The Kawachinagano International Friendship?Association (KIFA) based in Osaka, Japan is contributing to the development of education in Ghana in a practical way by constructing a toilet valued at 8,000 Ghana cedis for the Asamang Adventist Preparatory School.

KIFA is an affiliated organization of Kawachinagano City, located in the western part of Japan and was created in February 1992 through partnership between the citizens, municipal government and local organizations and given the role of promoting international exchange activities in the city.
The key role of the association is to promote international awareness among the citizens to foster the development and improvement in international relations, leading to the promotion of friendship and world peace.
To achieve its noble objectives, KIFA among other activities provides practical support to foreigners residing in Kawachinagano and it environs through the provision of free Japanese language lessons taught by volunteer teachers. As at March 2011, as much as 911 foreign nationals from 59 countries around the world, including Ghana have benefited from KIFA’s free language classes on short or long term basis since the program started in November 1992.
To help Japanese citizens develop language skills needed for international interaction and friendship building, the association has a language club which provides language classes in Chinese, English, French, Korean and Spanish for interested citizens at various levels.

KIFA has however extended its international outreach programs to benefit some children in Ghana through a donor-support project involving the construction of the KVIP toilet for the Asamang Adventist Preparatory School in the Sekyere South District in Ashanti Region. Members of the association, a few of which have experienced living in Africa in the past have worked tirelessly to raise funds to sponsor the construction of this important health-related infrastructure for the school after an appeal from the school was communicated to the association through Mr. Noah Nkrumah-Adasa, a Ghanaian resident in Osaka.
Through direct solicitations and diversified fund-raising activities, The Kawachinagano International Friendship Association has completed the construction of the toilet which has separate sections for male and female pupils as well as staff of the school.
To support the fundraising activities, the graduating class of 6th graders at an elementary school near Kawachinagano; the Ishikawa Municipal Elementary School (2009 year group) organized a special charity bazaar as their graduation project, raising a total of US$160 which they happily contributed as a donation towards the project.

The recipient school of the KVIP toilet facility is a privately-funded first cycle school set up in Asamang-Ashanti to provide the same level of special learning opportunities that are available to children in the cities. The school currently has an enrollment of about 380 pupils from the kindergarten to the Junior Secondary School levels.

At a special ceremony held alongside the association’s end of year general meeting on April 24, 2011 and attended by the Acting Head of the Ghana Embassy in Japan; Mr. Ezekiel Totime, the Deputy Mayor of Kawachinagano, members of the municipal assembly and heads of some educational institutions, the association declared the toilet construction project officially completed.
During his keynote speech, Mr. Totime highly commended the Japanese people for their resilience and nobility in the face of the multi-layered disaster that recently struck the country. He indicated that the people of Ghana are with the Japanese people and will stand by them in their own modest way.
The Acting Head of the Ghana Mission in Tokyo further expressed the Ghana government’s profound gratitude to KIFA for its kind gesture which complements efforts to improve on the lives of people in all sections of the Ghanaian society. The improved toilet facility, he said will undoubtedly uplift and improve the lives of some Ghanaian children who are thousands of miles away from Japan.
Mr. Totime who had traveled from Tokyo to Osaka to express the Ghana government’s appreciation to the association for its valuable support to the school answered questions on all aspects of Ghana after showing the audience a video clip on Ghana.

In his welcome address, the Chairman of KIFA; Mr. Akihito Yamamoto expressed how happy members of the association are that their collective effort has given the children of the school in Ghana the chance to use a better toilet facility.
Members of the Kawachinagano international friendship Association are pleased that their efforts are not only building physical structures but also building the unseen but important bridges needed to deepen and extend global friendship beyond their city, country and Asia.

The occasion was used to hold a charity bazaar to raise funds to support the victims of the recent earthquake and tsunami that devastated parts of north-eastern Japan. On behalf of the people of Ghana and recipient school, the family of the Ghanaian facilitator of the project, Mr. Noah Nkrumah-Adasa sold Ghanaian beads-necklaces and homemade doughnuts to support the fund-raising derive.


Noah Nkrumah-Adasa
Osaka, Japan.
adasamma@hotmail.com