Hannover, IL, USA -- A leading African presidential candidate visited Hanover Park on Friday to thank the village for its financial and cultural support to his West African nation.

Professor John Evans Atta Mills, presidential candidate of Ghana's National Democratic Congress, spent a few hours Friday at Hanover Park's village hall during his two-week jaunt across the country.

Mills stopped in Hanover Park, the sister city of his hometown, Cape Coast, to acknowledge the village's Sister City committee for helping secure a grant and sending humanitarian aid on a regular basis.

The U.S. State Department Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs recently announced that Hanover Park would receive $17,500 for HIV and AIDS awareness and education for its sister city.

According to the CIA World Fact Book, about 3 percent of the population in Ghana in 2001 was infected with HIV/AIDS, with 28,000 people dying of the disease that year.

Hanover Park was one of seven municipalities to receive the grant through Sister Cities International Organization, according to Hanover Park officials.

"It's only proper we come to thank you for what you have done," said Mills to Hanover Park officials during a short speech at village hall.

Mills said he also wants to learn more about the relationship between Hanover Park and Cape Coast, where he was born in 1944.

While the populations are about the same, both at approximately 40,000, Hanover Park has a larger economic base and enjoys a greater degree of prosperity than Cape Coast, located on the coast in Ghana, a West African country of more than 20 million.

Hanover Park became the Sister City of Cape Coast in 1991 through Sister Cities International.

Throughout the last decade, the village has enjoyed humanitarian, cultural and educational exchanges with Cape Coast, said Linda McCance Packham, a representative from Hanover Park's Sister Cities Committee. The village's Sister City committee has collected and sent clothing, books and computer equipment to Cape Coast. Medical supplies are also donated from local hospitals.

Members of the committee returned from a two-week trip in July from Cape Coast, she said.

The Sister Cities concept was created in 1956 as part of President Dwight D. Eisenhower's "People-to-People" program. The goal was to establish personal relationships that would lessen the chance of world conflicts.

Originally part of the National League of Cities, Sister Cities International became a not-for-profit organization in 1967 due to growth and popularity. Today, it boasts a network of 1,200 cities representing 125 countries.