Savannah Women Integrated Development Agency
Speaking to over 50 young people at the Tamale Regional Library as a Relationship Coach, Executive Director for the Savannah Women Integrated Development Agency (SWIDA – Gh) shared some tips with the youth on the importance of “Relationship and Finance; how they each affect the other”.
Futa is a deprived community in the Tamale Metropolis, with only one school, which has a population of about 100, from primaries 1 to 6.
The school has no library and other facilities to aid in improved learning for the pupils, making their performances poor year – in – year – out.
The Savannah Women Integrated Development Agency (SWIDA – Gh), in partnership with Plan Ghana, therefore introduced the SWIDA – Gh WVL Plan – Gh project, to help the pupils with various basic literacy approaches, to improve their performances.
Under this project, SWIDA – Gh is also partnering the Northern Regional Library Authority, which has the mandate of providing books and other basic learning materials to pupils and students for improved learning.
Futa is one of the communities benefitting from this intervention and since inception, many boys and girls in the community have benefited from learning from the engagements had during project visits.
Pupils from the upper primary, M /A Primary School, and the teachers were brought to the Library in Tamale for an educational tour at the library, where they were given some books to send home and read for one month.
These books are supposed to be returned after one month, where the library team will subsequently be visiting the community to change the books for the pupils after every reading.
Supported by Plan International Ghana, the SWIDA – Gh WVL Plan – Gh project is being implemented in 11 school in the Tamale Metropolitan Area, targeting 600 girls from upper primary to Junior High School.
Executive Director for the Savannah Women Integrated Development Agency (SWIDA-GH), Hajia Alimah Sagito – Saeed, has said one cannot succeed in business or any sphere of life without having good relationship with others, especially in the particular field.
She said this in her opening speech at the maiden edition of the Movement for Youth Development’s (MYD) Conference for Capacity Building for Young Graduates at the National Youth Authority (NYA) Conference Hall in Tamale.
Hajia Alimah, who is the Guest Speaker for the occasion, mentioned attitude and respect for relationships as some key elements one must have in order to have a successful business, or to advance in any sphere of life.
“If you want to create wealth and you have issues of relationship, then you cannot create that wealth. You need to reorganize yourself in how you relate with people; how you network with people, what do you do as a person to make sure that your relationship is of value to what you want to do? What are the kind of people you relate with? The moment you get all that right, then whatever business you start or do, you can succeed. Because you’ll need people around you to sustain whatever business you want to do. You’ll need resources and sometimes you don’t have that resources but other people have it. You’ll need to relate well with them”.
She further implored young people to open up their minds to the numerous opportunities at their disposal rather than looking somewhere else and thinking there are no opportunities.
“If you’re the type that all you think is to be rich, think beyond just being rich. Think about creating wealth that will sustain you”. The Executive Director cautioned.
A team from the National Malaria Control Programme monitoring the implementation of the Malaria prevention project in partnership with SWIDA – Gh in the Gushegu Municipality.
Girls in deprived communities in the rural parts of northern Ghana, have challenges with reading, due to the lack of exposure to books during their elementary days, mostly due to their background.
Many of these girls under perform in class and this makes failure become a part of them throughout their education and career.
It is in this light that the Savannah Women Integrated Development Agency (SWIDA – Gh), has provided support to 600 girls from 11 schools in the Tamale Metropolitan and the Sagnarigu Municipal areas to register with the Ghana Library Authority in the Northern Region.
This move, according to the Executive Director for SWIDA – Gh, Hajia Alimah Sagito – Saeed, is to help the young girls find their feet in reading, which will go a long way to help them improve their academic performance.
Hajia Alimah said it is no fault of the girls that they mostly come from rural communities, which is why society has the responsibility to cater for them in this area, for them to become better adults and contribute to nation building.
The support extended to the girls, is part of activities on SWIDA – Ghana’s Women – LEAD project, funded by Plan Ghana.
The main objective for the activity is to improve literacy for girls’ empowerment, which is slso in partnership with the northern regional Ghana Library Authority.
The project provides opportunity and access to the registered pupils to borrow and carry story books home, read them and share the lessons with their colleagues and friends for better learning.
On International Day of Non-Violence, African Students For Interfaith Tolerance (ASFIT) convened a dialogue with three inspiring young women peacebuilders from three different countries namely Cameroon, India and Ghana as part of its Public Lecture Series and Roundtable Discussions.
The theme for the dialogue was ‘Peacebuilding and Leadership Where Do Women Stand?’
It was a unique opportunity for the audience to learn, appreciate and support the work of these incredible young women peacebuilders contributing actively to making the world more peaceful and safer for everyone.
The panelists included Ms. Sirri Cynthia Wakuna Ngang who is a young peace activist from Cameroon, Ms. Sohini Jana from India is the Director of JK Policy Institute and Co-founder of Online Circle of Compassion, and Ms. Issah Rahama, Founder of Advocates for Community Development(ACDEV) and is from Ghana.
The panelists called for the meaningful participation of women in peacebuilding and leadership as they touched on some of the challenges they encounter in the line of doing their work. They urged young women to venture into leadership and peacebuilding.
The Executive Director for Savannah Women Integrated Development Agency (SWIDA-GH), Hajia Alima Sagito – Saeed who was the guest speaker expressed her excitement with the success of the event and urged that the discussion should continue even after the event. She also urged African Students For Interfaith Tolerance to keep up the good work in promoting peace and interfaith harmony in Ghana.
The Executive Director for SWIDA-GH has received a ‘Decade of Achievement’ award from the Humanitarian Awards Global (HAG) for her immense contribution to the development of women and girls in Ghana.
Hajia Alima Sagito – Saeed, through her works and particularly SWIDA – Gh, has worked with international and local partners such as USAID, World Vision, Star-Ghana and Shea Network Ghana to advance projects aimed at empowering women farmers and young girls to reach their ful potential and to contribute to the development of their communities.
This comes after Hajia Alima was nominated for her works in the area of empowerment and after many nominations from across Ghana.
Hajia Alima was honoured alongside nine other individuals, including Nana Hemaa Adjoa Awindor of ‘Greetings from Abroad’ fame, Dr. Rev. Mrs. Gifty Lamptey (founding partner, Sidalco Group of companies) and Dr. Emmanuel Bidzakin.
The awards night came off on September 18 at the Labadi Beach Hotel in Accra. Visit Humanitarian Awards Global | Celebrating Change Makers or follow ‘Humanitarian Awards Global’ on Facebook for more details.
The ‘Humanitarian Awards Global’ seeks to identify, honour and celebrate a cross – section of the nation’s most influential Non-Profit Organizations from a wide range of industries, who are committed to service and the growth of communities.
Congratulations Hajia Alimah!!!
The Executive Director of Savannah Women Integrated Development Agency (SWIDA-GH) Hajia Halima Sagito – Saeed, has called on stakeholders in the Karaga district to protect girls by fighting against child marriage and all forms of child abuse in the district.
She made this statement at the Karaga district assembly during a high level district dialogue organized by her organization, SWIDA-GH in partnership with World Vision International – Ghana on the theme “Ending child trafficking and violence against children: The role of traditional and religious leaders”.
According to Hajia Alimah, the fight against child marriage and all forms of child abuse is not just a fight for SWIDA-GH and WVI but one that takes a collective effort from all the stakeholders.
In attendance of the event included, religious leaders, parents, heads of department at the district assembly, education unit, police, CHRAJ, school children and youth groups.
Each group presented action points that they will tackle at their level to help end the menace of child marriage and child trafficking.
The participants all agreed that child marriage undermines the growth and development of young girls, as well as robs the nation of productive youth who could contribute towards national development.
The National “End Child Marriage Now Campaign” Coordinator at the WVI, Madam Barbara Asare Yeboah said the campaign was an initiative to reduce cases of child marriage by five per cent in the country, through rolled out interventions that targeted key actors, including traditional and religious authorities, young girls and NGOs to achieve the set out objectives.
She added that the campaign was aimed at influencing national policies that protect children from abuse and also mobilize young people for purposes of empowerment and capacity building, to arm them enough to drive capacity against child marriages in their communities.
The Savannah Women Integrated Development Agency (SWIDA – Gh), has been participating in the training and mentoring of women farmers under the Agrihouse Foundation, which seeks to raise the capacity of the farmers to improve their skills and knowledge in agribusiness.
The Women in Food and Agriculture Leadership Training Forum (WOFAGRIC) & Expo. is a series which accords women engaged in agriculture a platform to learn about the best practices in farming value chain, the application of leadership skills and access to land, as well as how they can become successful entrepreneurs as farmers.
The 3rd Women in Food and Agriculture Leadership Training Forum (WOFAGRIC) & Expo. which took place at the Akayet Hotel in Bolgatanga, brought together women farmers and entrepreneurs to share ideas and lessons learnt in handling and overcoming challenges in Agribusiness.
SWIDA – Gh has been instrumental in the training and mentoring, as its Executive Director as a Trainer and Mentor of WOFAGRIC, interacted with the women farmers, where she encouraged them to continue to reflect on all the previous sessions had with them, in which they are encouraged to continue to see farming as a business rather than just an activity.
According to Hajia Alima Sagito – Saeed, it is only when they the women involved in the farming begin to see things that way that more support will come an enabling environment to be created for them to improve.
She however called for continuous enhanced knowledge for women farmers on climate – resilient agriculture, as she recounted some of the challenges many of them face due to their low understanding of the effects of climate change on their activities, as well as they can adapt to it.
SWIDA – Gh had ten of its women farmers from within the Upper East Region participating in the Women in Food and Agriculture Leadership Training Forum (WOFAGRIC) & Expo.
Funded by the Agrihouse Foundation, the Expo. was climaxed with an Awards Ceremony to recognize women in agriculture within the Upper East & West Regions.
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