Building a Brighter Future for Generations to Come
Explore the history of the Mali Nieta Foundation and how we’ve been helping Maasai children for years.
In 2005, while performing executive physicals at Methodist Hospital-Houston, I was introduced to Garba Konate, a Mali citizen, who was studying at the University of Houston. He and I became friends therefore, when he was preparing to return to Mali in Africa, he told me that he wanted to develop a nonprofit organization to help his country, and the Mali Nieta Foundation was born.
With the IRS 501c3 designation in 2010, I began to collect excess hospital instruments, unused bandages, and other medical supplies. The personnel at Methodist Hospital heard about Mali Nieta and donated 8 cartons of sterile surgical gloves. We filled a 20-foot container and shipped it to a hospital named “Mere et Infants” (for mothers and children) which had recently been built in the city of Bamako, Mali. Most of the medical instruments that were shipped have been used repeatedly ever since. The durable medical equipment which included a C-Pap machine, and an oxygenator have transformed the services there.
From 2012-2013, 3 containers of medical equipment were shipped to Lima, Peru for the use of doctors that serve the indigent. At the same time and working with Garba, more medical equipment was shipped to Mali.
In 2017, I approached the University of Houston College of Technology about constructing a portable electronic classroom. Dr. Mequaint Moges loved the idea and assigned 5 seniors to work with me. A 20-foot shipping container was purchased and transformed into a solar powered, air-conditioned classroom of 14 computers with internet satellite access. The container was shipped to Mali and remains in use at Mopti, Mali.
In 2018, I met Dr. Donna Gunn EdD, and we started working together to improve a school of Maasai children, that she and Ravi Reddy founded in rural Tanzania. Promise Village Academy (PVA) is located about 2½ hours south of Arusha near 6 villages of about 10,000 people. The Massai in these villages live in abject generational poverty with an average lifespan of 42 years for men and 44 years for women. 52% of the girls will have teen pregnancies and 58% are subjected to Female Genital Mutilation. These people drink surface water which is highly polluted which limits their productivity and lifespan. They are ill several times a month with gastrointestinal illnesses.
Sandy, my love and I built a library for PVA and installed 24 laptops computers with 150 learning programs, satellite internet, 7,000 English language books, furniture, and a large, covered meeting area in the front porch of the library. The school is thriving now with 175 students, teachers, a 30-acre farm, a garden, a greenhouse, a small orchard, and a deep bore water well producing clean, drinkable water.
One of our biggest challenges at PVA is the poor nutrition of the students. PVA feeds the students’ breakfast, lunch, and a snack, yet using Body Mass Index (BMI) as a barometer, 1/3rd of the students show malnutrition with stunted growth and wasting. Only 5 students have normal BMIs and the rest, some 100 students, have BMIs between normal and wasting, with the trend toward wasting.
In Emboreet, Tanzania, a nearby village, Father Lawrence runs a small clinic, and every year Mali Nieta Foundation sends medication and equipment to the clinic to serve the Maasai and surrounding population.
Mali Nieta Foundation has allowed me to serve my fellow “humans,” save lives, educate, and improve the health of many people in several places in the world. Having positively impacted this destitute population is personally rewarding and fulfilling.