Heeno International

January 2023

On Monday, 9th January 2023, in Chippenham, Wiltshire, UK, HI’s Chairman, Dr Karamo Sonko was welcomed as Chairman of WellBoring (West Africa) by a distinguished group of English men and a lady, absolutely keen and excited about working in Africa to provide water for school children and their communities. They were the leaders of WellBoring (UK), a British foundation and HI’s partner, that has recently completely 300 wells, mostly in East Africa. Consequently, King Charles of Britain has recognized its co-founder and Chairman of WellBoring (UK), Nigel Linacre, with a British Empire Medal in the New Year Honours List 2023. Other good news include: the successful raising of more money for more wells in the Gambia, the decision to re-start projects in Sierra Leone, and a planned wedding of two of the foundation’s biggest supporters whom Dr Sonko met during his visit. HI is very grateful to Nigel for organizing the visit of Dr Sonko and grateful to the A-Teams in the UK and Africa, for their excellent work in our continent!

 

The year 2022 was a year for which I am grateful to, and proud of, our Gambian teams and colleagues. Here are the reasons why:

1. Throughout the year, a highly motivated and smart team of young men and women helped me to train 249 Gambians with special needs (ie. “disabled” Gambians) in entrepreneurship and tailoring. The team travelled and selected representatives all over the country. We had earlier given microcredit to an experimental group of 37 beneficiaries.

2. In June and August, we worked with our partner, Community Action Platform for the Environment and Development (CAPED), for the successful replanting of 2500 mangroves.

3. After an initial drilling campaign in the early part of the year, WellBoring West Africa’s Kenyan drilling expert said to me: “The Gambian team can now do it on their own”. He was right! Our Gambian team helped us to complete the drilling of wells for school children and their communities across all the five regions of the country. The entire Phase 1 programme was executed in a total of ONLY 3 weeks and completed in August.

4.  In December, more than 60 compatriots joined me to embark on a research project on tribalism with the following objectives:

To understand the causes, consequences and responses (policy, etc.) needed to counter it in our country

To organize a post-survey stakeholders' forum for presenting the outcomes and recommendations. Gambians at home and abroad (from academia, businesses and international organizations) teamed up for this project. 43 survey assistants are presently travelling in the country at the moment collecting vital data. Six additional research assistants have started addressing alleged tribe-related official actions and public verbal political pronouncements since 2000, and reviewing the existing academic literature on the subject in Africa. Our Gambian advisers include those with credentials from top universities such as Cambridge and Harvard, international financial institutions such as the IsDB and IMF, governments such as the American and British, and African universities in the Gambia and Ghana. I proudly say that they are all my friends or relatives with deep to the Gambia. The project is fully funded by Heeno International (HI), a wholly Gambian foundation.

I am also grateful to the Arab Bank for Economic Development in Africa (BADEA) and the government officials from five Ministries (especially the Ministry of Finance and Economic Affairs) for helping us to serve our nation in 2022!