MTN Collates CSR footprints in book form

L-R:, Executive Vice Chairman, NCC, Dr. Eugene Juwah;  Chairman, MTN Nigeria Mr. Pascal Dozie; Director, MTN Foundation ,Mr. Dennis Okolo,; Chairman, MTN Foundation Ambassador Hamzat Ahmadu, and Mr. Tunde Folawiyo, Director, MTN Nigeria at the launch of MTN Foundation’s View Book in Lagos at the weekend.

By Prince Osuagwu

Perhaps MTN has been looking for an apt description of its CSR footprints. But at the weekend, it announced to all, that it has stumbled on the answers. It appeared to be a book account format it called The view book. As expected, MTN proudly described the book an apt, correct description of the organic linkage between lending a hand and extraordinary power of transformation.
The event which attracted the who is who in Nigerian business circle, government and private sector also had the eloquent Wale Goodluck who is the company's Corporate Services Executive in hand to give graphic expression of how MTN through its Foundation has given hope to the hopeless, in a bid show appreciation to a favourable business environment.
Goodluck as always did not disappoint.  He quickly explained to the gathering at Civic Centre Ozumba Mbadiwe, Lagos, that the unveiling of the foundation viewbook was MTN Nigeria’s philosophical belief that the long term success of its business is inextricably linked to the viability of the society in which it operates. Yet he hinted that besides being a vehicle of touching lives the foundation was also keen in supporting the attainment of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) for the socio-economic development of Nigeria.
According to him, since 2004 the board of MTN Nigeria has committed 1% of MTN’”s profit after tax, to the foundation and since then, the foundation's footprints have been established in all the states and the federal capital territory, with 292 projects sites in partnership with over 30 different project partners over the years. He said the MTN Foundation viewbook offers a glimpse into how the Foundation has changed to the better,  lives of many Nigerians.
MTN also informed the gathering that under the foundation’s project, 129,283 school students and 6,086 teachers in 62 public secondary schools across 15 states and FCT enjoy facilities ,which bridge the digital and knowledge divide, 4500 men and women across 28 states of the country has been empowered with a mobile phone, recharge cards, promotional materials as well as training on basic accounting principles and customer services, and over 1,154 HIV positive mothers and 1,229 babies have benefitted from the foundation’s prevention of mother to child transmission programme, while 260 people living with HIV have been successfully trained in various income generating skills.
For the company, the foundation has invested in excess of 1.7billion naira in various education portfolio, 2 billion expended under the health portfolio, 1billion invested under the economic empowerment portfolio, making the unveiling of the view book tagged “A hand and a Smile”  an artistic archive of powerful photography and strong images of how MTN Foundation has transformed quality of lives in Nigeria.