The early years block (for children aged between 2 and 6) at Twedaase School in Tema has seen better days; unsafe uneven surfaces, broken masonry, and wiring in place but no power source.

The two-phase refurbishment over two weeks began with contractors – alongside the Futurestars team –  laying concrete, fixing masonry, and carrying out all the skilled jobs needed to prepare the site.  The children got involved with sweeping and cleaning and classes were moved out to under the trees for the duration.

Thanks to Aqua Africa nine solar panels were fitted and connected to the existing wiring.  Donor-supplied ceiling fans mean that the teachers and children will have light for the first time and they will stay cool too.

Once the buildings are ready staff members from every team in OMA Group will be volunteering across Thursday and Friday this week to clean and paint, paint, paint, ready for the handover back to the school next week.  We can’t wait to see the results.

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SAHFA International in Cotonou works to help promote education, eliminate hunger, food insecurity and malnutrition, helping rural farmers, facilitating access to drinking water, reduce rural poverty and giving support to orphanages through donations.

In Ghana the Samaritan Home, Adidome and the Royal Seed Home both received gifts of food and essentials.

Les racines de l’espoir  is a humanitarian society in Dakar, Senegal whose mission is to help vulnerable or sick people including street children

In Lomé, Togo La Pouponniere is a charity that was close to the heart of OMA’s founder Captain Monty Jones.´

In Abidjan, the donations went to  DLS (Donnons-leur du sourire) (Let’s give them a smile) http://donnonsleurdusourire.ci/

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Neale completed 213km in all, comprising 152km static rowing and 61km walking & jogging. A total of $213 (£113) was donated to the Missions to Seafarers and their fundraiser for ships crews globally, who either fall sick/injured or who are struggling to be reunited with family after their contracts on board come to an end.

Mission for Seafarers Secretary General, Andrew Wright commented:

“Seafarers are struggling in many ways …Many are unable now to finish their contracts on time because they are not allowed into their transit ports. They are having to work on. Some have asked to be released early so they can be with their families – but this is usually not possible now. Some have made it out of the port but have ended up stuck because they cannot get flights home as the airline system collapses. Many are not being allowed off ships, and there is a danger of stigmatisation – as potential disease carriers. Mental health issues will be very real.  We need to tell their stories. These men and women are doing truly heroic stuff in keeping our supplies going against a very difficult background. Without them we truly will be stuffed.”

Congratulations Neale and a great cause – for more information please check out Mission for Seafarers

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OMA Ghana and OMA Togo staff made a huge difference on Saturday 8th December.  As part of CSR project Futurestars, a kit amnesty in the UK culminated in a full 40ft container (kindly donated by partners Fendercare), containing hundreds of boots, kit and equipment.

So many companies in the UK were involved in donating kit, time and services to allow the container to be stored, filled and shipped.

Once it was delivered on site to Tema Stadium a fantastically attended Partners Day allowed all the kit and equipment to be sorted and distributed.  Teams from OMA Ghana in Tema and Accra, and OMA Togo in Lomé worked tirelessly alongside other Futurestars partners Yinson, Fendercare and Hapag-Lloyd and Prime Insurance 

We were also delighted to welcome teachers from the Futurestars schools in Tema, staff from the Ghana Education Service` boys & girls from the Futurestars development academy, a team from the British High Commission and fantastic local charity Accra-based Akwaaba Volunteers 

The container now has a roof and fitted with shelving and will be a much needed store room for Futurestars coaches at its permanent home at the Tema stadium.  A big thank you to everyone who attended and to Simon Milton, Futurestars director, Titus Bramble, Futurestars Ambassador & Lead Coach and particularly to Emmanuel Okyne-Tetteh, Futurestars project manager for making it happen.  Special thanks also to Francesco Leuzzi, (Country Manager) and Kwaku Nuamah (Logistics Operations Manager) from OMA Ghana and Rupert Rossi (Country Manager) and Raman Ibrahim (Finance & Administration Manager & Futurestars Project manager in Togo) from OMA Togo – what an amazing job .  Next stop Togo!

futurestarscharity.org.uk

 

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Futurestars applied to the Charity Commission, the Regulator for Charities in England and Wales, to be legally registered in order to allow the project to expand fund raising activities and bring new partners on board.

The project was started in 2015 by Simon Milton (ex-Ipswich Town FC, now Futurestars Director and OMA CSR Director) and Gary Miller (OMA Group Director). Working with five schools in Tema, Ghana and one school in Lomé Togo, it provides PE and sports coaching to some 2500 school children every week. OMA were quickly joined by Yinson Production WA who have spearheaded the refurbishment of the participating schools.

Simon Milton commented:
“The strength of the project is based on the commitment from its partners, we are delighted that founding partners OMA Group and Yinson Production WA have made long term commitments to the Charity. Fendercare Marine and Hapag-Lloyd have recently joined as new partners and we are also delighted with their support and look forward to developing the project further with them and their employees.

As a registered charity we can demonstrate good practice and transparency to companies and individuals who wish to come on board to help expand the project, both by increasing the amount of much needed refurbishment work as well as expanding geographically along the West African coast.

We have a fantastic team of Trustees, a great team on the ground running the project and all the schools report increased attendance and reduced truancy as a result of being part of the Futurestars programme – 2018 is going to be an exciting year!”

Partners in the Futurestars project are:

OMA Group
Yinson Production WA
Fendercare Marine
Hapag-Lloyd

For more information please visit the Futurestars Website

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Raman Ibrahim, Futurestars manager in Togo commented:

“I am so proud that through our education and sport project, two children are now crossing borders, leaving their home country for the first time and will represent our nation at the highest level.”

Odette and Amira are competing in the first-ever women’s championship in the sub-Sahara running from February 14-24 featuring the seven countries in the West African Zone B with Senegal appearing as guest country.

Simon Milton, Futurestars Director commented:
“The Futurestars Project goes from strength to strength, Raman and his team of coaches in Lomé should be very proud of the development of his players. I believe this recognition for Odette & Amira highlights the professionalism of the Futurestars Agoe Academy and we will all be supporting the girls and the team during the WAFU Nations Cup. I hope this will be the start of many more of our players getting the recognition they deserve.”

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Simon Milton, OMA CSR and Futurestars Director lead the event which showcased the work the project is doing in Ghana and Togo – as well as plans for the future – to 130 assembled guests.

All the Trustees were present including OMA Directors Gary Miller and Carine Noukpo, who had flown in from head office in Accra, and ex England captain Terry Butcher who travelled out to Ghana for the first time last September and spoke of his experiences there.

Gary Miller stressed that longevity and sustainability was one of the key tenets of the project, and that the founding partners; OMA Group and Yinson Production WA are in for the long term. The project has been in operation since 2015 and two years in, all five schools report that truancy is down and attendance is up since they joined the project.

Futurestars has now applied for UK charitable status which will enable more companies to come on board and more funds to be raised.

Brand new partners Fendercare Marine were announced the same evening – having seen first-hand the work that’s being done in Ghana and Togo they were first to sign up!

The guests also had a preview of the brand new Futurestars website www.futurestarscharity.org.uk along with the Futurestars video – a wonderful upbeat film of the work in Ghana and Togo, put together by Suffolk university student Will Allen. The soundtrack to the film is a brilliant, original song written and recorded by the Boogie Band and Fairga Promotions in Accra, Ghana.

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OMA Group has a longstanding partnership with Ipswich Town football club, part of which includes sponsoring the Under 16 Academy team. The team plays in the Academy Premier League in the UK and the players are working their way through to an Academy Scholarship (Ages 16-18) and following a successsful scholarship, a professional contract.

Ipswich Town have in turn continued to support the exciting Futurestars schools project (a joint initiative between OMA, Ipswich Town and Yinson Production WA). As well as sourcing and providing kit, Ipswich have been closely involved in preparing the annual coaching and training syllabus used by the Futurestars coaches in the five schools in Ghana.

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This year we were delighted to welcome former England Captain Terry Butcher along with ex-Newcastle & Ipswich defender and Futurestars Ambassador, Titus Bramble. Both players visited the five Futurestars partner schools and the football academies and took part in sports training sessions as well as the festival. Titus Bramble is staying on to work with the coaches and the children over the next few weeks in both Ghana and Togo.

See the Joy News round up and interview with Terry Butcher here.

A fantastic turnout at this year’s tournament saw the five partner primary schools (Baatsona, Community 7/1, Community 8/1, Rupublic Road and Twedaase schools) compete in football and netball tournaments and sprint races. The Academy teams – Futurestars Agoe, Togo and Futurestars, Ghana also played a close and exciting game that ended dramatically with penalties, the Ghana home team taking the Trophy from last year’s winners Togo.

Community 8 school were the worthy winners of the School’s football tournament. In the new events this year, the netball tournament saw Twedaase school take the trophy after closely fought matches, Enock Agude (Twedaase school) and Constance Tetteh (Community 8 school), were awarded the trophy for Fastest Boy and Fastest Girl. The Goal King award was presented to Isreal Aseidu from Community 8 school and the prize for the best behaved school went to Community 7 school. The hotly contested adult tournament was won by the Ghana Education Services team (GES Meo Stars). Congratulations to everyone who took part.
Boogie Band played an amazing set all day and children and adults alike enjoyed an excellent lunch and all day refreshments provided by Mayflower Catering Services.
The event was well covered by the local media – CitiFM, CifiFMonline, Graphic.com and Joy News.

Futurestars is an education through sport initiative started in 2015 by OMA Ghana, Ipswich Town Football Club and Yinson Production working with five primary schools in Tema. Ipswich Town trained coaches are employed full time by OMA to work with the children offering PE, netball, football and sports coaching as well as small development academies in football and netball for children showing particular promise. Yinson have spear-headed a refurbishment programme at the participating schools. For more information please see the OMA in the Community section of the website.

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On 23rd June this year a team from Alive & Kicking visited the Futurestars morning school session in Community 7 Primary School where the coaches were holding the regular morning football session and PE session for boys and girls between the ages of 7 to 11.

They also visited the After School Development Centre to see how the boys performed off the sandy pitches in the schools and to experience first hand the extended coaching, discipline and training the coaches give the boys who are privileged to be part of this project. Parts of the sessions were filmed and the boys were excited to share the opportunity OMA Group, Yinson & Ipswich Town FC have given them.

Alive & Kicking make durable sports balls in Ghana, Kenya and Zambia, keeping adults in employment, helping children play and raising health awareness through sport. For more information visit Alive & Kicking

See the Futurestars Development Academy in action -: Alive & Kicking and Futurestars

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