The Fonds XOESE organized this Saturday, November 25, 2023 in Lomé, an event called “WARIKOW chiefdom”. The activity brought together the leaders of the “WARIKOW…My relationship with money” campaign, initiated by XOESE. The participants, from several countries, had to share their experiences and talk about the activities carried out in their countries as part of this campaign. They also benefited from mini training on financial education.
The “WARIKOW… My relationship with money” campaign is an initiative set up by the XOESE to raise awareness among the actors of the different organizations that receive funding as part of their projects to understand the origin of the funds they receive in the form of grants, to know how to manage these funds and how to use them best.
According to Ms. Lidao Grace SEKOU, coordinator of the WARIKOW campaign, the “WARIKOW chiefdom », is organized, as a prelude to the Forum International French speaking2023of XOESE which is held in Lomé from November 27 to 30and serves as a framework for information sharing, capacity building and consolidation of lessons learned from the campaign.
One of the flagship activities of the WARIKOW chiefdom is holding a mini-training on financial education, led by Mr. Wilfried SEMEDO, Doctoral student in integral coaching, writer, accountant approved by the courts and tribunals of the Togolese Republic, coach in financial and entrepreneurial intelligence.
In his communication, the expert explained to the participants the dimensions that must be taken into account when talking about money. “When we talk about money, there is a spiritual or metaphysical dimension and a physical dimension to take into account. Regarding the metaphysical dimension, I worked with the participants to correct the disturbances which control the possession or not of money. I helped them understand how this spiritual or metaphysical dimension is composed and established? I gave them tools to be able to correct the disturbances. In relation to the physical dimension, we talked about entrepreneurship, how to manage your finances and above all what element to rely on to identify areas for improvement,” summarized the coach.
The latter also urged everyone to make good use of the money they earn. “We must know that the money we spend is our vital energy because we have worked to be able to earn the money and therefore we must know how to spend this money. And by spending it, we must make an evaluation to see if we are satisfied with the expenditure made, if it contributed to a reward or if this expenditure corresponds to our personal values,” underlined the coach who gave the participants a tool that allows them to constantly monitor their spending wherever they are. This is the One Money application, downloadable from Play Store in free and paid versions.
For the specialist, “between the funds that these women receive for their organizations and their own money, the common element is themselves. So if they can’t manage their money well, they won’t be able to manage the organizations’ money.”
The training was very clear and edifying for the participants. According to Ms. Sidi AMINETOU, WARIKOW leader Mauritania, this communication is of capital use. “We are going to implement everything the coach said in order to be able to better manage our own money and the money of our organizations,” she assured.
From the WARIKOW campaign
The WARIKO campaign, initiated by the XOESE started in June 2023. A total of 15 countries are affected by the campaign including Togo, Benin, Ivory Coast, Senegal, Burkina Faso, Mali, DRC, Cameroon, Republic of Congo. ..Should it be emphasized, WARIKOW, means “money affair” in Bambara.
According to the Coordinator of the WARIKOW campaign, Ms. Lidao Grace SEKOU, the campaign was very dense and filled with several activities. “We had several activities throughout the campaign, including monthly sharing sessions, monthly sessions by country group with questions specific to each country group so that organizations could express themselves on the difficulties they encountered in terms of money in their organizations. We had sessions with guests who had to give communications on financial management within organizations, on how to mobilize resources, how to manage them. We had the WARIKOW newspaper which is a monthly newspaper. It’s sort of the activities done. The communications allowed these women to learn, for example, how to make a budget, how to manage the money received? How do we empower ourselves as an organization and then address their challenges? How to deal with financial difficulties in organizations? », she explains.
Speaking about the achievements of the WARIKOW campaign, Ms. Sidi AMINETOU, one of the participants in the campaign says: “since the start of the campaign, we have received a lot of training and coaching on our relationship with money, on how to mobilize funds in the associative field, how how to manage and be accountable for these funds. This has been very beneficial to us in organizations and even in our families.”
It should be noted that the campaign ends on November 28, 2023 with a closing session, held during the Forum International French speaking2023by XOESE. This session brought together leaders from the different participating countries, as well as campaign participants. This is an opportunity for participants-es to share their experiences, present a detailed report on the activities carried out in their country and make recommendations for the future. The idea is to bring together all community members who participated in the campaign, including participating country leaders, volunteers, staff members and participants, to celebrate successes, discuss lessons learned and plan future steps.
