From a very humble beginning, Mrs. Agnes Ehigiator has developed a strong passion for working for humanity. It is as a result of her interest in charity work that she sets up a foundation,better known as Nnena Nina Foundation, where she trains and empower widows and less-privileged women in our society. She shares her story with BENJAMIN NJOKU

About my foundation Nnena Nina Foundation is set up to cater for the needs of the widows and the less-privileged women in our society. We set up a training centre, where these set of people can walk in and acquire skills easily.

The foundation was inaugurated on the 14th of August, 2010. We marked our first anniversary last month. I’m giving my time and support to the widows in our society. The organization is empowering individuals and widows and teaching them how to provide for themselves.

Motivation

When I returned to the country from Europe where I spent over 15 years, I realised that most of our women, especially the widows are passing through a lot of hardship. Some of them have no money nor a place to lay their heads with their children.

Agnes Ehigiator

As a result, I decided to come to their rescue by renting apartments for some of the widows and to many others, I gave them money to set up small scale business outlets. But to my surprise, I found out that the women were diverting the money into other things. The realisation of this, made me to conceive the idea of setting up the Foundation.

I have an undying passion to bring sunshine into the lives of some less-privileged women and widows in our society. This charity work did not start here in Nigeria. It started in far away Amsterdam where I lived for years. In Amsterdam, I was feeding over two hundred Nigerians who were stranded there.

Then, I was working in a hotel where foods were wasted on a regular basis. And realising that most young Nigerians in that country were facing difficulties, I pleaded with my boss to allow me take some portions of the hotel foods to them. They were jobless and at the same time homeless and most times, they assemble at a particular church where I usually send the left- overs from the hotel to feed them.

I was feeding them until I returned to the country few years ago. I have a soft-spot for my fellow human beings.

Rewards

For now, I’ve gotten nothing for my my kindness to humanity. But I believe, God is there for me. Since last year, when I set up this Foundation, we have graduated well over sixty-six women who underwent vocational trainings in different areas. The last batch had about thirty-three women . After the training, we empowered the serious ones among them by giving them initial cash to set up their own business outlets. In all, we have trained over 120 women since setting up this Foundation.

Thereafter, another set of widows about the same number enrolled for training again, and equally graduated. At the moment, we have about sixty-six women, already undergoing training in beed-making, event management, hall decoration, soap making and beauty therapy in our centre.

My experience

Working with the widows and the less-privileged women is highly emotional. In fact, many of them are faced with a lot of challenges ranging from accommodation problem to financial constraints . But I assist them mostly in the area of getting accommodation and upsetting their children’s school fees. It has been a very big challenge identifying with this set of women.

For me, if a widow has something doing, she will not only cater for herself and her children, but importantly, she will be bold enough to face the challenges of widowhood. That’s part of the reasons that I set up this Foundation; to empower the widows in our society. Also, there are some of these women out there whose husbands are still alive, yet they toil everyday like widows. We equally extend help to this set of women.

Apart from some volunteers who come around once in a week to train the women in various vocations, we also employed some instructors that we pay at the end of every month.

Gender sensitive!

I ‘m not gender sensitive, rather what happens is that I’m grieved because the women are the most backward in everything when compared to the opposite sex. But I don’t have anything against men.

What life has taught me

Life has taught me to be good and nice to humanity. It has also taught me to be closer to my Creator. Sometimes, it is difficult combining my role as a mother to my children, a wife and also, carrying out my charity work.

Hunger, unfortunately, is a tremendous challenge that continues to face our generation and is not going away until we do something about it and I’m thankful to my husband who gave me all the support and opportunity to touch the lives of widows in a special way.