To commemorate the Children’s Day, a Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO), Black Diamond Support Foundation(BDSF), choose to empower women in Agboyi-Ketu, a riverine community in Lagos State.
The NGO empowered not less than 200 women living in the community, which is about 10-minutes boat ride from Ketu in Kosofe Local Government area of Lagos State.
The convener of the NGO, Adefunke Adewunmi, said there was need to empower the women in the community, to enable them take proper care of their children.
According to her, if women in the community are taught different skills, the proceeds from the business will enable them feed their children and wards as well as give them good education.
“There is no celebration of Children’s Day without the mothers, without mothers, there won’t be children to celebrate.
“We must begin to also focus on the empowerment of mothers because of the total welfare of the children.
“We used this occasion to also appreciate the women for the sacrifices they make for children,’’ She explained.
Adewunmi said the women were taught different skills like soap making, bead making and baking, which was taught within a three-day period.
“We also fed over 500 children to commemorate the celebration. The children were given food, water bottles and other gift items packed in bags, just to make them have a feel of what children in Lagos city enjoy at this time,’’ she said.
The convener also said there was need to celebrate with the children in less privileged communities, to give them a sense of belonging.
She said many elites usually celebrate at beaches, cinemas but failed to impact on the lives of the needy.
“We have seen many who grew up in the slums and later became successful, sure it was someone who impacted and celebrated them.
“The less privileged children too need to be checked on, celebrated and visited often, to make them feel they are also born to reign,’’ she said.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that certificates of attendance were issued to the women, who participated in the training.
BDSF started activities to commemorate the Children’s Day from May 20 through to May 27, with awareness creation in the community to sensitise the residents to different health issues, which includes personal hygiene.
There was also awareness creation on issues of rape and the need to speak out and report incidences of rape to the Nigeria Police.
Apart from the three-day skills acquisition training for women and girls in the community, there was also the feeding of not less than 500 children at a party organised for them on May 26.
Also at the occasion, the chief of the community, Mr Taiwo Lamina-Opoinfa, commended the NGO for celebrating with the children and empowering their women.
“We are happy that our children were celebrated and our mothers trained, we thought people had forgotten us, but now we know we are not,” he said.
One of the beneficiaries of the skills acquisition programme, Mrs Tope Olofin, told NAN that she was appreciative of the training and had already started selling the soap she was taught how to make.
Olofin, who showed the NAN correspondent the soap she was selling, said that she wished many more NGOs could help train more women in the community.
“We were taught the soap making on the first day of the training and I am already selling what I made,’’ Olofin said.
Mrs Ngozi Perpetual, also told NAN that she could now make pastries.
“I can make cake and chin-chin, and I intend to distribute to other people, so they too can be empowered.
The NAN reports that BDSF was established in 2011, after the death of Mrs Apeke Adewunmi, who lived her life serving the poor and the needy.
The vision of the NGO is to establish and empower indigent people living in the slums.
**NAN
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