By Joseph S. Margai in Freetown, Sierra Leone
The Program Director of Graceland Sierra Leone, Bondu Manyeh, has said that her organization always gives psychosocial support to people of Sierra Leone.
Formed in 1994 during one of Sierra Leone’s war years, Madam Manyeh said Graceland Sierra Leone has been counseling and supporting lots of people by training them in areas that would help them to recover from their trauma.
She said one of the areas that have been troubling women is land and chiefs have been finding it difficult to handle cases relating to women’s access to land.
“We cannot only counsel people on trauma without giving them an alternative means of livelihood. We are supporting women to embark on farming and we want them to cultivate crops that they could eat or sell to earn their livelihood,” she said.
She cited that Graceland Sierra Leone has been supporting farmers and farm families to cultivate crops in Samu Chiefdom and other areas in the country, adding that such move has been helping women to be self-reliant.
“Graceland is also doing training and supporting women to embark on Village Saving Loans (VSLs) and that has been going on very well in rural communities. We are supporting them with micro credits so that they could embark on petty businesses that can enable them to eke out a living,” she said. She further explained that they are supporting women to do small and medium enterprises so as to enable them to take care of their financial obligations.
Director Manyeh said they are also encouraging owners of small businesses to come together and we have been supporting them.
She said besides farming, they are also supporting them in soap making, gara tie-dying, tailoring, among other craftsmanship.
She said in a case of conflict regarding the ownership of land by women from their husbands, Graceland counsel both parties and settle their differences amicably.
“We support people that have better idea in conflict management in order to resolve conflicts in some communities,” she said.
