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Concordia is proud to announce the appointment of Her Excellency Toyin Saraki, Founder & President of The Wellbeing Foundation Africa (WBFA), to its Leadership Council.

With over two decades in advocating for maternal, newborn, and child health across Africa, Mrs Saraki has dedicated her life to empowering communities through education and gender equality. Founded in 2004 in Nigeria, WBFA strives to improve health outcomes for women, infants, and children across Africa. Through a multi-faceted strategy consisting of research, programmes, policy, education, and advocacy, WBFA—along with its sister organization, Wellbeing for Women Africa—is facilitating tangible, lasting progress towards the attainment of the SDGs, with a particular focus on SDG 3, Good Health and Well-being; SDG 5, Gender Equality; and, SDG 6, Clean Water and Sanitation.

Concordia welcomed Mrs Saraki as a Speaker at the launch of the 2019 Concordia Africa Initiative in London. In a conversation titled African-Led Philanthropy: Recasting the Aid-Dependent Narrative, Mrs Saraki shared her insight into the ways in which African philanthropists and corporate foundations can advance meaningful innovations to create social impact across the continent. Emphasizing the need to ensure the longevity of philanthropic projects, Mrs Saraki highlighted the critical role of community-level buy-in in cultivating a sense of ownership, responsibility, accountability, and—ultimately—sustainability.

“It was an honor to host Mrs Saraki at our inaugural Africa Initiative, where she demonstrated her unwavering commitment to the youth of Africa and shared her invaluable perspective on the role of innovative philanthropic models across the continent,” remarked Concordia Co-Founders Nicholas Logothetis and Matthew Swift. “It is with great pride that we welcome Mrs Saraki to our esteemed Leadership Council, and know that she will play an integral role in shaping our priorities, approach, and growth as we develop our Africa Initiative at the Annual Summit in New York this September and beyond.”

Upon accepting the invitation, Mrs Saraki commented: “I am honoured to join the Concordia Leadership Council, the leading organisation in fostering, elevating and sustaining cross-sector partnerships for social impact. I look forward to bringing my experience as a global advocate for inclusive health, education and economic strategies focused on improving the wellbeing and livelihoods of women, children and youth to the dialogue; I am hugely encouraged by the prospect of cascading the power and effect of the Council’s vision, mission and strategic leadership into frontline collaborations that transform the lives of my fellow Africans for the better.”

Mrs Saraki is also a global champion for Universal Health Coverage, Special Advisor to the Independent Advisory Group (IAG) of the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Regional Office for Africa (AFRO), and the inaugural Global Goodwill Ambassador for the International Confederation on Midwives (ICM).

For a full list of Leadership Council Members, visit https://www.concordia.net/leadershipcouncil/

I meet Toyin Saraki in the restaurant at Radisson Blu Hotel, Kigali. Ambient music seeps from the ceiling speakers into my ears. The air is calm and cool, a distinct contrast to the buzz and heat outside the adjoining Kigali Convention Centre where several activities are taking place for the Africa Health Agenda International Conference.

Mrs Saraki’s charisma matches the warm, yellow glow of the lights in the room. Her voice is mellifluous, coming out in near-whispers. I introduce myself and take a seat across the table to begin our conversation. We are flanked by two members of her team and a PR friend I’d just made at the convention who helped set up the meeting.

Earlier in the day, Mrs Saraki was on a panel with Sarah Opendi, Uganda’s State Minister for Health, discussing social accountability for Universal Health Coverage, a main topic of the conference.

One of the most pressing topics of discussion was how much of the world’s health problems happened in Africa (24%) while only 3% of all the health workers in the world were African. Mrs Saraki’s foundation, the Wellbeing Foundation Africa, is helping solve this problem, particularly through a programme that hires and trains only local midwives.

Maternal mortality and the wellbeing of new mothers and their newborns is an issue that hits close to home for her.

Within the 24 hours between December 6 and 7, 1991, she gave birth prematurely to twins, 3 months before their due date. One of the twins died while the nurses struggled to keep the other alive. Still, within those 24 hours, she got married.

The experience inspired her to make a promise to God that she would help as many women as she could who do not have access to the kind of network and resources that she did. Thus, her career as an activist — an Unlikely Activist, as she calls herself — began.

“I think if the Wellbeing Foundation Africa has done something, it has brought reproductive health onto the front burner of issues in Nigeria, and quite rightly so because Nigeria is one of the highest contributors to maternal death worldwide,” she says about the foundation she started in 2004.

“When I started the foundation, we used to have about 1 in 6 Nigerian women dying in childbirth and I almost became one of those statistics myself, which is why I started the foundation in the first place. Now, between that time, 2004, and today, 2019, we’ve improved considerably. I think now, a Nigerian woman has a one in 14 chance of dying in childbirth. It’s quite a big jump to go from 1 in 6 to 1 in 14, but 1 in 14 is still too much. A woman in Finland has one in 4,000 chance of dying at childbirth.”

Nigeria has the 4th highest maternal mortality rate in the world but is projected to become number one by 2021, according to the World Bank.

Currently, Finland, Greece, Poland, and Iceland, have the lowest maternal mortality rates in the world (3), according to World Bank data. All the other three countries with worse figures than Nigeria are still African — Sierra Leone, the Central African Republic, and Chad. Just below Nigeria on the list are South Sudan, Somalia, and Liberia in that order.

Mrs Saraki tells me that the first 10 years of the foundation’s work focused primarily on trying to convince policymakers and governments to do the right thing by pregnant women and their newborns. However, everything changed when she became the global goodwill ambassador for the International Confederation of Midwives, she says. That’s when she saw more closely the kind of work midwives were doing with women.

The new insight motivated the foundation to start Mamacare, an initiative designed to inform and take care of expecting mothers and their babies after they’re born.

“The midwifery-lead Mamacare classes, first of all, seemed to increase hospital attendance of women in the surrounding communities, to the extent that even the medical directors of the hospitals were telling our midwives that the only day antenatal is full is when the Wellbeing Foundation Mamacare midwives are around,” she says.

“What we discovered is that the programme made the women proper autonomous agents in their own outcome. So, for instance, a mother who has been to 8 Mamacare classes, one for each month before pregnancy, will know what a placenta looks like, she knows what a placenta is supposed to look like when it has been brought out the correct way, she knows what it looks like when her placenta is not complete and she knows that that could put her at risk of death.”

At this point in our conversation, her tone becomes sombre.

“A couple of days ago,” she says, “I was looking at old pictures with my team and there was this particular group picture from a programme I used to run in 2004. It was called ‘Twins and Multiple Births Assistance, I’ve stopped it now. But back then, having multiple births put you at high risk of dying.

“The picture was full of old women carrying little babies. Most of them were twins. The old women were the grandmothers. The mothers had died in childbirth. Through that programme, we helped the grandmothers with money to buy formula because they could not breastfeed and look after the babies. It is a known fact that if a mother dies in childbirth, the child runs a 50% greater risk of dying before the age of one.”

Left to the government, the future does not look bright for Nigeria and maternal mortality rates. Nigeria’s health allocation has been consistently less than 5% of its total budget in the last 3 years. And even that percentage is for basic healthcare provision.

Access to clean water is still a big problem for several hospitals, contributing directly to poor hygiene and sanitation. Water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) coverage in healthcare facilities in Nigeria is only 22%. So, if the first drink of water a baby has is likely from an unclean source, what then are the babies chances of surviving and living a full, healthy life?

As with most problems in Nigeria, the solution lies in the hands of private and non-profit organisations like Mrs Saraki’s. And she believes that with the help of global partners, as has been proven thus far, these problems are not insurmountable.

According to the UN, global maternal mortality ratio has declined by 44 per cent since 1990 but still more efforts are needed since about 303,000 women are estimated to die yearly due to childbirth. CNBC Africa poke to Toyin Saraki, Healthcare Philanthropist and the Founder-President of Wellbeing Foundation Africa to share more on her efforts in regards to this on the African continent. http://cnbc.africa/videos/…

She made the call in Lagos at the second run of ‘High,’ a contemporary stage play, which tackles issues surrounding drug and prescription medication abuse in Nigeria.

According to the Public Relations agency that made the statement available to newsmen on Wednesday, Mrs Saraki thanked the cast and crew – including the show’s director, Keke Hammond – for choosing to tell what she called an important story that highlighted what was a growing social problem.

“As a parent, I cannot begin to imagine what its like to be dealing with a child with a drug problem and I want to thank you for this. You have shown it to us in such a reality and I think this story should be shown around schools in Nigeria.

“I think that the first step to getting things right is shining a light on this issue and I will do what I can because the more we talk, the closer we will get to the solution,” Saraki was quoted as saying in the statement

She charged parents to look out for lifestyle changes in their children, wards and dependants, which might hint at a substance abuse problem – a theme which flowed through the play.

“I think that every parent should watch this play because just from watching it, I could see that it’s actually very subtle changes. It’s not something that jumps out and shows you that this person is on drugs or not on drugs,” she said.

In his remarks, Mazen Mroue, Chief Operating Officer, MTN Nigeria, said that everyone had a role to play in ensuring that we build healthy thriving communities.

“I think the story touches every one of us. We are fathers, and we have brothers, sisters and children and as the play reflects, substance abuse does not differentiate between classes, ages and all the differences that we have.

“At MTN, we believe everyone deserves the benefit of the modern connected life.

“Through the MTN Foundation, which is responsible for our corporate social investments, we believe that everyone deserves the benefit of a healthy life, and that is why we are here and are part of supporting this show,” he said.

He said that ‘High’, supported by MTN Nigeria, through the MTN Foundation, tells the story of a group of childhood teenage friends on holiday from boarding schools whose lives, as well as the lives of their parents and families, get dramatically upturned when one of them suffers a drug overdose.

He added that substance abuse remain a significant problem in Nigeria. In 2018, the BBC reported that about 3 million codeine-containing cough preparations are consumed daily in Kano and about 6 million bottles in the Northwest alone.

He said that as part of efforts aimed at addressing a growing national problem, the MTN Foundation, in collaboration with a consortium of professional and public policy stakeholders launched an initiative called ‘ASAP’ – the Anti Substance Abuse Programme – in December 2018.

“ASAP aims at increasing public awareness of substance abuse and addiction among youths, discouraging first-time usage and casual substance abuse nationwide, and providing access to resources for people in need of professional help,” he said.

Health care philanthropist and wife of Nigeria’s Senate President, Mrs Toyin Saraki, has called for more advocacy around substance abuse and support for mental health practitioners.

She made the call in Lagos at the second run of ‘High,’ a contemporary stage play, which tackles issues surrounding drug and prescription medication abuse in Nigeria.

According to the Public Relations agency that made the statement available to newsmen on Wednesday, Mrs Saraki thanked the cast and crew – including the show’s director, Keke Hammond – for choosing to tell what she called an important story that highlighted what was a growing social problem.

“As a parent, I cannot begin to imagine what its like to be dealing with a child with a drug problem and I want to thank you for this. You have shown it to us in such a reality and I think this story should be shown around schools in Nigeria.

I think that the first step to getting things right is shining a light on this issue and I will do what I can because the more we talk, the closer we will get to the solution,” Saraki was quoted as saying in the statement.

She charged parents to look out for lifestyle changes in their children, wards and dependants, which might hint at a substance abuse problem – a theme which flowed through the play.

“I think that every parent should watch this play because just from watching it, I could see that it’s actually very subtle changes. It’s not something that jumps out and shows you that this person is on drugs or not on drugs,” she said.

In his remarks, Mazen Mroue, Chief Operating Officer, MTN Nigeria, said that everyone had a role to play in ensuring that we build healthy thriving communities.

“I think the story touches every one of us. We are fathers, and we have brothers, sisters and children and as the play reflects, substance abuse does not differentiate between classes, ages and all the differences that we have.

One day in 1991, when I was 28 weeks pregnant with twins, I started retaining a lot of water and my blood pressure skyrocketed. Then I started to bleed. I didn’t know it then, but it was eclampsia, a life-threatening complication of pregnancy.

By the time I got to a doctor in Lagos, Nigeria, it was too late. One of my baby girls died. The other repeatedly stopped breathing and had to be revived; one of her heart valves hadn’t closed. My doctors were excellent, but their information was inadequate – they said all I could do was pray.

I did pray, promising God I would spend my life helping other mothers if my baby lived. Then I learned about an experimental drug in England called digoxin, and because I was economically privileged I managed to get some of it. My daughter’s heart valve closed and she survived.

I have worked to keep my promise ever since for the millions of mothers in Nigeria who are not as lucky as I was. Many are not aware that advance preparations can help prevent tragedy. Worldwide, some 800 women die every day from complications of pregnancy and childbirth – that’s one in every 31 women in sub-Saharan Africa. Four million newborns also die every year for the same reasons.

We know relatively easy and cost-effective ways to save most of those lives – family planning, prenatal care, trained attendants at delivery. One dollar invested in reproductive health care for women can save up to nine dollars in other development costs. Simply providing voluntary family planning to the 222 million women worldwide who want it but lack access to it would cut maternal mortality by 30% and infant mortality by up to 20%.

At first I didn’t grasp the dire situation in my country. My first charity, LifeStream, raised funds to send children with heart valve problems to a wonderful surgeon in Israel. In five years we sent 78 children, and the surgeries were a joyous success, but far too few in the context of Nigeria’s then-population of more than 150 million people. I still hadn’t seen the whole picture.

When my husband became governor of Kwara State in 2003, my duties included reaching out to people at major moments in their lives. I congratulated them on marriages and births and consoled them at family deaths. I realized that in an average week I was consoling more people than I was congratulating. Sometimes I would congratulate a woman for giving birth on Monday and on Wednesday she would be dead. I began to ask all new mothers about their blood pressure, the bleeding, the breathing – and I saw it was not just bad luck in a few cases but a terrible problem across my entire country.

How bad was it? We had no proper records of births, deaths, illnesses, marriages, so we didn’t know. Doctors were reluctant to fill out more paperwork, but without it how could we develop policies and target programs? The first project of my WellBeing Foundation Africa was to establish national Personal Health Record books that put in a pregnant woman’s hand a list of all available health services and the treatments and medications she receives from the beginning of her pregnancy until her child is five years old. This pan-African maternal health and well-being charity has reached 220,000 women and children with these books so far – still nothing in a country where six million women are pregnant every year, but we hope soon to digitize these records for cell phone use. When something goes wrong, we and the woman should be able to know why.

Hospitals and clinics in Nigeria always ask pregnant women to supply their own equipment for deliveries – a navel clamp, mentholated spirits, razor blades, plastic sheets for the bed. For lack of these simple things, many women give birth at home in unsanitary conditions, and their risk soars as a result. Now the WellBeing Foundation has a pilot program to provide “MamaKits” of those items to pregnant women through midwives, adding medications for blood pressure and prolonged delivery to kits given to hospitals. We are also organizing groups of pregnant women to set up 1,000-day savings accounts together, adding cash transfer programs, loans and insurance that give us regular contact with the women to provide information and monitoring.

I had a son in 1995 and another set of twins in 2000, again with complications but this time with much more knowledge about what could be done. My children are all well, and now I am engaged with Every Woman Every Child, a United Nations program sharing information worldwide on what works. Our hope is that even the smallest clinic will be able to adapt these best practices to its local circumstances. The program aims to save the lives of 16 million women and children by 2015.

Donor countries like the United States should support these and similar initiatives because women and their children are the greatest resource any country possesses. Investing in them is the best possible investment in global stability and security.