Mark Agwonah Fund -- discussion

[Guest]

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[Diane R]

The Mark Agwonah Fund has made its first $25 loan, to an entrepreneur in Kenya.

Rose Juma Mafuno is in the business of selling dried fish (Omena: sardines) and kerosene.  She is looking for $100 to buy more supplies, to increase the time between trips to her suppliers and thereby reduce transportation costs.  She hopes to open a store one day.



Rose Juma Mafuno
Location:  Lunao, Bungoma -, Kenya
Business Name:    None
Activity:  Retail
Loan Requested:  $100.00  (Mark Agwonah Fund contributed $25)
Repayment Term:  12 months - repaid monthly
Loan Use:  Buy more fish and kerosene to sell
MFI: People Microcredit Investment Bureau (PEMCI)

I hope you all approve.  When I saw a loan come up from Kenya tonight, I thought we ought to get started spreading around some of our hopes for others, in Mark's memory.  The fund now has $325 remaining in Kiva Credit.  Please speak up if you would like to comment on how the fund chooses entrepreneurs to support.

--Diane.

[Cathi]

Hi!
I'm not a member of this lender group, and am new to Kiva.org, but...
I've made 3 small loans now and am focusing on the African continent mainly.
After making my first loan, i joined KivaFriends and read about Mr Agwonah's passing.

Today I saw a request for a $100 loan for Rose Juma Mafumo in Kenya added her to my portfolio. After returning to her profile from PayPal, I saw that this lending group had also made a loan to her!

Seemed like a wonderful coincidence, so I thought I would just say hello to you all.

I'm really excited to be involved in this whole micro lending effort.
Nice to meet you all and be working for the same thing!

[Diane R]

Cathi -- it's so nice to meet you, too! And so amazing that Mark's memorial loan fund helped bring you here to post.  Hop on over to the Introductions thread (now on its seventh page of posts!) and tell us more about yourself (and your frog? toad? creature!).

--Diane.

[Cathi]

Done! Thanks for the welcome Diane !
BTW - you and I also both loaned to a man in Mozambique.
Thought your picture looked familiar.

[Joe]

Great job Oli and Diane! Amazing how quickly this all came together. Check your PMs.

As for which loans to fund, I'd vote for anything close to where Mr. Agwonah was located. May he Rest in Peace. Perhaps the local MFI can help give us a heads up for anything new they list? It would be nice to see all their new listings being kicked off by this fund.

Welcome to Kiva Friends, Cathi!

[Jill]

     Responding to Laurie's comments/query about
   
    Whether the money "gift certificated" to the Mark Agwonah Memorial Fund
    was intended to be a "loan", someday to be paid back to the Group Members,
    or, in effect, a donation in his memory
   
    so that the Fund can use those monies, even after the initial loans are paid back,
    into "Perpetuity," making new loans to new Entrepreneurs as the old ones are paid off... ,

    This Mark Agwonah Memorial Fund Group Lender Person wants to make it clear that:

     It was always my hope and expectation that the money I "gift certificated" to the Fund
     would be a Permanent Gift, to be used, I hoped, over and over and over again,
     not only to help as many people as possible,
     but, with each loan made this year (next year, the year after, and all the years after that), to ensure
     that Mark Agwonah's name, the decency of his character, and the atrocity of what happened to him
     would be known and "kept alive" by every Entrepreneur (and that Entrepreneur's family and greater "circle")
     who receive the blessing of one of his loans.

    I very much hope that that was and, I hope, will be the intent of all the other participants.

    I still vote to keep the loans in Kenya, to be allocated to youth or youth-related enterprises, where possible,
but don't feel strongly enough, or full of myself, enough, to assert that in a way to suggest anything even close to those suggestions
being construed as "conditions."

   I'm just grateful to Oli for having started this and to him and to Diane for being willing to take the responsibility of being the
Fund's first Administrators (so, whatever you guys and/or the other Group Members think, is fine with me).

     Thanks,
     Jill

     

[Jill]

        Just, now, saw the Lender Page for the Mark Agwonah (Memorial) Fund,
        http://www.kiva.org/lender/markagwonahmemoria3530
        for the first time.

    It's very neat

    Thanks for putting it together, 
    and finally....
    Good Night

[wind5001]

Hello everyone,

I am back for today! 

Diane: Thanks for hopping in on our first loan! WONDERFUL!!

And: I am amazed that it has already garnered some attention. Cathi, a very hearty welcome to you from me. I am sp happy to see like-minded people here. Thank you for sharing!

To Laurie and Jill: I absolutely agree with your assessment of using the funds perpetually. I do not intend to withdraw my money (which I still have to pay in; waiting for my paycheck to arrive today!), and I do not think that others will. But I just wanted to make clear that it is not MY money now, that it is still the giver's money. It should be up to her/him to decide, whether to withdraw or not. It was not my intention to say that the money should be withdrawn. Maybe my sentence about the possibility to withdraw was too quick a shot; maybe I was inspired by our IGIVE Lender Group, which certainly is something very different. I personally see this as a permanent thing. Mark's fate has moved me so much, and has helped me put my own grief and despearation somewhat in perspective, that I want to ensure his memory lives on. And with our very first loan, we already achieved this.  It is amazing!

So, to cut matters short: Why don't we state here in this thread, right at the beginning, that the money is considered a donation and will always be relent?

Oli

[Wood Fairy Glenda]

I'm all for this!  That's what I thought was intended anyway.

On a closely related subject:  What's the status of the plan to help Mark's mother?

[wind5001]

Joe: I have asked Irene to give us a heads up, if possible!