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| Christelle Bay Nfor |
NewsWatch: Christelle
Bay Nfor, you are Managing Director of HOFNA, what does your association do?
Christelle Bay: HOFNA means ‘Hope
for the Needy Association’. It was created as a way of responding to some of
the needs of the common man especially people in communities which are
underprivileged and vulnerable. They either don’t have an open medium to
express the issues or lack the support that go with because it doesn’t suffice
to express a need but for the need expressed to be catered for. That is
actually what pushed us to establish this association. If you express a need,
the only thing that can make you think that something will be done about it is
when you know there is hope. That is why you see it is not just about a need,
but it is about hope for the needy.
NewsWatch: Last year you
launched the “Making Education Realistic” (MER Project), can you tell us more
about the project and the choice of C.S Nwangri as venue to launch?
Christelle Bay: First may be
from the choice you will know the meaning. You would agree with me that when
government took on the policy of subsidizing government run educational primary
schools, that is making them free, the other educational schools at the primary
level which are run by the lay private or by the missionary ran into causes of
financing which means nobody in an underprivileged or poor community finds any
reason getting into private primary schools to pay when the government school
is there for free. These schools therefore become highly needy. So the
situation becomes a bit aggravated when you go to a community that is
traditionally poor and now has to face this additional challenge, especially
with the government subsidized school not very assessable. That is why there
was the choice of Catholic School
Nwangri. The school falls in the category of
non-government primary schools, then you understand that there has been need
vis-a-vis the normal government schools that are subsidized by government.
HOFNA is not just about meeting immediate needs. It is about needs that are
sustainable, once you start training people especially cultivating and
inculcating into them the aspects that you can get to share with each other ‘s
need, you now build up a society that cares about its own needs and those of
others.
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| Launching of the MER Project |
NewsWatch: After
launching the MER project, what next ?
Christelle Bay: Like it is
said in Economics, you have to have a scale of preference because Economic
demands are inelastic but resources to meet these demands are always in limited
in supply. So therefore, needs are there and HOFNA is not just doing this in in
Nwangri, We’ve been doings things around underprivileged communities even in
Bamenda you would be surprised. Around the Banjah area where there was a need
for the community to have water, HOFNA as well HOFNA has done about three trips
of donation to the Abanghor Orphanage where you have children, some orphans
left by HIV mothers, fathers and so on.
NewsWatch: Many people
today create humanitarian associations with secondary aims, any hidden agenda
behind the creation of HOFNA?
Christelle Bay: The hidden
agenda is that we have to carter for the needs of the needy. If that is hidden,
then that is the hidden agenda.
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