As part of the ongoing youth-stimulated revolution for change in Nigeria, a young man, Tyough Beetseh has founded a charity that is driven towards providing financial and material support in education and health in Africa. It also aims to support post war victims and contribute towards the overall empowerment of young people across the Continent.

The charity, which was recently founded in January 2011, is based in the United Kingdom, and reaches out to other citizens of Africa in the Diaspora for support.

On January 23^rd 2011, The Tyough Foundation debuted with a fund-raising fair at the Redeemed Christian Church of God, Jubilee Christian Centre, Coventry, UK. The theme was “Buy a Doughnut, Empower a Child”.

During the church session, TY (as he is fondly called by his peers) explained what the ‘doughnut’ stood for in his campaign. He said, “D = Dignity, O = Optimism, U = Uplift, G = Goodwill, H = Hope, N = Nurture, U = Understanding, and T = Tranquility”.

According to Beetseh, the sub-initiative of the “Doughnut Campaign” was to mobilize funds towards a primary goal-area of education. In a chat with him, he explained that, “the funds generated in the sales of the doughnuts are to be used for the purchase of basic infrastructure, stationary and furniture for impoverished schools in the rural areas of Nigeria. The schools to benefit are yet to be selected.”

The charity is currently setting in place plans to raise awareness and funds for the surviving victims of the recent Jos crisis in Northern Nigeria. The founder has announced that, “these important campaigns will hopefully run in the last quarter of 2011 and the second quarter of 2012.”

The Tyough Foundation is on Facebook, feel free to join the vision.

By Tonye Garrick

It is a crucial time in Nigeria as the 2011 elections are fast approaching.  Although the diaspora votes will not be included this year doesn’t mean those of us far from home will be at a standstill.  Hence, the Vote or Quench DC Chapter decided to host a Dial-4-Change Brunch Telethon.  Our goal?  To make sure that even though our votes would not be included this year, we could still call our wonderful friends and family at home to encourage them to participate and register on our behalf.  To further entice, we had some delicious brunch food to treat our volunteers. We all know wherever there is good food, there will definitely be Nigerians

So, with some mini croissant sandwiches, mimosas, light M.I and Ice Prince playing in the background and laptops for Skype, we all came together for a wonderful cause.

After enjoying a great brunch, everyone quickly got down to business, reaching out to family relatives and friends at home to make sure they were all registered to vote.  Even though we did get some funny responses – “una wey dey for America wan make noise pass us wey dey here or una want make we do wetin?”, the majority assured us that they had or would be going the following Monday morning to register to vote.  Overall, the telethon participants and even people we dialed were glad that we actually got together as a group to make these calls.  We had a great turn out and it was a fun yet very productive afternoon.   Thanks to everyone who sacrificed their Saturday afternoon errands to come share this positive experience with us.  The truth is we cannot move forward unless we unite and this is just the beginning of a unified movement.

Guest Blogger Tonye Garrick sharing her experience during the Vote or Quench Brunch Telethon held on January 22nd, 2011 in the DC, Maryland, Virginia area USA.