summed up this week’s UK-Nigeria online meeting:

“This month we must focus on stocking up grains, be ready to respond to alerts on elderly and children who may be at risk of abuse”

The words followed on from last week’s discussion when we learned of Fantsuam Foundation’s rescue of an elderly mama who had been beaten and accused of witchcraft by her family and of the Rumbu (food bank) programme.
John explained that:
“The famine is most likely to hit Kafanchan and Kaduna state as a whole since many could not access their farm lands located in vulnerable areas ( post election turmoil) which means less farming activities for the year."

My weekly involvement with the news from Fantsuam Foundation as documented by these blogs should have prepared me for the unexpected but again it was shocking to hear of yet another accusation of witchcraft.
John Dada explained that it was the new team members Emmanuel and Ayuba who since the last meeting had been at the centre of a rescue of an elderly mama who was accused of witchcraft.
The FF team held a meeting with the entire family on Tuesday(17th), and their nurse had been to provide drugs and further treatment for the mama.
As Emmanuel stated : “These are some of the challenges we face in the rural areas where people tend to take the law into their hands”

This week brought the usual UK-Nigeria meeting at which a number of issues were discussed. But at this juncture I would like to take a moment to highlight another part of the two groups’ work together - namely how our network can be utilised for good.

On January 9th, Dadamac in the UK received a message from http://www.peoples-uni.org/ " target="_self">Peoples-uni (Australia), an organisation which is building public health capacity using internet based e-learning. In this message, staff there informed us that they had received a message from one of their Nigerian students, who was clearly distressed. This student had informed them that he was in the process of being evacuated to safe ground after enduring a set of very unpleasant experiences, which saw him trapped amid Nigeria’s ongoing unrest.

Following a short Christmas break, Wednesday the 4th of January saw the restart of the weekly UK-Nigeria team Meetings.

The last UK-Nigeria weekly meeting of 2011 unearthed a sad situation which is unfortunately faced all too often by those attempting to provide aid in developing countries.

Once again it involves an instance where such aid fails to reach those in dire need. The major frustration is that Fantsuam Foundation possesses the necessary skills and expertise to deliver this help, yet - despite its 10-year history of bringing innovative integrated programmes to its impoverished rural host community - “top down” funding remains hard to come by.

John Dada of Fantsuam explained the situation to Pam and myself. He said: “We feel sorry that we constantly have to inform folks that we do not have the level of slack in our budget for meeting unplanned expenses.

“A young man came in this morning, his home was burnt in the crisis and now he needs to have a surgery on Friday at the Teaching Hospital. He wanted help from Fantsuam Foundation.
He is one of many we have to turn away. There is a lot of talk from the Government end on peacebuilding, but it seems largely for photo opportunities and the assistance is not reaching the folks who really need it.”

A glitch with Skype meant that the Nigerian posts from this week’s UK-Nigeria team meeting were significantly delayed. However, as this is now an increasingly rare occurrence it gave us an opportunity to test previously relied upon communication channels. So, with a mixture of Skpe typed messages, sms, emails and Yahoo, here is this week’s update.

• John reported that Comfort is in Abuja for a meeting with the World Bank pertaining to the rice business development service project which they had previously supported in June.
• Fantsuam Foundation is expect to host a team from the Minnesota Renewable Energy from January 15th 2012 for training and solar installation at for the paediatric ward of Kafanchan Hospital.
• John and Pam had both made contact with Fola at Dadamac’s outpost in Ago-Are.
  The photo above, from Fola, shows the Life Fountain School, Nigeria where Fola reports he will be teaching pupils computer and internet usage next term.
• Fola has been able to add more photos to the Dadamac’s community Flickr

During this week's online meeting John Dada was able to give the UK-Nigeria team an update about the Attachab Eco-Village project.

Following the successful initial progress the French Embassy have just released the 2nd installment of their grant.

John reported that the classroom / manager's residence is nearing completion as is the borehole.
On Monday the construction of the overhead water tank and the installation of a solar pump are scheduled to commence.

John explained that they are using compressed bricks work for the build.
He also reported that as of today (Wednesday 30th November) there are over 20 young men working at the Attachab site.
John said:

" We have created a small employment opportunity in the village"

This is very important for the local community where unrest and turmoil (especially amongst the unemployed youth) is still high as was sadly demonstrated by the recent civil unrest.

John explained:

Global Entrepreneurship week (14-20 November ) saw Pam and I at the SHINE Unconference where we were attending hoping to find useful advice and collaborations to help us develop 'The Stronger Together' Workshops and Collaborators Clubs.

Photo by Andy Broomfield shows Dadamac's first Meetup which was held at Central Station On October 20th 2011.

During this week's UK-Nigeria online meeting John Dada, CEO of Fantsuam Foundation, shared with the team his vision.
John told us: " I woke up this morning with this thought that I could get youths from opposing camps to come together to rebuild one of the homes that was destroyed in the violence...I see this as an opportunity for a landmark in some symbolic activity that can draw a line under the cycle of violence and genuine peaceful dialogue begins..an activity to mark Martin Luther Day in January.