Mama Zimbi Stuns Widows With Bakery

 Ace presenter Akumaa Mama Zimbi on Saturday, June 25 embarked one of her social responsibility projects after she commissioned a bakery for some widows at Elmina, in the Central Region of Ghana.

The bakery was built through her Widows Alliance Network (WANE), under the Mama Zimbi Foundation.

WANE, the most formidable initiative for widows in Africa, is a project for sustainable economic development of widows. It aims at emancipating Ghanaian widows from the social, cultural and economic difficulties brought about by the injustices they face because of their status. Through WANE, over 300 widow groupings have been formed in Ghana with a nationwide membership of over 6,000.

The project was introduced in 2006 to equip widows in Ghana with the right employable skills, human rights education and social integration programmes to create a paradigm shift in how Ghana’s communities perceive and treat widows.

The Elmina Widows Association, which is one of the over 300 groups under the Widows Alliance Network, has been in existence for 2 years now.

Among the important dignitaries at the event were some members of the KEEA Queen Mothers Association, a representative of the Omanhene of Elmina, Nana Kojo Konduah (VI), Pastor Mensah Sortoh who the was the National Best Fish Farmer for 2008, and the Municipal Chief Executive Officer of KEEA, Rev. Mrs Veronica Asumah Nelson.

Akumaa Mama Zimbi (known in private life as Mrs. Joyce Akumaa Dongotey-Padi), who is the founder and executive director of Mama Zimbi Foundation, which WANE is under, entreated widows to make good use of the bakery so that they could make enough money to take care of themselves and also put their children through school.

In addition, Mama Zimbi revealed plans of replicating the WANE concept in other parts of Africa. By the year 2015, Mama Zimbi Foundation will unveil the ‘All Africa Widows Alliance Conference’ to be attended by the heads and selected executives of widow clubs and associations across Africa. It will be the number one platform for dialogue between the traditional, economic, cultural and social actors on a policy direction for supporting widows in Africa.

She also acknowledged and thanked Mary Buako, the founder and executive director of the Divine Mercy Chaplet Foundation (DMCF) who is also the board chairperson of Mama Zimbi Foundation, for helping to make the dream of Elmina Widows Bakery a reality.