Gift of hearing

Surgeon flying out to help deaf boy

A Lanarkshire charity are flying to Gambia with an NHS surgeon – to give a boy born with no ears the gift of hearing.

Mohammed Cham was due to fly from the West African nation in June to receive a special implant at University Hospital Monklands.

But the eight-year-old, also known as ‘wee Alieu’, was left broken-hearted after his application for a temporary visa was blocked.

However, the Project: Gambia charity held their grand summer ball on Saturday at the Alona Hotel in Motherwell – and they now have the funds to fly out a specialist who will treat the youngster and deliver what they promised.

The organisation support St John’s School for the Deaf in Serrekunda, where almost 300 children with hearing disabilities attend each day.

And the charity’s chairman Frank Devine told the Advertiser: “A few weeks ago, heartbroken at our inability to get our guest of honour, Alieu, to our summer ball, we said that if Mohammed can’t come to the mountain, we would ensure the mountain would come to Mohammed.

“So after raising £10,000 at our ball last weekend, we will take NHS Lanarkshire ear,nose and throat specialist surgeon, Arun Iyer, his wife, GP Priya Iyer and another health professional colleague of theirs to Gambia on a medical mission, dates still to be finalised, and get wee Alieu sorted.

“We’re hopeful Dr Priya Iyer will be able to work in a community health clinic during the aid mission.

“The potential in this is immense, not only for wee Alieu but for the other 299 children at the school. Some more fundraising may well be required here, but we’ll set about this with the same passion, focus and commitment we bring to everything we do.”

And the £10,000 raised from the summer ball will also fund a brand new school uniform for every single child at the school.

Frank added: “Project Gambia delivers. We keep our word in everything we do. We keep our promises to children, teachers and parents and we publicly and proudly affirm our thanks, respect and gratitude to our wonderful supporters.”

Project Gambia: People Feeding People received its charitable status in November 2014 after being set up by Frank and his pal Paul Lafferty a few years before that.

Their aim was to transform the lives of hundreds of children in one of the most poverty-stricken regions of West Africa, by raising enough money to feed the entire school community for the whole year. They fundraise constantly to reach their goal, through a variety of methods including organising Modern Soul events in Blantyre which have attracted some of the biggest soul stars in the world.

Frank said: “Project Gambia was established with the express purpose of creating a school feeding programme at Saint John’s, as all the available statistical evidence – including from the United Nations – have indicated that children are far more likely to attend school if they are being fed at their place of learning. Attendance rates go up, absenteeism decreases, the attention span of children improves, as does behaviour if children have been fed.”

Go to www.facebook.com/ projectgambiastjohns for more details about the charity.