Who Is Forces Of Love

IT does not take much to show one’s gratitude. A song, dance and applause by schoolchildren were “uplifting” enough to two groups of weary volunteers who flew from Kuala Lumpur to Sabah recently for a good cause.

The 16 volunteers felt welcomed upon arrival at the schools. The volunteers, members of Forces of Love (FOL), joined by 20 locals, were on a mission to deliver gifts to poor Sabahan schoolchildren in the interior and remote villages. They visited three schools in Keningau and four in Penampang.

FOL is a coalition of friends, supporters and volunteers who share a goal of assisting the marginalised and underprivileged. It was formed with the goal of helping the needy children in rural and urban areas. A total of 1,555 pupils in Sabah benefited from FOL’s third Educare outreach programme where school essential items were given to them.

These items included revision books, dictionaries, schoolbags, stationery items, uniforms, shoes, socks, raincoats, water tumblers, lunch packs and goodies packs.

In Keningau, three selected schools for the Educare outreach programme were SK Liau, SK Apin-Apin and SK Bundu. Headmistress of SK Liau Suanla Siarus thanked the FOL team for choosing the school where 193 pupils were given school essential items.

SK Apin-Apin headmaster Bilih Ebin felt the gifts were timely for the 230 pupils as 90% of their parents were farmers and barely had enough to replace the torn schoolbags the pupils used.

While in Penampang, seven schools which received the contribution were SK Kipovo, SK Togudon, SK Moyog, SK Buayan, SK Terian, SK Longkogungan and SK Babagon.

Teacher Fareen Davina Francis helped to collate information and come up with a mechanism to only benefit hardcore poor students in rural Penampang.

“Parents are grateful and hope this programme will continue yearly. The sponsored items such as books and school supplies (bags and stationeries) have greatly eased their burden. Before this programme, parents with children in Year 4 to Year 6 had to pay RM60 per child for revision books and at least another RM60 on school supplies.”

SK Buayan administrative assistant Harold Mark and several volunteers hiked to three remote schools uphill - SK Terian, SK Buayan and Sk Longkogungan - on two occasions. In January this year, they delivered books to the schoolchildren and last month, they handed over school bags and school essentials.

FOL- Educare project director Goh Chong Meng and operations director Daniel Kwan Kok Cheong flew into Sabah several times for assessment, recce and logistics prior to the actual programme.

While the project may look simple, the time used to collect information and fundraising takes almost a year from devising to implementation plus tedious packing.

Every care is taken to ensure the rightful candidates receive the right sizes in shoes and uniforms and names were labelled on the books to personalise the gifts.

“The current economic downturn makes it harder for fund-raising. Costs of goods have also escalated and some donors had also cut down on their donations,” said Goh.

Crowdfunding via good friends and supporters have been instrumental in the successful implementation of the project, he added.

Kwan said love and compassion formed the core components of the programme regardless whether they are rural or urban children. We strongly believe that by planting the seeds of love and motivation, we’re able to churn out useful citizens in the future.

Our volunteers worked non-stop every Sunday and public holidays to ensure the success of every event. All expenses were borne by the volunteers themselves. Donation collected is strictly to buy items for the children.”

Overall, FOL spent over RM 200,000 this year on its Educare programme to help 3,206 school children both locally and in Sri Lanka.

This amount included the costs of helping 1,555 schoolchildren in Sabah, 367 orang asli children in Perak, 288 “urban needy” in the Federal Territory and 1,000 children affected by landslides in Sri Lanka.

Previously, FOL also helped out in the Myanmar Nargis cyclone, floods in Thailand, east coast of peninsular Malaysia and Sri Lanka, Ranau and Nepal earthquakes as well as Rohingya migrants issues.