Newsletter
: September 2005 50p (free to members)
______________________________________www.oneworldlink.org.uk______________________________________
A most successful year
FULL
REPORT INSIDE ►►►►
ANNUAL
MEETING and A.G.M. from starting with a simple meal and
refreshment Mr Joe Pyne, Mrs
Josephine Komeh, Mr Vandy Bockarie Primary Headteachers
visiting us from Bo, will give their first reactions upon the completion of
their 2-week
reciprocal visit and programme to their respective partner schools, other
linking schools and the wider
educational community We are indebted to Bill Evans who has done a good stint
as Chair and made a very great contribution to the Link. He will be stepping down from this role at
the A.G.M. and nominations for the posts of Chairperson, Vice-Chairperson and
Membership Secretary will be particularly welcomed. Also volunteers for a number of other tasks
would be appreciated (see the previous June Newsletter!) Please make every effort to
attend
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BUILDING COMMUNITY PARTNERSHIPS BETWEEN
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A SERIES OF
SEMINARS Places are still available for this series of fortnightly
seminars presented by African postgraduate students at From 7p.m.to There will be a single
registration fee of £5 for the whole series (concessions) For further details contact
Sheila Grainger 01926 884931 SGRAINGER@WARKSCOL.AC.UK |
The Bo
One World Link
Community
Centre,
August 2005.
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Hussine
Yumkella in Bo My visit to British local authorities
recently initiated a “Task group for local government
collaboration with Sierra Leone” in July, to ensure the close coordination of activities
with partners in Sierra Leone as a mechanism of strengthening the capacities of the newly elected
local councils, drawing on the practical experiences and skills of their UK
partners with the aim of improving the delivery of local services. It
has been working closely with the key local government leaders in A multi-purpose visit has
therefore been organised between the 19th and 23rd
of September with the chair of the Task group, Geoffrey Calvert, from There will be a visit
report, shared with all members of the |
SCHOOLS Welcome to Mr Joe Pyne, Mrs Josephine Komeh, and Mr Vandy Bockarie,
Primary Headteachers from Bo, visiting their partner schools at Brookhurst,
Ferncumbe and St Anthony’s for 2 weeks, 10th – 21st
October. They will also be
visiting other linking schools and the wider educational community. If anyone else wishes to participate, please
contact Sarah Davis at Welcome to North Leamington Community School and
Arts College who have decided to link with The Ahmadiyya
School in Bo. We wish both schools
a long and mutually beneficial future relationship. Thanks to Aylesford School and Language College
for a staggering contribution of £1,000, raised by their non-uniform
day. £900 has been earmarked for teaching resources at the Community Centre
including emailing facilities to aid communication and £100 for the Bo
Mayor’s Youth Fund. The Primary Teachers’ Group are meeting for
the first time this term on September 20th after a very successful
year in 2004-5. This has become a key
group in encouraging activity in all our linked schools, representing: |
Up for grabs: The World development Movement is currently campaigning against our
Government’s apparent policy to pursue privatisation of |
WARWICK
DISTRICT ONE WORLD LINK WITH BO Chair’s
Annual Report – October 2005 |
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At this time of year I have usually given a
brief overview of the year which I am sure will be complemented by more
comprehensive reports from others on some aspects of our activities. This will be my final report as Chair, as I
am relinquishing that role at the AGM.
I became Chair in 2001, after completing a term as Mayor of
Leamington; I am handing it on now in the expectation that I will be asked to
take on other civic responsibilities next year. This has been a very busy year both in Bo
and in Last year I reported that the new Mayor of
Bo Town Council, Dr. Wusu Sanoh, had invited Councillor Mota Singh, the Mayor
of Royal Leamington Spa, to visit Bo.
We were delighted that Mota Singh was able to undertake that visit in
January 2005, accompanied by Hussine Yumkella, whose visit was sponsored by
Warwickshire County Council, together with Janet Alty and me from the Warwick
OWL Committee. Councillor Singh was,
of course, first and foremost representing Leamington Town Council as a
visitor to Bo Town Council and during the visit he and Dr. Sanoh signed a
friendship agreement between the two town councils. However, during the visit Mota Singh,
wearing his Janet Alty
provided important support to Mota Singh in fulfilling his role as a visiting
Mayor. In addition to this she had a
most fruitful time working with members of the women’s Kayoma movement, which
had grown out of Theresa Bangali’s earlier visit to Warwick OWL. We were all able to share in the
celebratory launch of Kayoma. One of my main roles was to liaise with Johannes Mallah and the other
members of the Bo OWL Committee. I was
also looking to firm up arrangements for a visit by two young people from Bo
to this District; I am pleased that
Johannes, working through the Bo District Youth Council, identified two young
people to do that. My third, most
enjoyable task was to link up with old friends from my first visit to Bo,
including some of the projects that had been helped by my “Bo Fund”. I was really impressed by the tremendous
change for the better since 2001 and by the optimism for the future shown by
so many people. Mota Singh and Janet in particular, but in
some part myself too, visited a good umber of our link schools and did a lot
to re-invigorate that process. All of
us were extremely pleased as well to visit the Bo OWL community centre, which
was then almost complete (Phase One) and is now in use. A tremendous achievement for Bo OWL and a
source of great satisfaction to us who had raised much of the money! |
I have left myself rather little space to speak about other
events. Dr Wusu Sanoh did visit us on
a reciprocal visit in March, on his way home from a conference in Towards the end of April George Mbayo and
Jane Nyambe arrived as the first leg of a hoped for Youth Exchange
programme. Due to circumstances at our
end, the visit programme was not as had been originally envisaged, but I am
very grateful, particularly to Dave Jones, but also to others in the Youth
& Community Service, for making their stay interesting and
worthwhile. Unfortunately Jane had the
misfortune to go down with malaria during her visit, from which she has now
made a good recovery. We are grateful
to Leamington Town Council for providing the core funding which enabled this
visit to happen. Our most recent visitor was Chief Kamanda
Gbonge, Paramount Chief of the Kakua chiefdom, who was with us very briefly
in August. This might be an
appropriate time to mention our developing relationship with a One of the outcomes of our January visit
is that Hussine Yumkella now has a brief from Warwickshire County Council
which enables her to develop local authority links with Bo in a way which has
never been possible before in our District.
We are also delighted that Councillor Mota Singh has been designated
as the link county councillor with us. I haven’t got round to some of the
exciting developments going on now, but I am sure you will hear about them
elsewhere in the Newsletter and when you come to the AGM. We hope that, at the AGM, we shall be able
to welcome three head teachers from Bo who will be here on the first part of
a teacher exchange, another exciting new development for us. Bill
Evans |
|
Lee
Hales |
Thanks to Lee for all the work he
has done in the I.T. field for One World Link, including his visit to Bo and
work there, now that he has completed his degree at |
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What
is it all about? |
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It was a hot, sunny day at the beginning of August when about twelve of us, committee members and others, met together in Jane Knight’s garden to spend some time talking about our Aims and Objectives. We had felt for a long time that committee meetings were so full of business that we did not have time to discuss the bigger picture. This meeting had been arranged to try to address that need. The afternoon was led very ably and imaginatively by Maria Franchi, who divided us into two groups, ‘for’ and ‘against’, to debate the motion that: “The activities of One World Link directly contribute to the achievement of its Aims and Objectives “. After discussion amongst ourselves, we had speeches from a proposer and seconder from each side and then contributions from the ‘floor’. This was not too easy since several of us found ourselves speaking against our own very strong feelings and beliefs! The outcome of the afternoon were the Aims, Principles, Objectives an the right, which we said would be put to a future meeting of the wider membership. We also said that we would put this to our friends in Bo to see to what extent we could agree. What do you think? |
·
To raise awareness of
issues of global relationships (adult education, public meetings,
presentations to groups, etc.) ·
To advance mutual benefit
to school education in each community ·
To develop interaction between
community groups in each community ·
To support and encourage
person to person interaction ·
To encourage a relationship
between local authorities and other public bodies in each community ·
To address the economic
imbalance between the two communities and support Bo-OWL to play a part in
the recovery of its community from war and poverty ·
To continue to support
exchange visits Evaluation: We
will monitor our achievement of these Objectives for effectiveness and
compliance with our overall Aim and Principles. |
Remember
that our visitors will be returning on or about October 24th. If you have letters for them to take
back, please make sure you bring them to the AGM on 22nd October, or send them to OWL POSTBOX
at 31 The
Greswoldes, Radford Semele, Leamington Spa, CV31 1TP before
that date.
BO DISTRICT
DESCENDANTS ASSOCIATION (BODDA) takes the pleasure of inviting all members of One World Link Warwick District to their 1st Anniversary This event will be
held on Would
anyone be free to go to represent us?
Please contact John Myers (see below) if interested. |
Write
to someone in Bo?
Frank Joseph Massaquoi, aged 56 Ibrahim Khalilu
Manneh, aged 46 Josephine Yennge Bappie, aged 29 Magdalene Hawa Kamara, aged 48 Fatmata Jebeh
Davies, aged 43 These and others would very
much like to write to someone over here.
Please contact Brian Austin, 31 The Greswoldes,
Radford Semele, |
Newsletter produced for OWL
by Brian Austin: news@oneworldlink.org.uk