The Catherine Bullen Foundation
Annual Report 2020 – 2021
Contents Chairperson, s Report Funding Projects
Chairperson’s Report
The contents of this Annual Report relate to the period from 1 September 2020 to 31 August 2021. However, with regards to Projects, it includes updated information that was available at the time of producing this report.
We have been extremely lucky in that the Foundation’s aims and projects continue to inspire individuals and organisations to support us by attending fund raising events, assisting on fundraising activities and donations.
With the relaxation of Covid-19 rules in the Spring of 2021, we were able to carry out a full programme of shop collections and also take part in the round the Island Yard Sale. However, our china smashing stall remained grounded as there were no events running to take it to.
Frustratingly, Namibia remained on the UK Government Red list for the whole of the Foundations financial year, meaning there was no possibility of Linda and I returning to Namibia. Despite lobbying the Department of Transport, this remained the case until October 2021. This resulted in the Foundation’s projects coming to a standstill, but with the relaxing of Covid-19 regulations, it is planned to kickstart them in the coming financial year. Hence the large amount of funds currently being held by the Foundation.
As with the rest of the world, Namibia has gone through a number of Covid-19 waves, culminating in the last Omicron wave. Since March 2020, there have been 155,000 cases with 3,914 deaths. Vaccination continues to be a problem with 14% being fully vaccinated with two doses. There is lots of hesitancy fuelled by social, media, superstition and religious conviction.
Finally, I would like to say a big thank you to our trustees and all those individuals and organisations that have again made this past year a successful one in very strange circumstances..
Roger Bullen – Chairperson
13 January 2021
Funding
The Funding report is split into the following categories. Below are the main items and events that contributed to our total.
Event Stalls
This covers the period from 1 September 2020 to August 2021. There were no organised events during this period to attend with our china smashing stall. There were only two stall events, one was the Round the Island Yard Sale - £272.50 raised, and the other a stall at West Mersea Car Boot sale - £62.70
Grants and donations from organisations
We have received a number of grants and donations from the following organisations.
Colin Westgate lectures to camera clubs around the country on Zoom. Instead of charging a fee, he asks for donations to the Foundation which were as follows:
Benfleet Camera Club - £40 Judging photos - £25 H2 Photographic Society - £25 Wrekin Arts Photo Club - £25
Tomato Fund - £100 St Mary’s School - £1,757.98 (For school uniforms) Pre –admission Draw (Colchester General Hospital) - £367 Mersea Island Rotary Club - £900 (Ambulance) Welwyn Garden City Rotary Club - £250 Sevenhills Whole Foods (Ambulance) - £5,000 St Barnabas Church - £265 Mersea Island Rotary Club, District Grant (Ambulance) - £1,100
Individual donations
Throughout the year the Foundation received individual donations which totalled £18,450 ( £12,683.10) Each donation receives an acknowledgement of thanks from the Foundation. In addition there were donations by standing order - £1,260 ( £1,290), and donations through the website portals (Paypal and Virginmoneygiving) – £9,695.90 (£2,954.12). Total donations were £29,405.90 (£16,972.22) .
Shop Collections
We were able to carry out shop collection from May 2021 onwards.
Collections were undertaken at various Co-ops in the locality and Tesco, West Mersea. Total raised - £1,117.81 (£553.82).
Events
Seafood Supper – Company Shed, West Mersea. Due to Covid-19 restrictions this did not take place
Indian Lunch –Titash
Due to Covid-19 restrictions this did not take place
Gift Aid
Gift Aid claimed on donations for this financial year was £4,452.46
Schools
The supporting of charities has been adopted by schools as part of being socially aware to the needs of others. As we are hands on and are willing to go into schools and tell them about the Foundation’s work. Donations from schools were as follows:
St Mary’s Senior School for Girls
As previously reported the pupils of St Mary’s Senior School for Girls in Colchester decided that they would like to raise funds to buy the children of Good Hope Primary School in the village of Okovimburu in the Omaheke region of Namibia, each a school uniform. The final round of fundraising took place January resulting in £2,243 being raised. A total of £6,016 was then transferred to the Primary school to buy uniforms for 500 children. St Mary’s have agreed to carry on raising money to provide socks and shoes for the children and we are very grateful for their continued support. (see cover picture)
Partnerships
Alaric Clothing and Accessories
Alaric Clothing and Accessories are based at Layer Road, Kingsford, Colchester beside Bannatyne formerly Clarice House. The owner, Lisa Merrett has adopted the Foundation as the charity she would like her shop to support.
Audley Travel
Audley Travel is ATI Holidays largest partner in the United Kingdom selling holidays to Namibia. They were looking for a local Namibian charity to support and the Foundation was put forward for consideration. It was chosen by the Audley Travel Namibia destination experts in London, Witney and Boston as the charity which should benefit from the monies collected from guests travelling to Namibia with them by adding N$100 to each invoice and advising their clients that by travelling with Audley, they were supporting a local charity. ATI are currently holding N$10,300 (£507.38) for us.
This amount has not changed from the last financial year due to the lack of activity in Tourism due to Covid-19
Projects
The Foundation continues to monitor past projects to ensure proper maintenance procedures are carried out and are sustained and to encourage best practice.
Omuhaturua Primary School Borehole
Nothing to report on this
Otjimanangombe Primary Healthcare Clinic.
In the middle of July, the clinic was visited by Epukiro Constituency councillors with a view to putting twelve isolation beds in the clinic for patients suffering with Covid-19. With the idea that if their situation worsened they would be transferred to Gobabis Hospital. The councillors have done this under their own initiative and have launched an appeal for funds and equipment as the Ministry of Health do not have the finance to support this.
During their visit they identified a number of maintenance issue mainly involving the lack of working toilets and no hot water which we were aware of and have been trying for sometime to get rectified by the Ministry of Works. This led to us liaising with the councillors and we asked a colleague, Mr Bob Puzey, an Englishman living in the village, who was a plumber by trade to look at the issues. He reported back to us on the problems he encounted which we passed back to the councillors. The result was that on Monday 9 August, a team from the Ministry of Works arrived to make repairs, but some are still remaining.
On 11 October, a number of beds were delivered but so far there have been no Covid-19 patients. The clinic is involved in the Governments vaccination programme against Covid-19
The following maintenance issues identified prior and during March 2020 are outstanding:
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Problems with the water pump, now removed from the clinic. This has reduced the water pressure in some parts of the clinic affecting toilets and the cold water supply
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Various bits of window furniture were missing
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A possible underground water leak between the tanks and clinic to be investigated. This has now been recognised as a problem, and the Ministry of Works will be investigating.
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Curtains still to be fitted.
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Some equipment still to be supplied
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The yard lights have been repaired, but one or two are malfunctioning again.
There has been no progress on the tender for the water softening system which includes the installation of a pump to boost the water pressure
Clinic Accommodation for Foundation
Work to renovate the accommodation has been completed thanks to Bob Puzey who employed a local contractor on our behalf. This was after we couried a set of keys to him via DHL and Komeho. We have still not got the set of keys back from Riaan
Catherine Bullen Foundation Ambulance
One of the Foundation’s projects is to replace the original ambulance that we donated in 2008, and have it based at Otjimanangombe. We have revised the specification to a Toyota Hilux 4.2D instead of a Land Cruiser 4.2D. This has reduced the price to £45,825 against £54,858 for the Land Cruiser. Although this will probably go up in this year
We are still lobbying the Ministry of Health to budget for two drivers, with the assistance of Charles Moore, the British High Commissioner. He recently emailed us as follows:
I met yesterday with Ben Nangombe, ED at MHSS. At the end of our discussion around COVID, I also raised the issue of ambulance drivers for Otjimanangombe. I was able to offer strong support for progress on this, given the incident relayed to me by Sister Tomas during my visit there, when a patient had to wait 9 hours to be collected, before the two hour journey to Gobabis. The ED offered to look into the issue, and thought it should be fairly straightforward to resolve by redeploying existing drivers from Gobabis (on a rotational basis if necessary) rather than employing additional staff.
He just called me to say that he has spoken with the Regional Chief Medical Officer for Omaheke. They wanted to check that an ambulance was available before redeploying staff. I couldn’t recall the status of the ambulance, but said I would check with you and get back to him. Could you please let me know? It would be great to get this issue resolved, and it would no doubt boost morale for Sister Tomas, and others who rely on the clinic at Otjimanangombe.
Although this is a solution to the staffing problem, in practice there would be problems which we have identified to the High Commissioner. He has passed on our concerns and we wait to hear from the Ministry of Health. Hopefully we will be able to sort this out during our forthcoming visit.
Current Project: Omuhaturua Primary School Hostel - upgrade
Phase 2: Construction of a multi-purpose hall to provide facilities for the school, the hostel and for the community of Otjimanangombe.
Throughout this last financial year there has been no progress on the construction of this building and it is still only progressed to the foundation’s having been dug.
After various emails and false promises from the builder we came to the conclusion that he had abandoned the site.
We then took the decision to start again from scratch with a slightly modified design and we are currently waiting for architects drawings before we go out to the trade to get quotes.
There was no communication from the builder from August 2021 onwards until in November when we threatened him with the Police unless he paid back the money that both the Foundation and ISP had advanced him.
In January 2022, he contacted us, wanting to discuss a payment plan to repay the money. We are currently discussing this with everyone concerned and we will meet with the builder during our visit to come up with a legally binding agreement.
Goeie Hoop Primary School - Post 10
St Mary’s Senior School for Girls have agreed to carry on raising money to provide socks and shoes for the children.
Provision of a borehole for Eiseb Primary School and Hostel
One of the Foundation’s projects is to drill and equip a borehole for the sole use of the school, the hostel and the State Clinic to provide an uninterrupted supply of fresh water. This will also allow them to irrigate the school garden to provide vegetables for the hostel kitchen.
Since our last report, Mr Booysen the drilling contractor has since supplied an updated quote which totals N$713,628 which at the current bank exchange rate of N$20.13 to £1 is £35,451. This includes all the solar equipment for pumping the water
This is fully funded with two thirds of the cost being funded by ‘the Friends of Jon’ and ‘Suni.E.V.’
We are waiting for an updated quote from the contractor who has advised that due to material and transport costs rising this could result in a price increase of 10%. Suni E.V. have agreed to cover most of this.
Drilling will take place in March/April and hopefully we will be able to attend. Arrangements also need to be made for the fencing off of the borehole and the erection of a plinth and memorial plaque.
Hostel kitchen
The school has converted one of the storerooms in the kitchen into a cool room.
The Catherine Bullen Primary Healthcare Clinic, Oshivelo
There are still various minor items regarding maintenance which we wanted to progress which will have to wait until our next visit. The clinic is undertaking Covid-19 vaccinations from 8.00 to 17.00 each weekday.
Conclusion
Due to Covid19, we now have a backlog of projects and the funds to cover them
Ambulance – we are hoping to resolve the staffing issues and place an order for delivery in September 2022. We will then hand this over to the Ministry of Health during our visit later in the year.
Eiseb Borehole – as previously advised it is planned to drill this in March/April 2022. This will be officially commissioned when we visit later in the year, although it will be operational before then.
– Multi-purpose Hall It is hoped that a contractor can be found and work completed by December 2022. The cost of the building will be considerably more than the original price. Fund raising from now on will go to this project.
– Otjimanangombe Primary Healthcare Clinic you will note that there are on going maintenance problems and lack of equipment that have delayed inauguration. We propose that subject to funds being available once the current projects are completed, that the Foundation provides funding to resolve these issues in order that the clinic can be officially inaugurated.
– Catherine Bullen Primary Healthcare Clinic As mentioned in this report, there are ongoing maintenance issues that need resolving. Again, subject to funds being available once the current projects are completed, that the Foundation provides funding to resolve these issues.
As mentioned in last years report, it is suggested that in the future we concentrate on supporting Omuhaturua Primary School and Hostel, Eiseb Primary School and Hostel and Good Hope Primary School and Hostel together with both clinics and the village of Otjimanangombe, This would not involve any large infrastructure projects.
There is one project which we may want to consider in the future if funds became available, and that is replacing part of the canteen roof at the Good Hope Primary School Hostel which was partially destroyed by a gale in 2016.
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