Madamfo Ghana Foundation marks 15th anniversary with three projects
Fifteen years ago, when a German-trained nurse came to Ghana, specifically to the Bosomtwe District, to offer her services, little did she know one day she could become a pillar in transforming lives across the nation and help augment developmental facilities nationwide.
Advertisement
How it started
Bettina Landgrafe, touched by the plight of patients and their inability to pay their bills, as well as the general poverty levels in the district, decided to lobby back home in Germany for support to help transform lives across Ghana.
As a result, she formed a non-governmental organisation (NGO), ‘Madamfo Ghana Foundation’, which simply means ‘My Friend Ghana Foundation.’
The foundation, with its parent body in Germany, is funded by individuals, companies and people from all walks of lives. Beyond alleviating poverty, the NGO’s prime focus is developmental projects of all kinds, including drilling of boreholes, building hospitals, KVIPs and supporting the government’s school feeding programme in some districts.
And as Madamfo marks its 15th anniversary, it has just finished three key projects with the support of the German government.
Projects
The first one, christened ‘Sports for Development’, is the construction of Ghana’s first-ever multi-purpose field at Brodi in the Brong Ahafo Region. The pitch, as the name suggests, is to be used for football and other disciplines by removing the goal-post and fixing equipment needed for particular disciplines.
Bettina Landgrafe and a medical officer examining some of the facilities at one of the hospitals.
The first phase, valued at 79,000 euros, is ready for use as plans are afoot to add other facilities such as changing rooms, offices and other auxiliaries to make it a complex. The entire project is estimated to cost 250,000 euros.
Also historic is the building of the country’s first-ever maternity waiting room, situated at Dunkura in the Bosome Freho District. Due to the hilly nature of the place, the NGO built the facility to help pregnant women, some of whom may not be healthy to make it back home after a clinical visit to stay there till they have been delivered of their babies. The facility costs 60,000 euros.
A kitchen built to facilitate the School Feeding programme at Apewu.
The third project is a library complex at Duadaso in the Brong Ahafo Region estimated at 45,000 euros. The fully furnished library is to help inculcate in children the habit of reading. Most of these children are seen loitering after school hours.
One of the medical laboratories built by the NGO
Touched by the lack of a modern library facility, Bettina, whose stool name in Ghana is Nana Anim Korkor Ababio, a developmental queenmother in the Kokofu Asaman Traditional Area, donated a 25,000 euro award she won as seed money to construct the library.
The library project is expected to serve 14 community schools in the area.
Scholarship
The NGO has also offered scholarships to over 400 brilliant, needy students. A board has been set up to assess students and those qualified are put on scholarship till they are out of school.
Bettina having fun with pupils in one of the classrooms built by the NGO.
Beyond the scholarship, Madamfo has over the last 10 years supported the government through the local assemblies, especially at Esiwa in the Bosome Freho District in the Ashanti Region to provide food to pupils.
Facilities
Madamfo has constructed not less than 200 of facilities such as classrooms, boreholes, hospitals and KVIPs across the nation with a special focus now on the three northern regions.
A newly constructed borehole with overhead tanks at Beposo in the Bosomtwe District in the Ashanti Region.
The attention on the Northern Regions aims at bridging the gap between the north and the south.
Staff
Nana Ababio, who is the CEO in Ghana, has two local key partners whom she works with while in Ghana. The Country Director, Mr Emmanuel Stephenson Kwame Kumadey and Mr Victor Manu, his deputy, are the main pivots around which the projects evolve.
A teachers quarters at Apewu.
The NGO also has six strong management staff with more than 100 auxiliary workers across the country.