200 Ebola survivors get entrepreneurship training

The umbrella organization for Ebola survivors in Liberia, Ebola Survivors Network, has ended 10-day intensive entrepreneurship training at the ELWA compound in Paynesville, suburb of Monrovia.

The executive director for “Business Link,” a local group, Madam Edwina D. Vankun-Lincoln, said the training was intended to empower Ebola survivors benefiting from donor funding by giving them skills to manage resources received.

Madam Lincoln said Ebola survivors are receiving limited funding from organizations of goodwill, but cautioned them that their title as Ebola Survivors would eventually change as time goes by. She said it is about time survivors make use of what they are getting from donor organizations to empower themselves.

She said giving survivors money is good, but if they do not properly plan how to utilize funds received from donors, it could become an embarrassment for them in the near future.  The training was held with the aim of transitioning survivors from dependency to a stage where they would be able to manage their own lives again.

Business Link was contracted by the American charity, Samaritan’s Purse to provide the training for Ebola survivors in the areas of introduction to entrepreneurship, customer service, building confidence, and budgeting, among other areas of business management.

By Ethel A. Tweh – Edited by Jonathan Browne