PDG, Fellow Rotarians, Rotaractors and guests.
I am humbled and honored to serve as president of this great club RCAS for the 2019-2020 Rotary year. Perhaps Chief Servant is probably an apt description of the role we play as president.
I would like to acknowledge the commitment and dedication to the cause of Rotary and to RC Accra- South that our past president Cyril and his board exhibited during the past Rotary Year.
In the same vein I would further like to acknowledge the work of all past presidents in making Accra South what it is today.
Last but certainly not the least, I would also like to say a big thank you to my wife Lynda and my family for the sacrifices they have made while I have embarked on my Rotary journey. On June 6th this year, I had the chance, for the first time in 8 years to spend my daughter’s birthday with her and it happened by accident. Thank you Sefakor and Klenam.
Boy how time flies. It was 7 years ago when I joined this great club. I must confess, at the time, I had my eye on a certain convention trip to Thailand. It wasn’t my primary motivation for becoming a Rotarian but I did certainly have it at the back of my mind. I recall vividly my first Rotary project, which was a WASH (Water and Sanitation & Health) project we executed in partnership with USAID were we constructed several boreholes in deprived communities around Bawjiase in the Central Region. I was shocked by the level of poverty prevailing in these communities given the close proximity to Accra, and was equally overwhelmed by the great impact these projects made in the lives of members of these communities. I recall a few of us visiting a stream which served as the primary water source for the people and equally for the animals in the community. I recall also asking one of the locals if they boil their water before drinking it and he responded by saying, “It doesn’t taste good if they boil it, so they drink it like that”. Now this is water that many of you wouldn’t even use to flush your toilets. We all know the importance of clean water and good sanitation. Access to clean water not only improves quality of life, but also brings tangible health and economic benefits. It also improves education for the girl child and contributes to poverty reduction. The gender dimension is critical here. According to UN studies, Women and girls spend up to six hours every day fetching water especially in rural communities and on average, a 15 year old girl spends twice as much time as a 15 year old boy in guaranteeing water access for her family. Those girls who do not have access to proper sanitation after their first menstruation, either leave school or will regularly miss at least one week of school every month.
Fellow Rotarians, this was my first reality check as a Rotarian and I quickly forgot about Thailand and begun to focus on the unique space we occupy as Rotarians to do good and render positive, life changing service to our communities. I am equally inspired and motivated each day by the amazing work 1.2 million Rotarians world-wide do in promoting peace, fighting disease, providing clean water, saving mothers and children, supporting education and growing local economies. Indeed, we must all be proud as Rotarians.
Our Plan for the Rotary year is an ambitious one, but one I think we should all embrace whole- heartedly and execute diligently.
We cannot achieve these plans without the commitment of club members. As the saying goes if you aim for nothing you will achieve it each time. In this vein we are instituting for the first time, what I call the RCAS Rotarian Pact. The Rotarian Pact is a set of goals that each Rotarian sets for him or herself in the Rotary Year. This set of goals cover all aspects of Rotary Life , from our basic obligations such as dues, attendance at meetings and participation in club activities, to membership, projects, fundraising ( in particular our 1 man 1000), foundation, district training participation in seminars, conferences etc etc.
I would encourage each Rotarian to set challenging goals. If you set a goal that is attainable without much work or thought then you are stuck with something below your true talent and potential as a Rotarian
I believe that by recording these goals and sharing them with each other and holding each other accountable to these goals we set in motion a system by which we become better Rotarians and achieve more as a club. We will monitor and evaluate these goals bi-annually and at the end of the year the best performing Rotarians will be duly recognized.
We plan to strengthen membership in terms of quality and numbers and to improve on the membership experience. We must pay particular attention to the type of Rotarians we attract and at the same time maintain diversity in terms of classification, gender and age.
It’s been a few years since RCAS has sponsored a new club. So as part of club extension, this year we are doubling down and hope to charter not only another Rotary Club but a Rotaract Club as well. Club training for Rotarians is an important component of the membership experience. We look to adopt innovative ways of imparting Rotary knowledge and also aggressively promote District and RF organized Seminars and training. We will encourage all Rotarians to explore the wealth of self-learning resources available online at the Rotary Learning Center.
The Rotary Foundation is the wheel that makes all Rotary Clubs function effectively. RCAS has an enviable record of contributions to the foundation and we will continue in the same spirit this year. We hope to participate in the District West African project Fair and apply for District and Global grant to support our projects.
Successful execution of Service projects is one of the main drivers of satisfaction for Rotarians and this new rotary year we plan to be very busy with projects. We will conduct joint projects with our Rotaractors, Sister Club in Lome and partner with other international clubs as well. As recommended in our strategic plan we will embark on our short, medium and long term projects in the Rotary year. These projects include WASH, Vocational training, Public Image and health among others.
We can’t successfully execute our projects if we don’t back it up with a successful fund-raising plan. We have a very bullish, record-breaking fund-raising plan that requires the participation of all Rotarians to succeed. We plan on raising a minimum of GHC 200,000 for the Rotary Year through a number of channels. We will continue with our One Man 1000 plan that involves all Rotarians and actively seek partnerships with private enterprise in achieving our fund-raising and service project goals.
Rotary work is done in committees and to this end I encourage each Rotarian to be part of a committee and will charge all committees to meet at least once a month. We will seek to ensure continuity in club committees and in future, the leadership of these committees will be from within the members that form them.
Looking ahead, the next Rotary year 20/21 is an important one for our club. First, we will be turning 20 years in Feb. 2021 and also one of own, DGE Yvonne will assume the highest office in the district as District governor. These are important milestones for the club and we need to plan accordingly and plan now.
I am looking forward to working with you all to ensure all the plans we agreed and signed off on at our cub assembly are successfully executed. This will not be possible without your cooperation and indeed sacrifice.
As a fellow Rotarian I was speaking to recently put it– “I joined Rotary because I have a passion for community service and I realized I couldn’t do it all by myself so I joined Rotary so I would partner with like-minded people to effect change in our communities”. This emphasizes the importance of teamwork in successfully executing our plans. Alone we can do so little; together we can do so much.
I will like to end by sharing a powerful analogy between the honeybee and the fly that one acclaimed, spiritual teacher, community builder, and Bhakti Yoga practitioner called Radhanath Swami came up with. It’s a story that is relevant to anyone and more-so to us as Rotarians. It teaches us a valuable lesson on improving our relationships to achieve a common objective.
The honeybee flies from fly to flower extracting only the nectar without disturbing the flower. The mindset of the honeybee is to seek the essence of each flower. Even in a place filled with rotten garbage the honeybee rather than paying attention to all the filth keeps its focus on finding nectar and it will focus and find that single flower in the midst of all the garbage.
Fellow Rotarians and guests, the honeybee is teaching us the art of focusing on the positives and dealing appropriately with the faults in each other. There will be faults everywhere and in everyone and there is never a shortage of things to complain about, but just as the honeybee seeks nectar even in the most unexpected of places, we can equally aim to seek the positives in those around us.
The fly on the other hand reflects another type of mindset. On an otherwise healthy body, the fly would focus on sucking on an infectious scab or sore. The fly may travel over hundreds of flowers in a field but what does it focus on. It focuses on tasting the garbage and excrement. It ignores the sweet fragrance of rose gardens and even in the best of circumstances and in the tidiest and cleanest of places the fly would focus on the trash.
This represents the mindset of ignoring the good qualities in those around us and focusing on their faults. Fault finding is a habit and the more we give in to it the more we are obsessed by it. It is important that as Rotarians we develop honest well-wishing communications in our relationship focusing on the positives while dealing with the negatives in a gracious constructive manner and try to bring out the best in each other. In so doing, we learn to recognize the positive qualities within our own self and to harness that to better serve our communities. Honeybee mentality of fly mentality?
A successful year for RCAS will require commitment and sacrifice from every club member. It will also require continued support from our families, friends, Rotaractors, and the bigger family of Rotary and we must adopt the honeybee mentality in bringing out the best in each other. This is the only way we can achieve more as a club.
I look forward to a successful Rotary year and in RCAS style, we indeed hope to Connect the W orld.
FORZA RCAS!!
Thank you.
Patrick Nutor
President 2019/20