Chinwe Bode-Akinwande is the founder of Chinwe Bode Akinwande (CBA) Foundation. The quintessential banker is a compassionate fellow who has devoted her time, talent and treasure to extending hope to underprivileged widows in Nigeria as well as helping and supporting their vulnerable children through her foundation. A self-motivated, focused and energetic performer with an upbeat, positive attitude, CBA, as she is fondly called is a seasoned motivational speaker, entrepreneur and a ‘doer’ with a difference who with her husband also runs the affairs of a Singles Forum known as SinglesConnect as relationship gurus.Bode-Akinwande holds a degree in banking & finance with certificates in strategic brand management from University of Austin, Texas, USA; Digital Marketing with EduPristine USA; Consulting Tool Kits with the prestigious Harvard Business School in Boston, USA. With over 20 years professional experience and expertise in relationship matters, branding, brand quality assurance, strategic brand management, strategic planning, project management, event planning & management, corporate identity refresh expertise, coaching/mentoring and consulting she is a valuable resource to empower and make impact in her sphere of influence. In this interview , Chinwe reveals all that make her foundation tick. Excerpts
Tell us about CBA Foundation.
CBA Foundation is a not-for-profit organisation dedicated to promoting the protection of widows in Nigeria and their vulnerable children. The foundation promotes immediate and lasting hope, confidence and courage in their lives through various activities not limited to grants, provision of relief materials like clothing, food supplies and importantly economic empowerment.
What inspired you to create an organisation like CBA Foundation?
The inspiration is a couple of many things, first of all I felt led by God, and secondly the foundation is rooted in kindness. Kindness driven to put a smile on the faces of women that thought they had lost hope and thirdly, I know there are couple of NGO’s around the country but I have realised that less attention is paid to under privileged widows and I am very specific with the term ‘under privilege’ because there are widows that are privileged so apparently their husband left something for them, then I have heard from my friends who are victims of what they have gone through from the hands of the family they got married to as a result of them being widows. They have been thrown out of the house, their kids were sometimes taken from them, and some of them would go with their kids but must drop the last name, which is the name of their husband.
There was just quite a lot of dehumanisation going on, injustice, while they are still at the brink of taking care of the kids, asking questions such as, ‘how do I start my life having lost my husband?’, there are families asking for travelling documents, asking for papers of the land and all that, so I felt I should bring my little quota to this as a self-less act to what they are going through. Also having done this for over four years, I have realised that we have over 600 profile authentic widows and the truth without exaggeration is that about 90 per cent of their kids are out of school. When you talk to them, they keep telling you, ‘madam make I chop first, make my children chop first before we think of school’. So that drives me; even if it is the basic education with the support of people to send them back to school; at least they should get the basic knowledge of primary and then maybe another organisation takes up their secondary education.
Was there any childhood experience that inspired you to do this?
I always start any interview with this narrative, my father is still alive and my husband is still alive so it means I am not a victim of widowhood. I am favoured; it is not by my power or my own doing, it has been God. Like I said earlier on, I have watched closely what happened to this people in our society, I have also listened in and run through research, my friends have been victim of such, I have one friend that the only thing they could not take from their house is the carpet because it was glued to the floor, the family moved in and the mother was at the corner of the house crying and they packed everything in the house.
What are the major tasks of your organisation and who has benefited from your programmes?
The task of CBA Foundation is enormous and very encompassing. As much as we are focused on the unprivileged widows and their children, the multiplier effects of our impact have been far-reaching beyond our target beneficiaries. Interestingly at CBA Foundation, we categorise our beneficiaries into two groups: the direct and indirect; the direct being individuals that are impacted at our event, they are the primary recipient of our impact. The indirect are what we call secondary recipient(s) of our impact. They are those that are impacted by our primary beneficiaries. So from these, you would agree with me that the society at large has benefitted from our outreach programmes.
How is CBA Foundation funded?
The bulk of our funding is through donations from friends, colleagues, members of the society as well as corporate organisations that have over the years partnered with us due to the their belief in us not just our impact but what we stand for. We reach out to this individuals by telling them that this is the email address if you need us to send you receipt we would do. That is our transparency. We allow you to know what your money is being used for. We are grateful to them for their support and implore many more to reach out to us as indeed we cannot do it alone.
In what ways can Nigerians and the world at large contribute to CBA Foundation?
Our website; www.cbafoundation.org provides all information on contributions and partnerships. In addition, by attending our events and following us on the social media. Our Instagram and twitter handles are cbafoundation_ and @cbafoundation respectively.
What do you think the government can do to support NGOs like this and what steps have you taken to attract such support?
Primarily, it is sad that we are in a society that doesn’t recognize the role of women in impacting the nation, especially the economy. In this regard, I would say that is the starting point. Once the gender inequality gap is addressed, identifying with widows won’t be a far cry. There is so much to do, it’s not just about giving money to these women but showing them how to economically use the money.
Also, there is a Violence Against Persons (Prohibition) Act (VAPP) which the act itself have the protection for the widows but the government should please do more. One thing is to have the policies and another is to have the act, but when it is not being enforced it lies in vacuums, it lies in isolation, and nobody uses it. So it is just doing more of advocacy letting this people know that there is a law out there that can protect them, they should push it the more and support, and that is all we are asking for.
What measures do you employ to ascertain that the beneficiaries are genuinely those in need of such intervention?
We have a team that carry-out intense background checks on these women. In addition, our partnership with the traditional rulers – Kings/Baales, Churches and Mosque leaders who already have them in their database provides relief on our identification.
We profile the widows to know about what they do, to even ascertain if they are truly under privilege widows not that you just come around and take food, clothing and not letting it go round for those who have nothing. We go further to research, we visit where they live. We listen to business idea from these widows and set up the business for them in the location that is suitable for them, we don’t want to do more of cash because there are needs you can just spend it on immediately.
Most importantly for us, we like them to go through check-ups, their health is key before running a business, we educate them on the fact that they need to live so this could only happen if they go through the series of check-ups and use their medication. The sustained part of this is that we go back to that community to enrich them. When we started this initially, they thought we are from a political party coming to solicit for vote.
What are the challenges of running an organisation like CBA Foundation?
Inadequate volunteers at meeting projected impact levels. Societal factors, as it relates to gender inequality. Being a foundation, we aren’t profit based which sheds more light on the limitations we experience on funds generation. But in all, with the passion we have for this course, we pay very little attention to the challenges that might arise.
How can government reduce poverty level in the country knowing that such will make the task of your organisation easier?
That is by frowning at gender inequality. With the employment of more women, poverty would largely be a thing of the past and I agree with you that such would ease our task a great deal.
However, on a holistic scale, the government must ensure that the opportunities to stimulate employment generation are readily available. Opportunities like regular and effective power generation, good road network.
Also, the government needs to step up its attention on the education sector. It is indeed a shame that Nigeria is far from meeting United Nation’s 26% limit of National budget that should be used for education. In 2017, it was reported that 7% of the national budget was allocated to education.
Skill acquisition is one other way. The unskilled segment of the society is enormous, largely due to the education gap. So I see this as a very strategic way of bridging the poverty gap.
Does the current state of the nation, especially as it relates to insecurity have any direct impact on your activities as an NGO?
Yes, it does have an impact. Security issues limit our free movement, security issues make us reconsider our spread to certain locations across the nation and if we do have to go there – the IDPs in the North East for example, it would mean spending much more on logistics.
So the security hitches I would say is venom that needs to be contained and treated with the greatest attention.
Do you have any words of encouragement to the widows and those in need of help and support?
I encourage everyone not to lose hope nor give up. As a believer, the grace of God is sufficient as indeed when there is life there is hope.
