Kongo(U/E), July 9, GNA - The District Chief Executivefor the Talensi-Nabdam, Mrs Vivian Anafo, has commended Rev. Brother Francis Sebo for sponsoring 45 brilliant but needy students in the Talensi-Nabdam District.

Rev. Brother Sebo, a Presentation Brother with the Catholic Church, is a Liberian and was posted to Upper East Region in 1976. He served in the region for many years before leaving for the US where he is serving as the Administrator for Social Services at the Holy Redeemers Parish of Kissimmee, Florida.

Mrs Anafo said this when the beneficiaries and their parents met to express gratitude to the Rev Brother who has come from the US to visit the students at Kongo.

Some of the students have completed universities and others have completed Teacher Training and Nursing Training colleges. Some are still in the universities, Teacher and Nurses Training colleges and Junior High and Senior schools. Rev Brother Sebo is paying their school fees, feeding expenses and medical bills.

Mrs. Anafo said the sponsorship package had relieved the Assembly of some of its burdens since those needy and brilliant students would have come to the District Assembly looking for help. She said during Rev Brother Sebo's stay in the district, he helped a lot of community members by empowering them especially women in skill training such as soap making, batik and dye making. Mr. Charles Bugre, one of the beneficiaries who had just completed the University of Ghana, thanked the Reverend Brother for his help and said but for the Reverend Brother's support, majority of them would have remained shepherds.

He said his main focus now would be to see how he could also contribute his quota to the development of his community. Rev. Brother Sebo said he decided to sponsor the students because he realized that education was the tool to break the poverty chain in the community.

He said he was posted to the District as a Presentation Brother in 1976 and realized that majority of the children in the area were engaged in shepherding at the expense of their education.

Rev Brother Sebo said he adopted a strategy by using football games which attracted many of the children to the field and he made them to play football for three hours and four hours in the classroom where he together with some of his colleagues taught them.

He said he was using money inherited from his father for the scholarship package in addition to donations from families and friends from the United States and Europe.

Rev Brother Sebo said the scholarship package would be extended to brilliant but needy girls and that 20 girls would be sponsored in the SHS and another 20 at the tertiary level. He said his plan is to sponsor those students to do doctorate degrees in the US.

Rev Brother Sebo said rich people should invest not only in their children's education but also those who could not afford education. 09 July 10