A 28-year old National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) member, Alims Thomas Iripia has embarked on a laudable project worthy of mention.
Thomas, from Gakem, Bekwarra LGA, Cross River state, on the 27th of May 2015, which was children’s day, came up with an idea he christened “Impact a Child Project – ICP,” after he observed that most of the children in Bogoro local government, Bauchi, the state he was posted to, go to school barefooted.
He launched the project on Facebook about 7pm that day with his first post pleading with his friends on the social network to help me raise 100 pairs of sandals for the children.
Thomas target for the project was 100 pairs of sandals to be distributed among 5 public primary schools in the local government, with each school getting 20 pairs.
But his target was surpa$$ed so fast as donations started trickling in fast from different states in Nigeria and beyond. In less than 2 weeks, Thomas had already gotten 180 pairs of sandals ready for distribution.
Each sandals cost N350 each and many people donated more than one pair. Two persons- Mr. Ray Ugba Morphy from Ogoja, Cross River State and Hon. Bola Ilori from Ondo State gave Thomas 100 pairs each. Mrs. Akintoye Adeola from London gave him 50 pairs.
As the time of writing this report, Thomas had gotten 360 pairs of sandals with support coming from even people he did not know personally as many of his Facebook friends had gone ahead to share his post on their walls and canva$$ing support for the project.
Thomas who was the best graduating student in the Department of Public Relations, Fidei Polytechnic, Gboko Benue State in 2012, belongs to Batch B 2014, Stream 2 and he was posted to Bauchi State with Batch Number- BA/14B/2355. His place of primary a$$ignment is a private school – Great Link International Secondary School, Bogoro, Bauchi State where he takes the students there on home management.
See photos below:-
