The leadership of Maloma was male dominated. Decision-making power was solely in men’s hands. This culture was noticed by women in the community. As a result of this, women were not respected.

The leadership system in the community of Majoe displayed an unfair governance and social discriminations against women. Baindu Samu, a 30-year-old community member is one of those that went through this repressive and non-transparent leadership system. This is her story.

At OneVillage Partners, we know that when communities define what success looks like to them and have the tools to measure that success, projects and interventions are more effective and more sustainable – ultimately, the projects will continue to improve people’s lives for longer than if community members were not involved.

From our most recent community partner, 12 women and men have volunteered to help improve the wellbeing of their entire community through OneVillage Partners’ Community Action program. These volunteers are part-way through a 14-step training on project design. They will emerge with leadership skills to manage the project and see it to fruition

In the community of Pejewa, Community Action volunteers trained by OneVillage Partners designed a project to increase agricultural productivity for the hundreds of farmers living in their community. Isata Harding explains their innovative and sustainable solution.

2021 is off to an exciting and busy start in OneVillage Partners partner communities! This year, seven communities will see their community projects completed, including a school, two clinics, and a skills training center; four communities will begin construction this month.

As is typical in Sierra Leone, Grima’s leadership was restricted to men from traditional ruling families; women held just two leadership positions in 2015 when the community started working with OneVillage Partners.

In the far east of Sierra Leone, the village of Grima completed a major public consultation withOneVillage Partners, a community-led non-government organization (NGO). The community members chose the priority issue that they and OneVillage Partners would address jointly with a development project.

Mamboma is a village located in the Peje Bongre Chiefdom of Eastern Sierra Leone’s Kailahun district. It was known for its corruption, embezzlement and unfair treatment of community members by their leaders. After the civil war, the community held elections, but were disappointed with the results; leaders continued to be self-serving.

Follow Hawa’s story as her community of Gbeka gains self-reliance from outside support.

In 2019, OneVillage Partners ended the year proud of all our collective accomplishments, grateful to those who made it possible, and we enter 2020 committed to deepening our impact in our partner communities and beyond.

As 2019 comes to a close, we are incredibly proud of the accomplishments we have achieved together with our partner communities.

Meet Henry Gbevo. He led 150 members of his community to become income stable.

Our Monitoring, Evaluation, and Learning team developed two new surveys piloted in 2019 to provide data in new areas.

Meet Mohamed Amara. Along with his community of Madina, invested in the youth of the community.

Meet Pa Foday. He started as a skilled worker, and motivated his community to make him a Town Chief.