Return journey
A new scheme encourages people from diaspora communities to share their skills with their countries of heritage. Brian Draper reports.
Maurice Tshiniama is champing at the bit. The London resident has volunteered to work for two weeks in Cameroon, which borders his homeland, the Democratic Republic of Congo. But there’s been a slight delay with paperwork and now he’s keen to get cracking. “I’m very excited,” he said.
Maurice has volunteered as part of a new, £3 million scheme funded by DFID in partnership with Voluntary Service Overseas (VSO), which was kicked-off in July to encourage more people from ethnic and religious communities to get involved in volunteering.
He came to Britain in 1985. “I learned English, went to university, and secured a job. One thing led to another, and I stayed this long,” he reflects. “But I know the chairman of one of the diaspora organisations, who is also from the Democratic Republic of Congo. He asked if I’d be interested in sharing some of my skills in Cameroon, and I agreed to go.”
Maurice works for the management training company CitySkills, and has “broad experience” in project management, fund raising, people management and finance. He also works for Widows and Orphans International, a training charity. Both organisations are sympathetic to his trip, and he is taking annual leave to make it.
When he gets to Cameroon, Maurice knows precisely what he’ll be doing. “They match your experience to the local needs, otherwise we wouldn’t be effective,” he says. “I will be working with three NGOs which have requested help in developing additional funding streams and resources. One of them works with young people, and they want to start a business to increase their revenue and become less dependent on the state. I have experience in start-ups so I’ll be looking at that.”
With the other two – which work with women and the disabled in Douala and Yaoundé – “I’ll be helping them from scratch to see what avenues they can explore to set up a business or increase their revenue,” he says. And his help is much needed. In Cameroon, most women, for example, operate in the ‘informal sector’ – organising themselves into cooperatives, common initiative groups and associations of entrepreneurs – but their integration into the formal sector is still hampered by limited access to education, poverty, lack of credit, technology and technical skills.
This is the second time he has volunteered for work in Cameroon, and he believes it helps to be a returning African. “I’m not trying to be xenophobic, but the people I help feel confident when they see a fellow African. They can open their hearts; they see that you can relate – you were born there, you know the difficulties. It’s heart warming to see that people trust you in that way. It’s a sort of homecoming.”
For Maurice, the real benefit he brings to people is selfconfidence. “They begin to realise they can do much more”.
He tells the story of a woman he met on his last trip. “I discovered that in the previous year, she’d managed to raise $50,000 from Coca Cola - yet she was still not confident to apply for other funding, despite having raised all this money. She told me she thought the Coke money was just luck. I said to her, ‘Do you think a company like that would just throw $50,000 out of the window?’ Of course not!”
The lessons, however, are not all one way. “Even though you are coming from an advanced country, you have to listen,” he advises. “In any part of the world, things change. I do not come thinking. ‘I know everything, listen to me!’ You have to learn to listen more than talk. That’s a real benefit you receive.”
The DFID Diaspora Volunteer Scheme managed by VSO will lead to over 600 new volunteering placements in the next three years. The scheme supports diaspora organisations to plan and implement their own volunteering programmes.
“Lots of people would like to volunteer their professional skills in the developing world – and to experience a different way of life. But many don’t know where to start. And lots of diaspora organisations have very strong links with their countries of heritage – but would like to do more by offering them professional support from volunteers. This new scheme will help both.”Shahid Malik, Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Development
“For the past three years, VSO has been working with African and Asian organisations to support people wanting to volunteer their skills in their countries of heritage. The project has shown the huge contribution the British-based diaspora can make in their countries of heritage and beyond.Mark Goldring, Chief Executive of VSO
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