Updated
April 10, 2004

A rushed trip to see Alun in Swansea - prooved very productive and heralds the start of a new era for GTS, with the impending start of GES the UK charity wing of GTS.

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Running GTS more or less single handed for the last 7 years, has really not been a hardship at all - infact I have loved it so much that I really can't imagine life without it.

BUT . . . . that is just what is about to happen. GES the UK registered charity of GTS (the implementing force in Gambia) is just about to be run by an elected Exec Committee and a small team of specialist advisers.

I will be offering myself as the Chairman for the first year but will then remain as the founder and an adviser to GES and devote all of my time to GTS and the implementation of our charitable aims in Gambia

The last 7 years have not been without many many funny incidents, most often along the misguided belief that GTS is a massive business with many UK staff and a large Gambian infra structure.

Maybe the website has given that impression, but it has just been my ability to create a few webpages and stick them together with hyperlinks - nothing clever and it has cost almost nothing other than time.

My favourite was a very very rude lady who was demanding that I sent her detailed information about about money transfer from the UK to Gambia - after a number of acidic emails from her in reply to my polite explanation that GTS was a self funding charity operating for paying members, she rung up to scream down the phone, that she knew my boss and would have me fired immediately unless I sent her the information.

I & I have smiled on many occasions about that one, I wonder who on earth she thought the boss was and come to that - who she was . . . !!!!!

Comments to GTS

Alun offered sometime ago to help with the sponsorship files for GTS, soon to become GES - "Gambia Education Support" in the UK where GES is currently registering as a charity.

We talked and talked and eventually agreed that the way forward was a properly developed package that would handle all GTS and GES member files as well as holding the sponsorship information for the whole organisation.

This will provide GTS with the means of updating sponsor information over the internet from Gambia or the UK, so that at last the people who generously hand over their money in donations and sponsorships will get information back from Gambia on a regular basis. (This has partly been a necessity as GTS has grown but also from the guilt of losing the sponsors of 7 children in Banjul Nding through a UK group, I dubbed 'The Dorinda 7' - if they read this they will know who they are and hopefully appreciate that their complaints about lack of information is being addressed)

GTS has concentrated on making sure the children sponsored get their school fees paid regularly and are visited and monitored regularly and that the fuinds provided does provide what has been requested in a monitored way - but reporting back to the UK sponsors has been a far lower priority BUT the two are just as important - because although the purpose is being served in Gambia, the funds dry up in the UK if the feedback is not adequate. (i.e. The Dorinda 7)

Alan and maybe Peter (my step father), will craft the database not only to hold information for membership cards, reminders etc. but it will provide GTS in Gambia with all the flight details for member pickups from the airport,

In addition Sponsorship details of schools, projects and individual children, will be held in a format that will give sponsors a direct internet link to how their money is being used and monitored, along with up to date pictures and reports about every child school and project supported by GTS and GES money..

The system will allow letters and emails to go to sponsors directly from the system - triggered by the fact that the relevant files have been updated, either from Gambia or from the UK, will handle generic newsletters to the membership of GTS and GES.

GTS/GES has finally out growing the mini desk in my living room and all the evening hours of GTS work after real work - it has almost reached adolescence and will soon have a voluntary secretary, a treasurer, a sponsorship co-ordinator, a membership secretary, an education advise and resource committee, a PR, publicity and advertising committee as well as fund raising teams all round the UK.

I never thought in 1997 when my kids came back from holiday in gambia and said 'we have to do something dad' that it would grow into this.

I really do have to thank Helen, my wife - The Gambia has dramatically changed our relationship and she, with enormous love and consideration has allowed it to do that, it has taken pretty much ALL of my spare time for the last 7 years, a considerable amount of family funds and now sees me spending months at a time in Gambia on GTS projects.

I must also apologise to the likes of 'The Dorinda 7' - the only ones to actually pull out of GTS in the past 7 years for the shortfalls in communications and feedback - I hope that is all a thing of the past.

In June this year 2004 - the Charity Commission paperwork will be sent off - the new GES executive committee will be in place with the advisory groups and committees already getting on with it.

If you want to help GES or GTS in any practical way in the UK,
please DO CONTACT US.

Even with the 20 extra pairs of hands here in the UK - there is always more to do, events to raise awareness and funds to organise and run, even if they are private dinner parties or coffee mornings, or public car boot sale mornings or Jumble sales afternoons - GTS/GES is a unique charity in the way it is run creating sustainable employment and educational opportunity.

Gambia was the smallest British Colony in the Empire, it desperately needs constructive help to pull itself out of being a charity reliant 3rd World country - GTS/GES does not give out charity money - it provides the means for education and employment, it has a dedicated volunteer base in the UK of people who have great sympathy for Gambia and its people and an equally dedicated Gambian staff of around 40, working right through the year to improve education and work opportunities.

If you can - PLEASE JOIN US TO HELP in some way of your own

Thank you

See also GES charity page

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