Muslim NGO s define infaq and sadaqa/sadaqa jariya as central concepts for the empowerment of Muslim communities. On the one hand, Muslim NGO s use the term to manifest their position as intermediaries between donor and recipient. An NGO, not the donor, identifies the eligible recipient or provides a list of eligible projects such as religious centres, water projects, educational projects, or health projects, among others. On the other hand, sadaqa jariya, especially, requires and creates trust between the donor and the NGO as mismanagement or embezzlement of funds donated as sadaqa jariya not only breaks the bond between an NGO and its donors but also leads to a condemnation of those responsible for NGO s in the eyes of Allah.
Muslim scholars and treatises regard sadaqa as voluntary alms. While zakat is defined as mandatory, subject to certain conditions and is targeted at a specific group of beneficiaries outlined in the Qurʾan (Surah al-Tawbah 9:60), sadaqa is not subject to any conditions, limits or guidelines and may be given to non-Muslims as well.1 Calls for donations by Muslim organisations and activists in Ghana are usually identified as sadaqa rather than zakat and have become relatively common with the upsurge of Muslim NGO s and their activity on social media in the last decade. Infaq, in turn, is a generic term in Arabic meaning spending and disbursement. However, it also carries the moral imperative of doing good without asking for any return or hoping for any reward. Infaq, in its Qurʾanic interpretation, should be for the pleasure of Allah only, should be done before death, should not be for showiness and should be done without any desire for publicity.2 It therefore differs from sadaqa or voluntary alms, and sadaqa jariya or ongoing/perpetual/running charity,3 as both terms imply the hope of reward in the hereafter and an act to achieve the salvation of the donor by giving to the needy.
Many treatises and elaborations on Facebook regard sadaqa as a form of everyday charity. In the elaboration “Doors of Sadaqa”, the (anonymous) author of a posting on the Facebook account of the Rayhan Yakub Foundation lists apart from words and verses praising Allah, mundane deeds as sadaqa. The latter list includes removing thorns, bones and stones from the paths of people, guiding and listening to persons with disabilities, supporting poor persons with ones means at disposal alongside ordinary courtesies as long as the intention is to please Allah.4 Similar advises are also posted by the Grain of Hope Foundation. The advice to their followers is to keep a Qurʾan in any masjid, to keep a bowl or glass of water on windows for the birds, or to give cloth to the needy and poor ones. Another suggestion is to keep a box in one’s room and put a coin inside whenever one believes to have sinned, to open the box after a month and to give the cash to the needy people or to sponsor an orphan.5 Thus, Muslims are advised to give sadaqa to several causes by allocating one part of their wealth to provide Iftar for needy persons, a second part of it to sponsor orphans, a third part to sponsor old people, and a fourth part to contribute to the building of mosques and so on.6
Sadaqa jariya or continuous charity, on the other hand, is defined by Muslim scholars as “sincere charity” given for the sake of God. “As a productive Muslim you should set aside a portion of your salary every month for sadaqah even if it is a small amount,” the (anonymous) Rayhan Yakub Foundation author explains and suggests the money to be invested in building a mosque, digging a well, opening a school or planting a tree.7 The (anonymous) Grain of Hope Foundation author further reminded that sadaqa jariya is a kind of waqf (pious endowment):
Ongoing charity (sadaqah jariyah) is a charity the reward of which continues after a person dies. As for the charity of which the reward does not continue, such as charity in the form of food given to a poor person, that is not ongoing charity. Based on that, giving iftar to those who are fasting, sponsoring orphans and taking care of the elderly—although these are acts of charity—are not ongoing charity. But you can contribute to the building of an orphanage or home for seniors, and that will be an ongoing charity for which you will earn reward so long as that institution continues to benefit people.8
Therefore, sadaqa and especially sadaqa jariya have evolved as the central concepts and tools for generating funds as well as have provided a blueprint and a framework for Muslim activism. The majority of dawatist Muslim NGO s stick to a narrow interpretation of the framework, i.e., sadaqa for humanitarian relief (Iftar and Qurban) and sadaqa jariya is restricted to the building of mosques and schools as well as the digging of wells and drilling of boreholes. Solidarity-based and especially secular Muslim NGO s, in contrast, have expanded the framework to include the construction of health clinics and hospitals, among others, on their agenda.
1 Feeding and Clothing the Poor during Ramadan and at Eid
Religiously motivated humanitarian relief, i.e., donations to the poor and needy during Ramadan as well as the annual Muslim festivals Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha, is the essence of and core element marking almost all Muslim NGO s in Ghana. Such annual donations are part of both horizontal and vertical forms of philanthropy and have been orchestrated through numerous local, regional and national organisations in recent decades. Their activities have swollen tremendously over the past decades. Some of the international Muslim charities have in recent years fed thousands, if not ten thousand, recipients with Iftar and Qurban donations, such as Direct Aid, Qatar Charity, Dar al-Ber Society, King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Centre, HUDAI, Deniz Feneri and Turkiye Diyanet Vakfi.9
Numerous Muslim charities organise local Ramadan food donations and Iftar meals as well as Qurban donations and Udhiya projects mainly in urban locations and Zongo communities, among others in Accra (for example, Fadil Islamic Foundation, Ghana Society for Islamic Education and Reform, Islamic Ummah of Ghana, and Grain of Hope Foundation, Zongo Educational Aid),10 Kasoa (Muslim Aid Ghana),11 Kumasi (for example, Al-Sidiq Foundation for Care and Charity, Ansar al-Din Association, Muslim Ummah of Ghana, Muslim Access Movement, Sunna Hausa Relief Organization, Ummah Foundation, and Yamboni Foundation),12 Sekondi and Takoradi (Attaqwa Foundation),13 Obuasi (Deen Al-Haqq Islamic Foundation as well as the Hajia Saratu Sidi Ali Foundation),14 Tamale and Bimbilla (Sayfudeen Fund). A few of them also target rural communities, for example, the Accra-based Grain of Hope Foundation and Make Zongo Great Again,15 the Tamale-based Awakening Muslimah,16 or the Takoradi-based Al-Salaam Charitable Foundation.17 Others have run programmes at urban and rural locations in several regions, such as the Eid Feast Ghana, GIYSA, MY Akhirah Account, MY Hereafter Project, Peace Dawah Media and Save Aid Project, see further below and Chapter 3.6.
Informal associations and groups, too, engage in ad hoc outreach campaigns, collecting cash, food and clothes for specific target groups. Some of them are lose networks of expatriate Ghanaian Muslims who joined in a common cause such as the Tuo Ladan Ramadan Food Project in Nsawam-Adoaqyiri Zongo initiated by German-based Muslims in 2021.18
Online calls for donations during Ramadan gained momentum in 2012 when the Islamic Peace and Security Council (IPASEC) launched its appeal to support needy Muslim families. The IPASEC is an independent advocacy body set up and chaired by the National Chief Imam Sheikh Osman Nuhu Sharubutu. Its mission has been to foster peace and stability in the Zongo communities and the 2012 Ramadan Fund Raising campaign seems to have been a singular event. Nevertheless, the campaign was among the first to publicize detailed estimates of items, beneficiary families and cost needed. The total budget for the project was about GHS 780,000 (USD 400,000), of which GHS 40,500 was earmarked for residential and community support by the National Chief Imam in New Fadama, Accra, GHS 638,000 for regional distribution and GHS 89,500 for various local and regional chief imams. However, I do not know if the project succeeded in meeting its targets. Although the call stated that all donors were to be recognised with an appreciation letter, receipts and their names to be published on the homepage of IPASEC, such information is not found on the homepage.19
Facebook has since then emerged as the main tool for Muslim NGO s to disseminate calls for donations and run Ramadan and Eid campaigns. The Ghana Academy of Muslim Professionals (GAMP, formerly Ghana Muslim Academy) posted in April 2019 information about the Ramadan Food Package Project of the US organisation Islamic Ummah Relief. As part of its own Ramadan call, the GAMP called its members to support the project by making online donations.20 The Ummil Mu-Mineen Aishatu Siddiqa Foundation, a Muslim charity with headquarters in Kumasi, launched its Ramadan Charity Project on Facebook in May 2019 with the slogan “Making orphans and needy people smile in the blessed month of Ramadan” and called for Momo donations.21 One month later, the organisation posted a note on Facebook that it had received a donation from Daarul Qurʾan Islamic Aid International and had used it to sponsor the distribution of clothing to orphans during Eid al-Fitr.22 The Islamic Research Association Ghana, in turn, issued calls for its Ramadan 2019 Iftar Project to sponsor 200 orphans, widows and less privileged by making donations through its Mobile Money Account,23 renewing it in 2020.24 The Tamale-based Charity Foundation in Ghana announced in early February 2020 its ambition to feed at least 20 households during the upcoming Ramadan in addition to donate new clothes for fifteen orphans at Eid al-fitr.25
Graph 9
Iftar, Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha donations, 2019–2023 (n = 85 organisations; R = Ramadan Iftar, EaF = Eid al-Fitr, EaA = Eid al-Adha)
The use of social media increased dramatically during Ramadan 2020 and remained at high levels for the next three years; see Graph 9. Interesting to note is the high usage of social media even after 2020, arguably an effect of the positive impact the programmes had made in 2020 when the fasting period and the following Eid al-Fitr festival occurred when the country was gripped by the Sars-Cov-2 virus. Ghanaian Muslim NGO s extensively used Facebook and mobilised their efforts to alleviate the sufferings of vulnerable members of local Muslim communities. The Light Foundation, among others, donated as part of its Ramadan 2020 campaign 2,000 food packages worth over GHS 7,000 to local mosque communities in the Greater Accra Region.26 The Emmoa Foundation carried out a five-day food drive in Accra, feeding more than 2,100 persons from March–April 2020.27
Other groups initiated similar activities. The ASWAJ Ashanti Region Zakat, Sadaqah and Waqf Committee, for example, posted a video plea for donations on Facebook in April 2020.28 As part of its Ramadan COVID-19 Campaign, the organisation distributed flyers via social media and the ASWAJ Ashanti Regional Imam posted a sermon on Facebook in March 2020.29 The call—or the connections of Sheikh Ismail Adam Sakafia—were successful as the community could announce on Facebook that the Office of the ASAWJ Regional Imam had received USD 360 from the Yi Domin Allah Platform in the USA as charity to the needy in its fight against the COVID-19 lockdown.30
The Ummil Mu-Mineen Aishatu Siddeeqa Foundation addressed COVID-19 in its 2020 Ramadan Charity Project:
What about the orphans and needy? As the world is faced with the COVID-19 Pandemic UMAFS presents its financial campaign for orphans and needy. Spending your wealth in the way of Allah is a good way of attaining Jannah. Spending your wealth to support the orphans and needy during this pandemic is a good way of gathering good deeds.31
A similar call—“Feed the Needy COVID-19”—was posted by the Kumasi-based Markaz Aleawn Alyaqin Humanitarian Services on Facebook in early April 2020.32 In May 2020, donations from the Egyptian Islamic NGO Relief Development Foundation enabled it to organise an Iftar project. The organisation also distributed millet drinks and food to blind people in Asawasi, a suburb of Kumasi but issued a call for additional donations when it turned out that there was not enough prepared food to cater for disabled persons.33 The Seed of Hope Foundation, in turn, posted a call for sharing one’s excess food with those in need in early April. Ten days later, it was able to assist 100 poor people in Kumasi.34
A novel feature were youth-led Ramadan campaigns. Starting with the Feed the Street event organised by the Accra-based youth group Muslim Society during Ramadan 2020 (and branching out into Kumasi and Tamale by 2022, adding Kasoa to the list in 2023),35 other grassroots initiatives followed in the next year. Street Iftar Ghana, an Accra-based ad hoc social community, organised food donations in Kanda, New Fadama and Lakeside in 2021 as well as in Madina, Mamobi and Botwe in 2022.36 Make Zongo Great Again, too, had started its Iftar program during the lockdown in 2020, reaching some 300 persons. It launched its second Ramadan Iftar Feeding Project 2021 in early April, and distributed food packages to 200 needy persons in Ashaiman from mid-April to mid-May 2021. One year later, it launched its third Ramadan food project, this time targeting needy residents in a rural village in Eastern Region as well as organising the (maiden) Children Eid Feast at Zongo Laka in Ashaiman.37 According to its 2023 Ramadan Food Appeal, it aimed to double its outreach and targeted 100 families in rural villages.38 Zango Youth Volunteers Association, in turn, organised in 2023 its maiden (?) Street Iftar event in Kumasi.39 Muslim Aid Ghana, a local NGO in Kasoa officially launched in 2022, started its Ramadan donations in 2021, followed with the distribution of Ramadan relief packages to needy persons in Kasoa and Gomoa Gyama in the next year.40
Save Aid Project expanded its fundraising campaigns on social media during Ramadan 2022 by launching several new initiatives. The group had in 2021 visited rural villages in Central and Eastern Region apart from organising activities in Greater Accra Region, the most spectacular being its Ramadan Iftar Van-initiative. In the following year, the group introduced the “10gh project” (“Your 10 gh [Ghana New Cedi] will make our visitations to Oti and Bono Regions a reality”) alongside the “Donate a Flask” campaign (“Donate 30 cedis to purchase a flask to help a village preserve hot water for the Ramadan”). In April 2022, the group embarked on its Ramadan outreach and provided Iftar meals to its rural and urban target groups as part of its “Adopt a family” project.41 One-year later, its Ramadan as well as Qurban donations targeted needy persons and orphans in Greater Accra, Eastern, Savannah and Upper East Regions.42 The Hand to Hold Foundation, too, made an early start when it launched its Ramadan 2022 Project on Facebook already in January 2022. It managed to collect GHS 900 to buy food items and donated them to six widows in Accra Newtown, Alajo, Madina and Kasoa.43 The Islamic Sadaqa Foundation, in turn, started its online campaign in mid-April, announcing its ambition to raise GHS 10,000 and to feed 100 poor households for a day during Ramadan. In early May, it notified its supporters and followers on Facebook about the successful execution of the project.44
2 Orphans
There is little information on orphans in Ghana, and even less is known about their numbers in the Muslim communities. Traditionally, local Muslim scholars and imams would take care of at least some of them by feeding and providing shelter in their homes and makaranta. The number of orphans a scholar or imam would be capable of taking care of depended on the funds he received from his local community through zakat and sadaqa. Usually, these funds would be irregular, and most of the time, the orphans would join scholars’ students to beg for alms in the streets.45 Orphanages and orphans’ donation initiatives and programmes by civil society organisations, first by Christian mission societies and NGO s in Ghana, have substituted traditional and informal caring of orphans since the second half of the twentieth century. Muslim establishments followed, too, though rarely recognised in public for decades. The common trajectory for organised and formal Muslim orphan programmes usually started with an imam establishing a private orphanage and founding an NGO to generate funds for running his establishment.
The case of the Adabiyya Islamic Society in Ghana serves as an example. Established by Sheikh Alhaji Yusif Dauda Garibah in the 1990s and officially registered in 2000, the Society operates an orphanage, Adabiya Orphanage, in Goaso, Ahafo Region, since 1996. Sheikh Garbiah manages the orphanage with six paid staff members alongside thirteen volunteers solely on donations. Initially, Sheikh Garbiah acquired 40 acres of land for the orphanage, consisting of a mosque department, a schools department, and departments for water provision as well as orphans’ and widows’ care and care for the less privileged. In 2017, he posted a call for donations on the homepage as he planned to build dormitories, additional classrooms, staff accommodations and bathrooms, a hostel for visitors, a kitchen and suitable dining rooms for the children, staff and visitors, as well as facilitate the orphanage complex with electricity, plumbing for running water, and an access road.46
Another case is that of the (Shiʿa) Ansari Orphanage in Accra. The orphanage existed already when the NGO operating the orphanage, Muslim Orphanage and Humanitarian Assistance, was incorporated and commenced business in July 2013.47 At this point, the orphanage counted 386 children and had already received financial assistance amounting to USD 1,200 from (unspecified) donors in Europe and Egypt. Nevertheless, conditions at the orphanage were trying, and the NGO posted pleas for additional support on Facebook saying, “we need more food”, “desperate need of books to teach the children”.48 International support and donations to the orphanage, termed by the group as payment of zakat al-fitr, were to be paid “through Bait al-Mal and not any other account” by order of “Imam Ahmad a.s.”, the bank account of the Bait al-Mal being in the name of “the Savior of Mankind Association” at the Commonwealth Bank of Australia.49 The NGO has since then posted annual calls for support and donations during Ramadan and before Eid al-Adha,50 usually combined with pictures of some of the orphan children pleading for help and assistance:
Assalaam alaikum Ansar brothers and sister Ansar orphanage home Ghana is greeting you all and also sending their tears to you for help they have no help from others any more and they are our future Ansars here they need help Insha Allah you can help them not others jazaakumu laah.51
There is no data on how many Muslim orphanages or orphanages operated by imams or Muslim NGO s exists in Ghana, and I have only managed to collect some preliminary data about a few of them. Apart from the above-mentioned Adabiya Orphanage in Goaso and the Ansari Orphanage in Accra, the Nuuru Usmaniya Foundation for Humanitarian Services and Development (NUSMA) is an orphanage centre in Accra established by Sheikh Osman Nuhu Sharubutu.52 Others are the Darus-Salam Orphanage in Accra,53 the Mercy Islamic School and Orphanage in Adenta,54 the Taqwa Orphanage and School in Dodowa,55 and the Daarussafaba Salam Orphanage in Nyinahin, Kumasi.56 The Saudi scholar and philanthropist Sheikh Mohammed Bin Fahd Rubyan funded the Ghana Muslim Mission Orphanage at Beoposo, Ashanti Region, and planned to extend it with a technical and vocational school.57 The Turkish charity Deniz Feneri funded the Sultan Dilaru Arslan Orphanage of the ASWAJ Efiduase Asokore in Asokore Zongo.58
Local mosque communities run a variety of orphans support programmes. The Majid Ar-Rasul in Nima, Accra, serves as an example. Its existing support scheme includes the annual distribution of new clothes for orphans as well as the provision of Iftar and Qurban at the Muslim festivals. Recently, the mosque community embarked upon an ambitious project to transform the annual into a monthly and permanent support scheme; the idea is to solicit sadaqa donations for the project among its members and establish a foundation for the scheme. Furthermore, the mosque community envisions the foundation to also carter for needy and widows.59
The Aisha Siddiqa Islamic Girls Academy (ASIGA), a school complex including an orphanage in Accra, has received donations from the UK charity Caravan of Mercy and other international sponsors to carter for 90 orphans and poor children.60 The Prime Need Orphanage Institution in Swedru has been a target of the US-charity Forgotten People Organisation’s Orphan Program since 2019.61 Al-Jihad Muslimah Foundation, likewise, has supported students of Ahmed Uwaisi Orphanage at Boadi, Ashanti Region, and An-Nur Orphanage in Old Tafo.62 The Network for Intellectual Muslims Africa (NIMA) Cares, an Accra-based NGO founded in 2014, has run in cooperation with the National Chief Imam an orphanage since 2019. In addition, it funds a monthly scholarship programme for 143 orphans.63
Several NGO s are engaged in funding the building of new orphanages. A recent initiative to build an orphanage in Ejura Sekeye, Ashanti Region, was launched by Peace Charity Foundation and the Al Jihad Muslimah Foundation in September 2020.64 One month later, Al-Mannan Charity Foundation announced its plan to build an orphanage in Kumasi.65 A third one is the initiative by Sheikh Yusif Saeed Yahya to construct an orphanage education centre in Boaman, Ashanti Region, in January 2021, relying on both internal and external funding with regular updates on Facebook about the progress of the project. The complex, when finished, will comprise a classrooms block, separate dormitories for boys and girls, an administrative block and a masjid. Tellingly, the Facebook account of the project contains video clips with calls for donations in both Arabic and English.66
Some Tamale Muslims donated land to the Tamale Orphanage Project of the Salam Ul-Muslimiyn Ghana, although the NGO has not provided any updates on the progress of the project;67 the Tarbiyya Foundation, supported by some Turkish NGO s, plans to build an orphanage in Accra.68 The US-charity Islamic Ummah Relief (IUR), active in Ghana since 2019,69 collected almost USD 43,000 in 2020 to complete Al-Amaam Orphanage at Potsin, Gomoa East District, Central Region.70 The Techiman Muslim Youth Association (TEMYAS) launched its orphanage project in January 2020; the group has acquired three plots of land at Tuobodom and some funding from local donors to start the project.71
Operating and running an orphanage is expensive. Not surprisingly, therefore, not many Muslim orphanages have been established and few, if any, receive government support. Some imams who take care of orphans have made use of social media to call for assistance, for example, the imam of Agogo central mosque, Ashanti Region, who, through his Facebook group and local NGO Friends for the Needy, posts calls for assistance in kind and cash for 36 orphans and needy children.72 The NGO combines self-help with making calls for external, local, national and international donations; among its former activities, volunteers of the NGO cultivated 9 acres of maize in 2019 to reach the NGO’s objectives.73
The engagements of Muslim NGO s is a parallel phenomenon. Among the oldest initiatives is the Orphan’s Project of the Ghana Society for Islamic Education and Reform (GSIER). Starting in 1996 in Madina, Accra, its Orphan’s Project became the responsibility of the women-wing of GSIER. The core idea of the Orphan’s Project is to take care of orphans, assist them financially and morally, and give them an academic and religious education.74 In addition, GSIER sponsors over 200 orphans in various primary, junior and senior high schools in Accra and 10 in universities. Since 2017, it has organised an annual Orphans Day.75 This seems to have sparked off several Muslim organisations to organise similar events. Islamic Ummah of Ghana, for example, supported World Orphans’ Day in 2018,76 while Zongo Inspiration Team (ZIT) arranged a big orphans’ party in Accra on World Orphans’ Day in 2018.77 In 2019, ZIT collaborated with Rayuwa Foundation to celebrate World Orphans Day.78 The Light Foundation runs an online orphans sponsor programme via its e-application found on the organisation’s homepage.79
The Ghanaian-UK Justice Yateem Foundation (JYK, established in 2018) runs an orphans sponsorship scheme in Ejura, catering for the school fees, clothing and upkeep of 400 orphans.80 The Salaga Islamic Research Foundation (SIRF, established in 2014) runs a monthly orphans support programme in Salaga;81 the Accra-based Race 4 Aid supports 202 orphans with monthly stipends in Kumasi and Tamale.82 In turn, Care Bridge Foundation (established in 2020) supports the Taqwa Orphanage and School in Accra and Kpawumo Children’s Home outside Tamale, joining the IUR fundraising campaign for constructing the Al-Amaam Orphanage in Potsin.83 Furthermore, the Tarbiyya Foundation sponsors orphans in Accra, Kumasi, Yeji, Prang, Atebubu, Ejura, and Wenchi.84
A few Muslim organisations donate to and support Muslim children in (denominational) orphanages, including The Light Foundation and the Muslim Health Workers’ Association of Ghana.85 Some Salafi youth groups are sceptical about this approach. The Muslim Youth Hereafter Project (MYHP), therefore, instigated its orphans’ programme in July 2020. The programme aims to focus on the capacity building of orphans rather than merely supporting them once a year. MYHP motivates its programme by a strong belief in the necessity to infuse the orphans with the teaching of Islam. The activists of the MYHP even declare on Facebook:
Finding yourself in an orphanage in Ghana makes you a non-Muslim by default, as there are no Islamic activities or policies for Muslim orphans.86
This is clearly an overstatement as many sheikhs and imams take care of orphans in their schools or run orphanages. Nevertheless, MYHP wants “[…] to be the mouthpiece of orphans, especially Muslim orphans in Ghana,” and decided to undertake four major programmes within the year in addition to intermitted “mini-projects.” In addition, the orphans’ programme was concentrated on the Nyohini Orphanage in the Northern Region, and the MYHP embarked on its first training programme for volunteers as well as launched its first support campaign for the programme ahead of Eid al-Adha in July 2020.87
Other Muslim NGO s run similar projects and programmes. The Ghana Academy of Muslim Professionals (GAMP) decided in 2008 to launch the Orphans Support Project, OSP. Based each year on the financial capacity of the project, the OSP identified recipients and assisted them through their home guardians. GAMP covered for school fees, provided subsistence money and bought learning and teaching material for about 20 orphans.88 However, it seems as if the OSP became dormant in recent years. Instead, GAMP donates annually to various orphanages.89 The Kumasi-based Kafilul Yateem Foundation for Social Services in Ahinsan, the Markaz Aleawn Alyaqin Humanitarian Services in Old Tafo and the Ummah Foundation run local orphans support programmes usually on an ad hoc basis as they rely on external funding.90 The Sekondi-Takoradi branch of FOMWAG as well as the Takoradi-based Attaqwa Foundation, in turn, have made donations to the Daboase Orphanage.91
Several youth organisations, among others the Ghana Islamic Youth Sadaqa Association and the Ghana Muslim Student Association’s section at KNUST, alongside NGO s run by Muslim celebrities such as Problems Shared Problems Solved Foundation and the Essa Ajeman Charity Foundation, solicit donations for assisting orphans via their networks on social media.92 The Al-Yataama Care Foundation, for example, runs collection campaigns through its WhatApp group, among others its ‘Schools Bag Donation’ scheme (in total GHS 3580 collected and 100 school bags purchased in September/early October 2022), its ‘Donate a Bicycle for Orphan’ project and its ‘OrphansBack2School’ project (total estimated cost for both projects: GHS 16,830).93 The Tamale-based MY Akhirah Account has organised Ramadan outreach programmes in Tamale, Bimbila, Kumasi and Accra since 2017; in 2022, the group launched the Eid for orphans-project as part of its donations during Eid al-Adha.94
Another common practice is the distribution of food and clothes to orphans during the Eid festivals. Some initiatives have existed for decades, including Haji Abubakar Yakubu Batalima’s Society for the Assistance to the Orphans and the Disabled (SAFOAD), noted in Ghanaian newspapers since the late 1990s.95 Others are recent ones, for example, the Orphans Sallah Parties organised in at various location in Accra by Immaa-Allah Foundation,96 Al-Qalam Institute,97 and the Baye Do Everything;98 the support to orphans in Chereponi and Tamale by Bunyan Foundation;99 the Orphans Iftar organised in Kumasi by Al-Aziz Humanitarian Projects,100 Al-Bushra Foundation,101 and Al-Mannan Charity Foundation;102 or those organised in Ejura by the Justice Yateem Foundation.103
Similarly, the Tamale-based Kpibsi Mini Gbala Foundation (established in 2017) has supported orphans in several locations in the northern parts of the country, including Tamale, Savelugu, Kumbungu, Bimbila, Walewale, Bolgatanga and Yendi, since 2018.104 In recent years, these events have developed into massive celebrations, as was when the Accra branch of the Ghana Muslim Mission feted over a thousand orphans, widows and widowers at Eid al-Adha in 2019, a project it had launched one year earlier.105 This practice, too, has its roots in the traditional and informal forms of local assistance but has become an institutionalised, formal and public event during the age of social media, and many local Muslim NGO s have managed to generate both internal as well as external/foreign annual funding for these projects. Some of them earmark their Eid donations to orphans.
Starting in 2012, GAMP has been involved in the supervision of the distribution of relief items to orphans and deprived families during Ramadan (food packages) and Eid al-Adha (ritually slaughtered cow meat). The IHH of Turkey and the WEFA of Germany have mainly supported this annual relief service. GAMP’s target group for its Eid Orphans Relief has been the “forgotten orphans”, or those whom imams and Muslim chiefs identify as not receiving any care from an orphanage and have been registered by GAMP before the food distribution day.106 The Kafilul Yateem Foundation for Social Services (probably) receives donations from Arab/Saudi philanthropists for its Eid donations to orphans.107
The Save Aid Project, in turn, belongs to the NGO s launched during the age of social media and solicits donations from its members via Facebook. The Accra-based Muslim NGO started in 2018 to organise special Eid-ul Adha parties with orphans, the first in 2020 at “an orphanage in Accra”, the second in 2021 at the Islamic Charity Centre—Children’s Home and Quranic Memorisation School in Kasoa.108
Similar activities were organised by the Islamic Ummah of Ghana (IUG) in cooperation with the NGO Global Muslimah Dilemma (GMD). Starting in 2017, IUG and GMD organised their first Iftar gatherings for orphans and widows in Accra.109 In April 2018, IUG posted a call to raise funds to provide iftar for over 1,000 orphans and widows; two months later, IUG and GMD were feeding orphans and widows in Accra and providing food and clothes for 100 orphans in an orphanage in Awutu Akropong, Central Region.110 Later in the year, the Accra-based Islamic Centre for Future Women donated food, toiletries and other provisions to the Mercy Islamic School Orphanage.111 The Accra-based Rayuwa Foundation, in turn, organised World Orphans Day in 2018 and 2019; the latter one was held in Kanda, Accra, and gathered 500 orphans, street children, and less privileged ones in Accra.112 To mitigate the negative impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, members of the Rayuwa Foundation organised an outreach event and donated clothes, toys and stationery to the Chosen Children’s Center Orphanage in Darkuman, Accra, in November 2020.113
Empowered Sisters in Deen (ESID) started its activities by launching the ESID Face of Sadaqa initiative in December 2018. The initial initiative, soon termed the ESID Orphanage Project, was in support of the Boadi Islamic Orphanage Home in Kumasi in January 2019. After the inception of the organisation in April 2019, the initiative turned into an annual event supported by its national branches. In February 2020, ESID donated to Taqwa Orphanage School; in February 2021, it visited Tamale Children’s Home; in February 2022, it supported Father’s Orphanage Home in Anto, Western Region.114
During the age of social media, a common feature is video calls on YouTube and Facebook to support local (ad hoc) outreach programmes for orphans. Hajia Wasila Mohammed’s NGO Nuur Fauka Nuur, also known by its Hausa name Haske Bisa Kan Haske (both meaning Light upon Light), among others, generates funds for its orphan Ramadan/Eid al-Fitr/Eid al-Adha programmes through local donations generated by calls for sadaqa in Hausa in its video postings on Facebook.115 Hajia Wasila Mohammed, also known as Queen Lucky, is a public TV celebrity, hosts her own show on Hijrah TV, Taimaka Min, and operates an orphan’s home in Accra.116
NIMA Cares, likewise, solicited funds for its COVID-19 Food Distribution for Orphans and Street Children Project in September 2020;117 Chief Alhaji Sulley Issah Foundation (established in 2019) as well as Teimako and Blessings Organisation raises funds for Darus-Salam Orphanage;118 Fadil Islamic Foundation for the Taqwa Orphanage;119 Ar-Rahman Foundation solicits funds for its 2020-initiated orphans and street children project in Accra as well as in support of the Darus-Salam Orphanage;120 whereas Peace Charity Foundation (established 2019) raises support for orphans in Ejura.121 Taqwa Daʿawa and Development Foundation, in turn, raises funds for its Ramadan Charity Fund as well as its orphan’s sponsorship programme; in March 2023, it called for 200 persons to donate 20 cedis, by mid-April, the call had yielded GHS 2,618.122 Other organisations, for example, Help Orphans Tamale and the Orphan Relief and Sponsorship of Islamic Welfare Aid Ghana, use social media merely as an open call for support, hoping to attract the attention of an international donor and have left few other traces about their activities on the internet.123
3 Prison Inmates
A previously ad hoc form of humanitarian assistance transformed into a recurrent annual event is targeted donations to Muslim prison inmates. An eyeopener was perhaps the visit of the Ghana Muslim Academy to James Fort Prisons in Accra in 2003. The members were astonished to know that about two-thirds of the more than 700 inmates were Muslims. Very much touched by the situation, the Academy decided to embark on the Prisons Reformation Project in 2003.124 (However, the project’s outcome is unknown, nor if it continued with the programme over the years to follow.)
Little is known about ad hoc donations to Muslim prison inmates before they started to be announced in public. For example, unnoticed in public for fifteen years, the annual donations to Nsawam Medium Security Prisons by a group of Muslims coordinated by Alhaji Seebaway Zakariya aka Paapa Angola and Malam Faatullahi at the Eid al-Mawlid al-Nawabi, the birthday of Prophet Muhammad, only hit the headlines in 2016.125
It is likely that similar donations were made during Ramadan and the Eid festivals. A few of them hit headlines, for example when a local Kumasi-based Muslim NGO, the Islamic Library for Reading and Recording Centre, made a donation to inmates of the Central and Manhyia Prisons in Kumasi in 2009,126 or when the Muslim community at Agona Swedru donated items worth GHS 1,000 (ca. 160 USD) to the Gomoa Osamkrom Prison Camp in 2013.127 Since then, and assumably correlating with the expansion of Muslim NGO s and their excessive use of social media, donations to Muslim prison inmates during the Eid festivals have become an annual affair.
Nsawam Prison has been one of the prime targets for Eid donations. In 2015, it received rice, Islamic books, clothes, and toiletries valued at GHS 3,000 (ca. 485 USD) from Sadaqa Train as part of the organisation’s outreach campaign.128 In 2016, when the prison counted close to 900 Muslims among its 3,350 inmates,129 Islam for Ghana organised a donation campaign with Al-Mumin Foundation—Ghana for its Muslim inmates.130 Al-Mumin Foundation continued its Iftar programme for Nsawam Prisons in 2017 and 2018; the latter year is intended to feed 1,000 men and 20 women inmates and planned to start a rehabilitation project to teach the inmates tailoring, weaving and craft.131 In 2019, Nsawam Prisons received items worth GHS 15,000 (ca. 2,500 USD) from Kabore Oil Limited (KOL) as an Eid donation.132
A few weeks earlier, Crime Creek Foundation (CCF) directed a Ramadan donation it had received from the US Muslim charity Amaana Foundation to the prison.133 In 2020, Crime Creek Foundation repeated its Ramadan donation to the prison, funded by an anonymous donor and Hajia Barikisu based in the USA.134 KOL and CCF are neither Muslim run enterprises nor especially targeting Muslims in ordinary activities but stand out as non-Muslim initiatives addressing the needs of a distinctive section of the Muslim community. Moreover, CCF’s donation must have been ad hoc, as there is no note about it on its Facebook account. However, a local Muslim initiative resurfaced in 2021 when the Problems Shared Problems Solved Foundation launched a fundraising campaign to collect clothes, food and money for Muslims inmates at Nsawam Prisons.135
Other prisons in Ghana’s southern parts have occasionally received ad hoc Eid donations for its Muslim inmates. In 2017, Ar-Rahman Ar-Rahim Foundation posted a call and coupon for its Ramadan feeding programme 2017 for Muslim inmates at Kumasi Prison;136 in 2019, Eid Feast Ghana donated to the prison;137 in 2023, Al-Mannan Charity Foundation donated at Eid al-Ahda to Kumasi Central Female Prison.138 Al-Mumin Foundation organised Ramadan Iftar for Muslim inmates in Cape Coast’s Ankaful Prisons in May 2018.139 In 2020 and 2023, the Ghana Academy of Muslim Professionals donated food and assorted items to inmates and officers at James Camp Prisons in Accra.140 The Mother of all Nations Foundation started its Iftar with Inmates Programme in 2021 at various locations in Greater Accra, among others La Nkwatang Madina Police Station and James Camp prisons (in 2023).141 The Munsam Foundation provided Iftar and Eid meals for Muslim prisoners in Amanfrom Prisons,142 whereas the Hand to Hold Foundation to those in Awutu Senya Camp Prisons (in 2023).143 The Cape Coast Circuit of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Mission, in turn, made headlines with its Ramadan donation to Ankaful Prisons in April 2021.144
Public donations to Tamale Prisons started during Ramadan 2017 when The Bamba Islamic Institute, Ghana, donated items worth GHS 270,000 (ca. 44,000 USD) as part of its social welfare programme to its inmates. In a press release, Sheikh Amin Bamba, CEO of Bamba Islamic Institute, urged other Muslim NGO s and philanthropists to assist prison inmates, as the government was incapable of meeting their needs.145 Likewise, and perhaps encouraged by Sheikh Amin Bamba, the Muslim Youth Hereafter Project launched a campaign to provide Iftar for 100 Muslim inmates at Tamale Prisons.146 Another organisation that responded to Sheikh Amin Bamba’s call was Awakening Muslimah. Since 2018, the organisation has provided Suhur and Iftar meals for Muslim inmates at Tamale Prisons during Ramadan.147 It launched the Ramadan Prison Feeding Campaign on Facebook for donations in cash and kind, and at least in 2020, Awakening Muslimah managed to provide 2,520 Suhur and Iftar packets.148 In 2021, it moved the Ramadan prison feeding campaign to its newly designed homepage, managing to reach 90 per cent of its targeted GHS 6,000 (ca. 970 USD) budget.149 As a result, Awakening Muslimah provided meals for 220 Muslim inmates in April 2021,150 increasing it to 320 one month later.151 In 2023, the FOMWAG Northern Region joined to provide Iftar donations to Tamale Central Prisons.152
Muslim inmates in other northern prisons have rather seldom been the target for public fundraising campaigns of Muslim NGO s. Nevertheless, the Eid donation by Sadaqa Train in May 2019,153 alongside the combined effort of two southern Zongo youth groups, Zongo First International and Youth Connect Ghana, to raise funds for Eid donations to Navrongo Prisons in May 2021,154 indicates perhaps a new trend in the annual ‘Eid for prisoners’ campaigns. In Wa, the 2019-established local NGO HealthWay Foundation celebrated Eid al-Fitr with the inmates at Wa Central Prisons, arranged health screening for them in 2019,155 and repeated its Eid outreach in 2020 and 2021.156
Not only Muslim NGO s, celebrities and philanthropists but also public persons, political associations and volunteer groups have started to address the plight of Muslim inmates. For example, Hajia Samira Bawumira, the wife of Vice-President Dr Mahamudu Bawumira, initiated Eid al-Fitr donations to Nsawam Prisons as part of her corporate social responsibility in 2017.157 The Alpha Patriots, a volunteer group in the New Patriotic Party (NPP), donated food to Muslim inmates of Bawku Central Prisons in April 2021,158 whereas NDC politician Hajia Zuweiru Ibrahimah made Eid donations to Salaga Prisons in 2020 and 2021.159 This seems to correlate with the increased visibility of politicians and political parties during Ramadan and the Eid festivals.
A new chapter in mobilising assistance for Muslim prison inmates opened in 2019 when Alhaji Inusah Salley, a Muslim entrepreneur in Accra, sponsored a borehole project as sadaqa jariya in Kumasi Prisons. Initiated by Ashanti Regional Prisons Commander together with Alhaji Papa Angola, the project was subsequently commissioned by the National Chief Imam Sheikh Osman Nuhu Sharubutu.160 In the same year, the regional branches of the Empowered Sisters in Deen (ESID) started their nationwide ‘Ramadan Iftar with prison inmates’ by visiting prisons in nine regions.161
4 Ad Hoc Calls for Persons in Need
A recurring feature is ad hoc calls for donations to assist needy persons. This is a kind of modernised version of informal and traditional almsgiving where a donor renders support in cash or kind to a person in the community. While the traditional way was usually connected to wealthy Muslims doling out alms to “their” beggars after the Friday prayers, Muslim associations and NGO s identify poor persons in the communities, usually widows and elderly, and adopt them as “their” clients. For example, Ghana Islamic Youth Sadaqa Association (GIYSA) has effectively made use of social media to solicit donations for “our old blind woman” in Wassa Nkran village near Tarkwa,162 “our old granny and her sister” in Peki village in Volta Region,163 a widow in Tamale,164 widows and their children in Accra,165 or as well as street-beggar boys and girls.166 Sometimes the sums are very small, as was the case when GIYSA wanted to assist an old blind woman in Peki village to pay her transportation costs to join the Friday prayers in the local mosque.167 Sometimes the group tries to raise sums as large as GHS 12,000 to pay the cost for surgery of an older woman.168
The main difference between the traditional and modern ways of ad hoc almsgiving is the trans-local, transnational, if not global outreach of the calls for donations on social media. Like other organisations, GIYSA can rely on a network of followers living in Ghana and abroad and at least once, it received a donation from an anonymous private donor in the USA to be used to assist local poor people during the COVID-19 lockdown.169 Sunna Hausa Relief Organisation, to give another example, received donations in 2019 to cover the cost of one Sheikh Abdul Karim’s treatment, among others GHS 6,050 (ca. 980 USD) from Nurul Islam, GHS 4,000 (ca. 650 USD) from Darul Hadith and USD 50 from “one Malama in Aboabo No. 1”.170
Another novelty not connected with the traditional form of almsgiving is the impetus, especially of Muslim youth associations, to turn ad hoc doles into funding for self-help as is demonstrated by a Facebook posting by GIYSA in early 2021:
Assalam alaikum warahmatullah wabarakatuhu. Today we embarked on a street survey to interact with one of the street beggars to make some enquires.
*There is a woman with 4 children around the traffic light of 3rd gate (Ashaley Botwe) road*. We went to her and asked her why she is begging instead of working, and she replied due to no other job alternative, whereas the kids too 3 of them are her grandchildren too as well. Our conversation got to a point where she even began to tell us much about how she would be happy if we can set up a small-scale business for her, she would be happy because life has been unbearable for her.
*However we asked her what type of business can she run. She gave us a lot of business ideas, especially she attest*[sic] kokoo with koose is one of the best she is good at and she will be happy if we can help her up with that. She is not asking for money. All she need is for us to help her get work to do and she would be extremely happy.
However we have looked for a site along the roadside for her; now we are only left with capital to set up a kooko and koose business for her.
However we cannot do this on our own. Therefore we are calling out to brothers and sisters in Islam. Walahi, this woman is from our own. Let’s contribute and support her to make her dreams come true. No matter what, she is our sister in Deen and we share the same faith with her. Let’s reach out to her before people from other faith help her and later luring her away from Islam because she didn’t feel the sense of belonginess. *The haddith says, poverty is almost disbelief*
Let’s reach out to her so she can take care of her 4 kids as life is indeed a great struggle. Donate via 0249530504 […] and let’s reach out to this beautiful sister of ours, remember tables do turn.171
GIYSA terms its outreach campaigns as ‘Jihad tours’. Like other Muslim youth organisations inspired by or linked to Salafi groups, such as Sadaqa Train (see Chapter 3.6 below), humanitarian assistance closely connects to their daʿwa mission. The effect of social media has been a profound one, as is demonstrated by the numerous videos the Muslim youth organisation have posted on Facebook showing, for example, the amount of food stuff and material goods that its members already have donated (and making calls for further donations).172
5 Persons with Disabilities
Contemporary Ghanaian society has witnessed a wide range of technological, economic and political changes since the 1990s. While they have generated political and economic stability on a macro level, some of them even resulting in a drop in the relative number of poor households during the last decades, the vulnerability of distinct groups in society remains unresolved due to the limited capacity and outreach of the state-funded social welfare system. Major challenges are child protection, rural-urban drift, persons with disabilities (PWD), conjugal violence and care of the elderly. The absence of a child welfare system is symptomatic. The Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey of 2006 already concluded that about 15 per cent of Ghanaian children were not living with their biological parents and 8 per cent of them had one or both parents dead at the time of the survey. Furthermore, according to the Ghana National HIV and AIDS Report from 2010, there were about 1.4 million orphans and vulnerable children in 2009. The majority of children and youth in poor rural households, Baffoe and Dako-Gyeke noted, migrate to urban regional centres and metropoles where they end up as street beggars. Although there are a few public and private orphanages, they further highlighted that these institutions and homes were not adequately resourced, faced inadequate funding, lacked professional staff, and most of them were overcrowded with children.173
Persons with disabilities (PWD s) face similar challenges. For long stigmatised and largely marginalised in both society and academic research, the 2006 United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities propelled the passing of the 2006 Persons With Disabilities Act in Ghana and, as recent critical overviews indicate, promoted a surge of research into stigma and disability rights in Ghana.174 Based on figures from the 2010 census, the Ghana Statistical Service estimated that 3 per cent of the total population of almost 740,000 individuals were classified as PWD s, including persons with visual, physical, speech, hearing, emotional/behavioural and intellectual disabilities.175 Individuals with physical and speech impairments have not attracted much, if any, special attention from Muslim NGO s but is usually lumped among “the needy” and “the destitute”,176 although the Accra-based NGO Islamic Bureau for the Disabled and Service to Islamic Institutions has occasionally provided wheelchairs and monthly support to persons with physical impairments.177
Individuals with emotional or intellectual disabilities, in turn, belong to the most stigmatised persons in Ghanaian society. Hitherto, faith-based and traditional healers,178 including Muslim healers,179 have treated treat many if not most of them. For long, no Muslim NGO s had them on their agenda with the exception of the Kumasi-based Al-Bushra Foundation, a novel initiative to carter for the well-being of people with Down Syndrome.180
5.1 A School for Visually Impaired Muslim Children
The largest segment among PWD s is those with visual impairment. Based on WHO data, the Ghana Health Service estimated about one per cent or 240,000 persons to be blind and three per cent of the population to suffer from visual impairment.181 Blindness, especially when caused by onchocerciasis or river blindness, has been historically a vice of many rural communities, although effective control programmes have substantially reduced its endemic prevalence and confined the disease to the Lake Volta and Black Volta river area.182 Further, there is a great urban-rural variation in the number of blind persons, as indicated by a study comparing the prevalence of blindness in Wenchi (bilateral blindness among persons above 30 years is 1.7 per cent) and a village near the Black Volta river (percentage of bilateral blindness as high as 8.1 per cent).183
Targeted interventions for educating and training blind persons started in the 1940s. Starting as private institutes, most if not all of them tied to Christian initiatives, there are five publicly recognised schools for the blind who receive government subsidies or are monitored by the Ministry of Education.184 They all face several challenges and constraints, not least a chronic lack of funding, equipment and material for education alongside professional instructors.185 The regional imbalance is striking, only one of the schools is located in the northern parts of the country, and calls by the Ghana Blind Union to establish a blind school in Tamale resulted in sympathy but little action.186
The novel initiative of Mustapha Ibrahim, national spokesperson of Muslim blind students, to build a school for the blind outside Tamale ranks among the few targeted projects that has generated a national and even international appeals when the initiative was backed by several Muslim NGO s, see below. Previously, Muslim groups and philanthropists would support schools inhabiting blind Muslim children, such as when The Light Foundation donated to the Akropong School for the Blind in September 2014.187 Two months later, the Foundation delivered meat packages to the school as part of its Udhiya donations.188 However, these donations were ad hoc rather than recurrent events, as there are no further postings about such campaigns on the Foundation’s Facebook account. Likewise, the Iftar donations to Muslim inmates at Akropong School for the Blind by Al-Mumin Foundation in May 2017 and the Eid fest organised by Faata Africa and charity donations by Ghana Islamic Research Association in 2023 stands out as an ad hoc events.189 Sadaqa Train, in comparison, had organised annual visits to the school between 2015 and 2020,190 alongside distributed the Qurʾan in Braille script to visually impaired Muslim pupils.191 The Islamic Centre for Future Women, in turn, donated to the School of the Blind in Aburi in 2019.192 The Hikmatullah Research Foundation, furthermore, had targeted the Wa School for the Death and Blind for its Ramadan donation and Iftar campaigns in 2016 and 2017.193
None of the Muslim NGO s had initiated any intervention programmes to address the educational needs of visually impaired Muslims. Ayisha Frimpong, the director for the Accra (?)-based ‘Disable Muslim Network’,194 made this observation at a meeting organised by the Istanbul-based International Union of Braille Quran Services in November 2019 to promote Braille Qurʾan literacy in sub-Saharan Africa. Out of 35 special schools in Ghana, she noted, none took account of the special needs of Muslim children not speak about providing classes in Islamic studies.195
Concurrent with Ayisha Frimpong’s urge to address the special needs of blind Muslim children and students in 2019 was the emergence of Mustapha Ibrahim as their national spokesperson. He founded his NGO Janat-ul-Firdause Charity Foundation in 2013, became a blogger in 2018 and became one year later the National Co-ordinator of Blind Muslim Students. He and his foundation, as well as his 2021-established company Kausar Drilling Services, have within the last decade emerged as the main facilitator for empowering Muslim PWD s and orphans.196
Starting with donations from Sadaqa Train and Al-Huda WhatsApp Group Canada in 2019, Mustapha Ibrahim’s Foundation has provided monthly sponsorship packages and schemes for blind and deaf Muslim students at various schools throughout the country, among others, Koforidua School for the Deaf, Akropong School for the Blind, Wa Senior High School, Wenchi Methodist Senior High School, and Wa School for the Blind. Since 2020, the US charity Wal Jamaha Alliance Charity Foundation has funded the scholarship programme.197 In addition, the Janat-ul-Firdause Charity Foundation through a Canadian donor has supported the Alhaq Islamic Orphanage in Ashaiman alongside running an orphans adoption programme (currently, two orphans have been adopted by US philanthropists). Furthermore, external donations have enabled Mustapha Ibrahim’s foundation to provide for Iftar and Qurban. Internal donations, on the other hand, have been difficult to mobilise, as only few of the 112 members on Mustapha Ibrahim’s WhatsApp list are capable to do so. Moreover, the COVID-19 pandemic and the economic recession that hit Ghana in 2022 has made fundraising extremely difficult, Mustapha Ibrahim explained to me in October 2022.198
Several years after Ayisha Frimpong’s appeal, a Ghanaian Muslim NGO finally launched the first special target project for empowering visually impaired Muslims, the Ali Amir School for Blind Muslims. Originally as an initiative of Mustapha Ibrahim, it gained backing from Muslim Influencer Khalifa Faith and his Peace Dawah Media and its charity branch, the Ali Amin Foundation. In 2021, they launched an ambitious project on social media to support the building of the school.199 Managing to raise USD 15,000 as a starting capital, the organisation purchased land at Barekese, Ashanti Region, and Oyibi, Greater Accra Region, for the project. Construction work at Oyibi started in the same year with an initial capital of USD 10,000; total cost of the project amounting to GHS 1.3 million. Work at Barekese was scheduled to start later in 2021.200 Both centres were outlined as a modern educational complex and is to include a masjid, a Qurʾan memorisation centre, classroom blocks, a vocational training centre, a Western education centre, a dormitory, a teachers’ hall and a health clinic.201 Mustapha Ibrahim joined the campaign in May 2021 and started to share the fundraising calls via his network on social media.202 In June 2021, Muslim influencer and media celebrity Ibrahim Baba Maltiti and his NGO Problems Shared Problems Solved,203 alongside Muslim philanthropist Abdul Mannan Ibrahim and his Al-Mannan Charity Foundation joined the campaign.204 In August 2021, the host of The Punchline Show Alhaji Hafiz joined the campaign.205
The fundraising campaign itself is a prime example of a younger generation of Muslim activists such as Mustapha Ibrahim, Khalifa Faith and Ibrahim Baba Maltiti or Muslim news platforms such as The Punchline. All of them use social media with continuous postings of promotion videos by Muslim celebrities and videos showing the progress of the construction work as well as crowdsourcing to solicit donations nationally and from abroad. A project account exists at
A major breakthrough of the school project occurred in February 2022. In an interview to Joy News, Chief Executive Officer of Ali Amir Foundation Alifa Sallah excitedly declared that the response to the project had been massive and positive. High-ranking public persons had donated to the cause in kind and cash, among others Vice President Alhaji Dr Mahamadu Bawumia, former President John Dramani Mahama alongside the National Chief Imam and the Chief Imam of the Ahlus-Sunna. Total cost of the project stood at GHS 1,000,000, and the project was expected to be finished by 2024. Once completed, the school will then be handed over to the government.208 In August 2022, Peace Dawah Media announced on Facebook that the project had reached its fifth phase, and issued a call for donations to finish the plastering the classrooms and for buying doors.209 In September 2022, the First Gibrine Foundation made a donation to the project.210
However, the finishing of the school project has yet a long way to go, especially as it lacks funds (as per October 2022) to construct a masjid, dormitories and a playground. Mustapha Ibrahim, lamented that most Muslims are rather shallow or do not donate to the campaign. This, he fears, is mainly due to the prevailing prejudices against blind and visually impaired persons in Ghana, upheld by the negative image of the ‘blind (Muslim) beggar’. Nevertheless, he is still confident about that the school could open by the end of 2022/early 2023 if only funds were forthcoming. Currently, there are three visually impaired students in South Africa for training, he informed me, including learning the Braille script for blind Muslims, who will start as teachers at the school when it opens.211
5.2 A School for Deaf Muslim Children
About 0.4 per cent of the Ghanaian population are estimated to be individuals with hearing impairments.212 This group, too, has become a special target group of Muslim NGO s. The first school for the deaf was established in 1957; today, there are about 16 schools for the deaf.213 One of them is the Savelugu School for the Deaf located in Savelugu, Northern Region, the only special providing Islamic tutorials and education to Muslim children with hearing impairments.
The founding of the Muslim Deaf Development (MDD) marked perhaps the first step toward a coordinated attempt to address the plight of a discriminated and marginalised group of Muslims in Ghana. Speaking at the launching event of the organisation in Tamale in 2012, MDD Director Iddrisu Mukhtar214 informed that the organisation was affiliated with the US-based Global Deaf Muslims (GDM),215 and was committed to working with parents, Islamic scholars, and organisations to advance Islamic education of deaf Muslims. In addition, MDD would facilitate dialogue between deaf and hearing Muslims, promote awareness of deaf rights, and enhance the provision of sign language interpreters at mosques and other Islamic events.216 Since its inception, MDD has annually organised Iftar, Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha celebrations at its centre in Tamale,217 largely (if not solely?) enabled by donations from Global Deaf Muslims.218 For example, in 2023, MDD received donations from Global Deaf Muslim Foundation, enabling it to provide Iftar in 2023 at Savelugu School for the Deaf (78 deaf Muslims), Mamprong Senior Technical School for the deaf (60), Gbeogo School for the Deaf in Bolgatanga (46), Tamale Center (180), Yendi Deaf District (30), and St. John’s Integrated SHS in Navrongo-Tono (48).219
MDD, through financial assistance from GDM, has launched several programmes at its centre in Tamale.220 In April 2013, it started a free ICT training programme in sign language and Islamic classes in sign language. Five months later, it started Friday sermon interpretations in sign language221 and collaborated with the National Road Safety Commission, a road safety campaign for the deaf in November 2013.222 Moreover, MDD, through funds received from the GDM Zakat Fund, has been able to assist individual deaf Muslims.223
A recurring topic of MDD and GMD has been to solicit support for the Savelugu School of the Deaf (SAVEDEAF) and its 250+ students. They made a first donation in April 2013 to support the SAVEDEAF water project,224 namely installing a water tank. In 2019, GMD initiated a new campaign on the global fundraising platform LaunchGood, the Masjid for the Deaf, to raise USD 25,000 to renovate and modernise the school mosque and build bathrooms and washrooms for males and female students, dig water well, hire an imam and two sign interpreters. When the campaign closed in early August 2020, it had raised USD 5,630; enough funds to pay for a water well and to start the renovation of the masjid.225
MDD stands out as the only Ghanaian Muslim NGO exclusively focussing on empowering deaf Muslims. A few other Ghanaian Muslim NGO s have organised ad hoc campaigns to assist such persons with hearing impairments. For example, The Light Foundation donated to the Mampong-Akuapem Demonstration School for the Deaf as part of its Ebola Campaign in September 2014. In contrast, the Muslim Youth Hereafter Project provided food items to the Association of the Deaf for distribution among 40 deaf “brothers and sisters” as part of its COVID-19 campaign in July 2020. The Islamic Centre for Future Women assisted the School of Deaf and Dumb in the Eastern Region in 2021.226
6 Mobilising sadaqa in Support of Deprived Communities
An early instigator of combining calls for sadaqa, social media and daʿwa projects has been the Salafi youth movement Muslim Youth Project (MYP). In 2013, it started an outreach project for the propagation of Islam in rural communities. An integral part of the MYP campaigns for donations is social media, such as calls for Mobile Money donations and the dissemination of videos of tours to villages on Facebook and YouTube.227 In 2014, MYP extended its activities and launched a campaign to raise funds for its Syria Aid Project (#Ghana4Syria).228 Although its calls initially did not use the term sadaqa but charity, the English quotes from the Qurʾan refer to verses where sadaqa is discussed.229 MYP soon generated an impressive number of followers on Facebook (6,996 by May 2019, 6,524 by early July 2022; although the last update on the Facebook account was in 2015).
Concurrent with the Muslim Youth Project was the beginning of another youth movement named Sadaqa Train in August 2013. Although sometimes cooperating with the Muslim Youth Project, Sadaqa Train is not linked to any particular Sunni group (Salafi or Tijani).230 Furthermore, in contrast to the Muslim Youth Project, Sadaqa Train has become a registered (independent) charity (increasing its followers from 1,863 on Facebook as of May 2019, to 2,434 by early July 2022) and has expanded its activities to cover the whole country with coordinating units in Accra, Kumasi and Tamale.231
Sadaqa Train hit the headlines when the newspapers reported that some Muslim students had joined ISIS in late August 2015. A few days later, it was revealed that three of the youngsters had been members of Sadaqa Train and belonged to its WhatsApp group.232 The revelation resulted in a public outcry, and Muslim leaders condemned in public ISIS and any form of extremism.233 The leader of Sadaqa Train, in turn, reacted to the accusations that Sadaqa Train was spreading extremist ideas and declared in a radio interview:
I don’t believe shutting down the group is a good way. That will mean giving credence to the claims that we are for ISIS when we are not.234
In early September 2015, Sadaqa Train published a statement declaring that the organisation is a registered non-governmental Muslim youth organisation; its main aim is “to bridge the gap of comfort and knowledge between the cities and rural communities in Ghana.” It further highlighted the peaceful dimension of its mission to reach out to Muslims in the hinterland to share knowledge and charity. Finally, it assured that its WhatsApp group had never discussed extremist ideas, nor did the organisation “… even remotely entertained any ideas of terrorist activities.”235
Figure 27
Sadaqa Train. Cover of the 2019 Annual Report
Author’s collection
The public declarations of Sadaqa Tarin founder Sharif Shaban a.k.a. Jannah Focus cleared the air and the organisation survived the crisis in 2015. To further increase the transparency and accountability of its operations, Sadaqa Train has published annual reports including financial statistics of its activities and projects on its homepage since 2015 (see Figure 27). Initially, its main source of funding came through donations in both cash and kind, collected through social media broadcasts as well as through “Masjid and Market Storms”, i.e., by visiting selected mosques and markets to raise funds.236 At first, all community visits were organised Accra but as a way to cut expenses for transportation, Sadaqa Train branched out into three regional sectors with operational centres in Accra (Southern Sector), Kumasi (Middle Sector) and Tamale (Northern Sector). This was sufficient to cover the expenses of the charity and daʿwa trips to remote rural locations during the early phase.237 Annually, each sector organised community and prison visits, termed “Triple Trips”, although the COVID-19 pandemic halted the rural outreach programmes in 2020 and 2021. In addition, Sadaqa Train made annual donations to orphanages and widows; this activity was not affected by COVID-19.238
Sadaqa Train’s range of activities expanded in 2017 when it commissioned its first borehole project, resulting in a substantial increase of its annual budget. According to the financial reports, annual internally collected donations varied from ca. GHS 17,400 (USD 4,200) in 2015, GHS 15,600 (USD 3,900) in 2016 and GHS 17,500 (USD 6,600) in 2017.239 From 2017 to 2019, the organisation funded eight water projects in rural communities,240 a ninth in 2020,241 and three in 2021.242 Funding for the water projects is provided by private Ghanaian philanthropists and donors, amounting to GHS 12,000 in 2017 (figures for 2018 are not available), GHS 40,000 in 2019, GHS 10,500 in 2020, and GHS 31,000 in 2021.243
Another new project is the “Zakaatul Fitr Project”. Starting as a campaign on Facebook in 2016, “Send your zakat al-fitr cash (estimated GHS 10 per saʿa) to buy rice packages for the needy.”244 Together with the “Ramadan Food Drive”, the project has become an integral part of its annual humanitarian relief efforts and has replaced the community visits in 2020 and 2021. Furthermore, the widows’ support has since 2020 transformed into a widows empowerment scheme, its core activity being the donation of sewing machines and freezers. The latest addition to Sadaqa Train’s investments is the Akim Achiase Islamic School Construction Project in the Eastern Region. Launched as a three-year project in 2020, Sadaqa Tarin has earmarked almost GHS 35,000 to commission the six units’ classroom block.245
Sadaqa Train has grown into a mature nationwide daʿwa and Muslim development movement. Funding is predominantly generated internally, although some of its recent projects, among others, its donation of medical equipment to health facilities in the Northern and North East Regions in February and May 2021, as well as its 2021 Ramadan Food Drive and Qurban programme, were in partnership with the Danish Muslim NGO VIOMIS Aid.246 Sadaqa Train has collaborated in recent years with several local and international Muslim NGO s. Cooperation with VIOMIS Aid started in 2018 (mosque and borehole projects as well as donations to hospitals in the Northern Region).247 In 2019, it cooperated with Subulussalaam248 in a health-screening project in Dome-Abra and the distribution of Eid clothes in Accra as well as with Islamic Ummah Relief in its visit to Nsawam prisons.249 In 2020 and 2021, it joined hands with Emmoa Foundation to organise COVID-19/Ramadan Food Drives.250 In 2021, the ‘Unity Organisation Denmark’ provided funding for Sadaqa Trains’ construction of two mosques in the Tolon District, Northern Region,251 and sponsored its Iftar at Kukpehi in the Sagnarigu District, Northern region.252 Furthermore, Sadaqa Train collaborated with the NGO Banaatul Khayr—Garden of Dawah in the distribution of Eid clothes for orphans in Dzorwulu, Greater Accra Region.253
Despite its expansion of activities, Sadaqa Train resembles more of a network than an institutionalised organisation. Its headquarters in Accra has neither an office nor salaried staff. The organisation operates solely through voluntaries via WhatsApp; according to Sharif Shaban, the WA-broadcasting list includes about 800 to 1,000 persons. Applications for new projects (water projects, masjids) are forwarded to him from local communities, whereafter Sharif Shaban checks with donors and contractors about the feasibility of the project before he announces it on WhatsApp. The Facebook account of the organisation, in turn, is monitored from Tamale.254
The Muslim Youth Project, in turn, launched the MY Hereafter Project (MHP) in 2013 as well as the MY Hereafter Project Ummah Welfare Fund in 2018. In 2018, it became a partner organisation to the United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network (UN-SDSN).255 Until 2020, MHP’s main activity was its annual Ramadan fundraising campaigns to assist widows, orphans and prison inmates at various locations throughout Ghana. At least during the Ramadan 2020 campaign, its followers on Facebook were called to “[…] kindly consider giving us your sadaqah and zakat so that we can feed our mothers who have lost their husbands and struggling to take care of their orphans.”256 In 2017, MHP volunteers organised the Vocational Skills for the Kayaye (female porters) project in Kumasi. The project included soap making, baking and dressmaking.257 After the Ramadan collections in 2020, the organisation decided to rebrand the MHP and focus on assisting orphans in the Northern Region. Executives, as well as volunteers of the MHP, were only to be enlisted from the named region as the organisation wanted them to fully engage in its local programmes and initiatives. On the other hand the organisation announced on Facebook, “[…] donations, advises, suggestions and any other good you have for us is however welcomed, irrespectively of where you are in the world,” indicating that it still relied on external funding to run its operations.258
The MHP Ummah Welfare Fund, in turn, is a crowdfunding initiative for collecting donations to cover the expenses for medical treatment, hospital and surgery costs for individual Muslims in need;259 its call for support case nr 100 was published on Facebook in July 2023.260 In 2021, MHP further extended the range of its activities in the Northern Region when it started to register children for the National Health Insurance Card (the ‘1 Child_1NHIS Card’ project; by June 2023, MHP had registered about 3,800 children). The aim of MHP is to encourage its members to donate monthly to its health projects, such as the ‘1 Child_1NHIS’ project and its health outreach programmes in deprived communities. Like its Ummah Welfare Fund, MHP notifies the donors about funds received and their usage each month to achieve full transparency and accountability of its activities.261
MY Akhirah Account (MAA, established in 2017), in turn, is a sister organisation of the MY Hereafter Project. MAA, in contrast to MHP, is primarily a dawa organisation with headquarters in Tamale. Similar to other groups, it combines dawa with outreach programmes and uses social media for its announcement to solicit contributions of cloth, shoes, food or money. MAA’s Ramadan Projects have targeted communities in the North (Tamale and Bimbila) as well as South (Accra and Kumasi).262 The Kumasi-based Strive for Jannah Foundation (SFJ), in turn, has shared various appeals of the MHP on its Facebook account and participated in soliciting funds for covering hospital and medical expenses. It also uses social media for its own targeted calls for urgent or emergency funding in support of needy individuals or, since 2022, to solicit funds for its borehole projects.263
Some members of Sadaqa Train established the Muslim Access Movement (MAM, see Figure 28) in 2013. Their ambition to raise funds for farming activities can be identified as a sadaqa programme. For a start, however, MAM received some small donations enabling them in 2018 to buy six sheep, slaughter them at Eid al-Adha and distribute their meat among orphans in the Kwadaso area in Kumasi.264 Nevertheless, MAM’s main instrument for empowerment is its online radio and TV channel, MAM TV Online. Apart from being a daʿwa channel, its Public Health Education Committee (MAMPHEC,265 established in 2016) aired a campaign for establishing an Islamic hospital in 2018.266 The hospital project, it seems, never reached the planning stage and did not materialise. On the other hand, MAM has organised some ad hoc activities, among others a blood donation exercise in Kumasi 2016.267 In 2019, MAMPHEC announced its ambition to extend it activities outside Kumasi and launched a donation campaign for selected hospitals in Tamale.268
Figure 28
Muslim Access Movement. Members of MAM at their head office in Kumasi where their main media outlet, MAM Online, has its studio
Photo: Holger Weiss/2018
Another visible organisation on social media is the Ghana Islamic Youth Sadaqa Association (GIYSA), a Salafi organisation registered in 2015. It has since then established branches and representatives in all regions and has made sincere efforts to generate its own source of funding by selling homemade food and calling for mobile phone donations. Initially, it organised Iftar programmes and so-called Jihad Trips to promote daʿwa and support of Muslim educational facilities as well as the donation of collected items and cash in rural areas in the Western, Central Volta, Northern and Upper East Regions.269 In 2018, GIYSA launched its ‘1GHS Makaranta Project’ to raise funds for Qurʾanic schools, which had received support from the organisation. The plan was to raise one cedi from each of its 250 members per month. Its initial activities also included fundraisings and calls for donations for orphanages by its branch in the Northern Region in 2015 but seem to have stopped since then.270 In 2023, it launched the GISYA Food Bank programme, an ambitious two-step initiative for supporting needy persons. The food bank itself serves as a hub to accommodate food and consumable items gathered from donors, to be later distributed to beneficiaries. Thereafter, during step two, beneficiaries would be assisted with training of skills and guidance to help create jobs.271
The key objective of GIYSA is “fulfilling the Sadaqa Jariyha of our supporters.” Sadaqa jariya, or donations made to have benefit people after the death of the giver, such as the building of schools, hospitals, installing durable water systems, and investments in local agricultural or small-scale business enterprises, is identified by Muslim activists as the Muslim way in achieving the Sustainable Development Goals:272
Entrust your sadaqatul jariyah to GIYSA!!! When a person dies, his deeds come to an end, except for three: ongoing charity (Sadaqah Jariyah), knowledge that is benefited from, and a righteous child who prays for him. (Sahih Muslim) When you give to a Sadaqah Jariyah projects you reap endless rewards. It is one of the most beautiful forms of charity since it provides benefit—for both the giver and receiver—for years to come. We’ve prepared transformative, impactful projects for you to support, allowing you to multiply your blessings while helping to lift people out of poverty. Donate your charities to 0249530504 (KABIRATU ZAKARI).273
GISYA stresses its experience of administering sadaqa jariya in a statement posted on Facebook:
We install wells to provide communities with clean water, we provide the tools and training to start sustainable businesses, we plant fruit trees, and we repair schools and mosques, helping communities not just to survive, but to thrive. And when we implement your Sadaqah Jariyah, our staff aren’t parachuted in. They’re local, and they understand local needs, making sure that your charity is as impactful as possible. Every day, we work to give people the means to support themselves and their families. Go ahead, explore all of our impactful Sadaqah Jariyah projects below. Give Sadaqah Jariyah. Transform a community. Multiply your blessings for years to come.274
GISYA has initiated several borehole projects in Ghana, among others, in a village close to Techiman and Tetteh Nkwanta village. However, the latter project had to be abandoned as it unearthed unsettled disputes between the Muslim and Christian inhabitants, and GIYSA proposed to its members and donors to divert the local borehole project into either building an Islamic training centre, establishing an Islamic orphanage, or assisting in the building of a mosque.275
The Day Break Daʿwah and Development Centre Charity Fund or Daybreak Daʿwah Charity, in turn, is an initiative of a Kumasi-based MFBO. Established by Akurugu Iddrisu Yakubu in 2015, the organisation focuses on daʿwa and “developing people.” The latter objective includes a vision to generate funds for the investment in educational and social infrastructure facilities, including schools, hospitals and orphanages.276 On its signpost, it calls for donation, i.e., sadaqa, to “support the needy in society.”277 However, the organisation was relaunched (or someone reformulated its objectives) in 2018. It then initiated a three-part donation call on its new Facebook account. Presenting its four focus areas as 1) charity, 2) food aid, 3) education, and 4) women empowerment, the organisation issued an open call to make donations either through mobile money transfer, or through making a payment into its bank account or by buying its coupons. The latter form can be defined as an innovative non-digital initiative: issuing so-called Food Aid and Education Fund coupons valued GHS 5, 10 or 20 (USD 0.8/1.6/3.2), the donor becomes part of a halal investment.278
Daybreak Dawah Charity operates in Accra, Kumasi, and Techiman mainly on a voluntary basis, see Figure 29. Interestingly, members are both Muslim and non-Muslim young persons. Its activities were at first mainly micro-level interventions, i.e., paying school fees and hospital bills alongside donating clothes and mosquito nets. Funds are solely generated internally through outreach campaigns in Ghana.279 In 2021, the organisation raised its stakes and started two additional intervention schemes, namely the granting of interest-free loans as well as an orphans support and rehabilitation programme. Since then (until August 2022), the organisation has (at least) granted nine interest-free micro loans to women traders in Accra and Kumasi.280 The orphan support programme, in turn, collected funds during Ramadan 2022.281
The Wa-based Islamic youth NGO Hikmatullah Research Foundation (HRF) organises seasonal outreach programmes, termed Ramadan Sadaqa Quest (2015, 2016) and Ramadan Sadaqa Trip (2017). It solicits its cash, cloth and food through calls for zakat al-fitr donations on Facebook. Starting the programmes in 2015 with Iftar programmes in four selected senior high schools in Wa and a rural community, as well as a donation to the Wa regional hospital, it shifted its emphasis and targeted the Wa school for the blind in 2016 and 2017 alongside some rural communities in Wa West District.282 Apparently, it seems that HRF since then has ceased its activities; at least its Facebook account has no further updates on its activities.
Figure 29
Daybreak Dawah Charity. Signpost of Daybreak Dawah Charity in Kumasi
Photo: Holger Weiss/2018
The Tamale-based Tiyumba Hope Foundation, on the other hand, is a recent Muslim celebrity-initiated initiative that terms its seasonal outreach campaigns as THF Ramadan Sadaqa, collecting cash and food from its members;283 the recipients being widows and orphans in rural communities in the Northern Region.284
Less is known about the activities of the Gosoa-based Sadaqa Association, the Facebook group
7 Generating Donations from One Million Muslims via Social Media
Crowdfunding has become an important tool to generate funds for various projects during the internet age. Usually, it involves three types of actors: the initiator, the supporters, and the moderating or facilitating organisations, usually an internet platform such as GlobalGiving. However, the two cases discussed below have changed the idea of crowdfunding as the facilitator is not a dot-com organisation but social media, including Facebook and WhatsApp. Most Muslim CSO s and NGO s use social media to generate funding, although mostly during a restricted period. The most common forms are calls on social media during Ramadan, addressed by the initiator (either in the name of an organisation or an imam) to the members and supporters of the association, group or organisation for Eid (Iftar and Adhahi) donations. Sometimes they are also addressed to members abroad. Nevertheless, this form of crowdfunding is ad hoc and usually does not have a target sum to be raised. Or, as is the case of some Ramadan calls, the target sum to be collected can be raised during one month.
Figure 30
Save Aid Project. Logo included in SAP brochure
Author’s collection
The Accra-based Save Aid Project (SAP, see Figure 30) started in 2016 with a call for Ramadan and Iftar donations. Since then, it has run annual Iftar, Ramadan and Eid al-Adha campaigns and organised parties for orphans at Eid al-Adha, targeting Zongo communities in Accra as well as rural communities in the Central, Northern, Upper West, Volta and Western Regions.287 The objective, SAP founder Ayuna Huudu explained, is to reach out to remote villages all regions. SAP stands for “movey saved (SAVE) → targeted for aid (AID) → generates into a project (PROJECT)”, he further noted. His initial idea was to concentrate on remote villages as most NGO s focus on Accra and urban areas. Since then, the group has broadened its rural outreach programmes in 25 villages with educational projects, namely by supporting to poor children to go to school, alongside organising annual orphans parties.288
Apart from its humanitarian relief programmes, it launched a COVID-19 Local Language Awareness Project in April 2020, posting videos in Dandi and Tem, with English subtitles on Facebook, and organised the SAP Iftar Van during the lockdown in Accra in May 2020 and February 2021.289 In May 2022, the organisation extended its activities and posted an announcement on Facebook about its intention to drill boreholes and invited local communities facing water problems to inform them about their needs: “Kindly send us the following details: Name of the community/location/region. Note: Include picture or video (not exceeding 1 min) of the current water situation in the community.”290 By October 2022, SAP had received five applications. The plan is to erect boreholes with roofs as to create a shaded meeting place in the villages.291
Ayuna Huudu’s main challenge is to turn his voluntary organisation into a permanent one with salaried staff. Covering the operative costs of the organisation has been a challenge as it only relies on donations from its members. Especially its rural outreach programmes are expensive as SAP does not have an own vehicle but relies on rented ones. Therefore, all of the projects have been on an ad hoc basis. For example, the extent of the annual ‘Adopt a Family’ programme, i.e., the Ramadan donations to poor families in remote villages, depends on willing local and foreign donors and sponsors. The ‘Donate a flask’ campaign during Ramadan 2022, in turn, only managed to get a few donations. However, a (undisclosed) Turkish NGO the orphans’ party in 2022; Ayuna Huudu expects the cooperation to be deepened in 2023. Nevertheless, he is confident that his direct approach to foreign donors will pay off, especially as they remain anonymous and most videos of project targets are never posted on Facebook but directly sent to the donors.292
Feed the Streets, and Eid Feast Ghana are examples of two recent targeted, special-purpose Ramadan campaigns extensively using social media. Initially initiated by The Muslim Society, a youth association in Accra, in 2020, the Feed the Street (FTS) campaign targeted hawkers in Accra and Kumasi. It gained momentum when other NGO s and associations, including the KR Foundation, Sawrah Foundation, Back to the Community, the Institution for Humanity and Al-Farhaan Family, joined the event alongside receiving support from local private enterprises and ventures such as KR Live Media, A+Concept, Reigans and Shams Enterprise. While the campaign in 2020 consisted mainly of written daily postings plus a few videos on Facebook, the organisers made heavily use of short videos with endorsements by male and female activists to join the campaign in 2021.293 At least the organisers regarded their campaign as a success—in 2020, they fed 500 people in Accra; in 2021, they fed 1,000 in Accra and organised a similar event in Kumasi where they fed 500 people; in 2022, they fed 1,000 in Accra, 500 in Kumasi and expanded their activities to Tamale where they fed 500 people.294
Eid Feast Ghana, in contrast, is a local campaign in Kumasi, starting as Eid Feast for Prisoners and Eid Feast 2k19 in 2019. While COVID-19 inhibited the project in 2020, the organisers relaunched it in 2021, resulting in a donation of food items worth GHS 8,000 (USD 1,300).295 In 2022, the group supported 150 households, one year later 160.296
Ambitious, long-term crowdfunding campaigns for sadaqa jariya or ongoing charity were (seemingly?) absent on the Ghanaian Muslim internet scene until 2017. That year in February, Fareed Ibrahim, a student at Kumasi Polytech, and his companions launched the ‘One Million Pesewas A Month’ campaign on Facebook.297 At first, the initiators and their supporters defined themselves as a local Muslim youth group to champion Islamic societal development298 but formalised itself as the Islamic Community Association in September 2018.299 The ‘One Million Peewas A Month’ campaign soon spread over Facebook, among others backed by Deen TV,300 and linked to various Muslim daʿwa and youth Facebook groups and networks such as Al-Noor Ghana Foundation.301 In his initial posting in March 2017, Fareed Ibrahim declared,
… we just need 1million Muslims who are willing to donate 60 pesewas every month for one year:) if this happens, we will be able to raise GHC 7.2 million [ca. 1.2 USD] at the end of the year, i.e 0.60* 1000000* 12 = 7,200,000. This amount will be enough for the most nicest makaranta edifice and three brand new 49 seater Yutong buses.302
A kick-start of the Islamic Community hospital project was the drawing of an architectural plan without charge by an architect in May 2017.303 At the end of the year, the campaign vision was enlarged to embrace not only a Quran Memorisation Centre but added as its long-term project to build an Islamic hospital to provide healthcare services to the general public with special modalities of the Islamic healthcare system and to launch an affordable housing project for life starters.304
The school project of the Islamic Community Association, too, has been able to reach its first milestones. By September 2018, the project listed 932 members, raised GHS 11,557.76 [ca. 1,870 USD] through crowdfunding, and established representations in eight regions (Greater Accra, Ashanti, Brong Ahafo, Upper East, Upper West Northern, Western, Eastern, Central).305 However, less than one year later, the group faced a minor crisis when it announced that the campaign had received about GHS 18,000 (ca. 2,900 USD) by July 2020, and declared:
Why have we not started something with the amount raised? Per our Architectural design we require 4 plots minimum (but per the amount raised, we can only afford 3)—Tonight Friday 19th July 2019 In Shaa Allah, we are going to have an extensive discussion as to whether we should size down our project or adopt a different Strategy in raising funds or do a proper reform of leadership and try a new set.306
After consultation with its architectural designer, the plans were scaled down in August, and one month later, the group managed to acquire two plots of land in Ntonso.307 Although it could not afford to buy the two remaining plots (it made a new call to its members for increasing their donations to secure in four plots of land), the group—at this point registered as the Islamic Community Association—started to work on the land. By May 2021, it had moulded 3,500 building blocks and fenced the two plots.308
Race 4 Aid, also a second-generation Muslim NGO, extensively uses social media for raising funds alongside reporting to its local and foreign donors (its main donor seems to be in the UAE) about the progress of its various rural community campaigns (Drink Life Campaign, Water4all Campaign, Building Bridges Campaign [i.e. school blocks with mosques], Qurban and Eid gifts, orphans sponsorship). Following their postings on Facebook from late June to late September 2021, it announced the completion of a water project at Obrecheowo Community/Agona East District, Central Region (June 23rd), at Old Manponteng, Central Region (July 7th), the distribution of monthly stipends to orphans in Seyikrom, Eastern Region (July 8th) and Nyakpala, Northern Region (July 17th), cash stipends at Eid al-Adha for elders with orphans in Nyakpala (18.7.), for orphans in Greater Accra Region (July 19th), Eid gifts to family heads at Buayinny, North East Region, and Kagbali, Northern Region (July 20th), Zenu community/Accra (July 21st), Botiano community (July 22nd), Chashegu, Northern Region (July 23rd), the completion of a masjid project at Tampion community (July 25th) as well as reminded its followers that “we are still in the month of Dhul Hijjah and multiple folds of good deeds are still recommended” (July 30th). In August, it reported about the distribution of stipends to orphans (August 5th and 12th), made a plea to mitigate climate change and water scarcity (“Plant a tree, be inspired by activities that are environment free. Together, we restored back quality underground water”, August 6th), announced the completion of an Islamic school project in Adenta Commandos (August 13th) alongside the commissioning of water projects in Buayinny, North East Region (August 23rd) and at Gomoa Mpota, Central Region (August 30th). The almost daily updates on its orphan sponsorship, water and masjid continued in September, in addition to the launching of its National Health Insurance Service project in Agona Swedru District, Central Region (September 9th).309
8 Local Initiatives in Tamale and Wa
The majority of Muslim NGO s are local initiatives. Many of those associations, youth groups and grassroot organisations discussed in the previous chapters have a local outreach; some of them count but a few active members although several of them can boast with hundreds, if not thousands of followers on Facebook. Most of them are found and active in the Zongo communities in Accra and Kumasi. For an outside spectator, Muslim activism seems to be concentrated to the two urban metropoles in southern Ghana. Much less visible are those groups and organisations in other parts of the country, especially those in predominantly Muslim locations in northern Ghana.
The Sayfudeen Fund, in turn, operates in the Northern Region. The instigator of the charity is Sheikh Khalid Abdul Mumin (born in 1981), who formed the organisation together with Haji Shaibu Abiru in 2017. The latter has since then served as the chair of the fund. The headquarters of the fund is located in Tamale. Its main locations of activities are in Tamale and Bimbila.
The Fund presents itself is a regional self-help initiative, being the outcome of a team of Muslim youth “who came together to pull resources in cash, kind and materials to get them to the needy in societies for the sake of Allah.”310 It is among the few Muslim faith-based organisations that list its members on its homepage, giving an indication of its outreach in 2017. Nineteen of the 48 named members reside in Tamale, others in Bimbila (18), Chereponi (1), Janga (1), Kpandai (1), Kumasi (1), Nalerigu (1), Pusaga (2), and Zabzugu (3), and one in Iran.311
The Fund lists daʿwa, education and humanitarian projects as its main areas of activities, including mosques construction and outreach programmes to non-Muslim communities, sponsorship of brilliant but needy students, support to orphans and abandoned children, help to needy in deprived communities as well as help to Muslims or persons who are critically ill and need funds to undergo complex surgeries.312 In line with its focus on daʿwa, the fund’s first project was the construction of a masjid at Tampei Kukuo in the Tamale Metropolitan District313 and a call for donating hijabs, zalabias (fried dough foods) and clothes for poor people so that they could celebrate the Eid al-Fitr festival in 2017.314
Similar to other Muslim FBO s, the Sayfudeen Fund uses Facebook as its main channel for informing about its activities. In July 2021, the Facebook account of the fund listed 2,272 followers, ranking it among the larger Muslim organisations in Ghana.315 A comparison between the postings on the homepage and Facebook indicates the outreach of the organisation. While the call for donations during Ramadan 2017 was successful, and the organisation donated clothes, food and other items to needy families in Nanumba North and South District, the collection for the mosque project at Tampei Kukuo ended with its completion in late 2018. In October 2019, the fund started its second mosque project by calling for donations for reroofing the Jummah (Friday) mosque in Kukuo, Nanbuma South District. This project was completed in May 2020. In December 2020, the fund started a campaign for roofing and completion of a three-unit classroom block at Ansuarudeen E/A Primary School in Bimbila, resulting in the donation of 12 packets of roofing sheets and nails to assist roofing of the three classroom blocks in March 2021.316
The postings of the Sayfundeen Fund on Facebook seem to indicate that the campaign during Ramadan 2017 was not followed up, or at least did successive Eid campaigns not result in any postings. However, in May 2021, the Fund organised Iftar parties at selected senior high schools in the Northern Region,317 indicating that similar activities had also existed in previous years but have left no traces on Facebook or that the organisation opened a new field of activity.
The photographs and information provided on Facebook and the homepage of Sayfudeen Fund reveals that the organisation is an initiative by young Muslims. The organisation depends solely, it seems, on the contributions of its members and has so far not established any visible links to national or international Muslim organisations or funding agencies. So far, the organisation has assisted in the building of two mosques and one primary school as well as organised (at least once) a Ramadan collection. This is rather impressive by a regional self-help organisation without external financial assistance. However, the realisation of many of its aims, such as sponsorship of students and support to orphans, would require either a substantial larger membership who could support such campaigns or the support of national/foreign Muslim philanthropists or charities.
Aris Social Centre is an example of a local Muslim NGO that receives donations identified as sadaqa. Established in 2009, it uses locally collected sadaqa to build mosques and drill boreholes in Tamale and the surrounding countryside. “People are willing to support the building of mosques as it counts in the hereafter,” Sheikh Jamal Deen Omar Muhammad explained and emphasised that these donations are sadaqa garin or “sadaqa that will remain.” In addition, the Centre receives each year local donations for its Iftar programme; in 2018, three persons paid the programme and fed one hundred persons daily after the breaking of the fast.318
The Anbariya Relief Project (ARP), on the other hand, is an ad hoc initiative of the Anbariya Sunni Community in Tamale. It organised its first campaign in the aftermath of the 1989 as well as 2003/04 flooding in the Northern Region. In comparison to its third campaign after the heavy flooding in 2018, the two earlier ones had been organised without any collaboration with the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO), and it took a long time for the group to gather and distribute the relief goods.319
The 2018 relief campaign of the Anbariya Sunni Community made national headlines. Directly after the flooding, the head of the community, Sheikh Saeed Abubakar Zakaria, called the Anbariya imams, and they decided to launch a support initiative. This time, the ARP collaborated with the NADMO; its sorted relief goods at the premises of the Anbariyya were distributed by the NADMO according to a written list.320 The ARP presented relief items such as clothing, food, building materials, utensils and mats valued at GHS 3,854,000 (ca. 624,000 USD) for onward distribution.321 The positive experience of the 2018 campaign propelled the Anbariya Sunni Community to consider transforming the ad hoc relief committee into a permanent relief body and transforming the ARP into a Relief Services Fund. The Fund, the plan foresees, is to receive both zakat and sadaqa donations to be used for emergency intervention.322
The Tamale Charity Association, in turn, invited on its 2019-homepage potential donors to invest in their sadaqa jariya projects, namely mosques, water and sanitation, schools, orphan sponsorship and feeding the poor (i.e., Iftar and Qurban). However, the whereabouts of the Association are unclear as its homepage is identical to that of the Imam Dawa Islamic Center and has (so far) not left any identifiable traces on Google.323 Presumably, the latter Centre is linked to the Imam Dawah Organization, an NGO founded by Sheikh Hussein Khalid Jimah in 2003. The organisation runs similar projects as those of the Tamale Charity Association and the Imam Dawa Islamic Center, and raises part of its funds from its members, part being donations from Saudi, Qatari and UAE philanthropists.324
The Muslim Youth Association (MYA) is a Muslim daʿwa group with headquarters in Wa, Upper West Region. The impetus for forming the group came from former senior secondary school students who had been members of the Ghana Muslim Students Association. MYA has been active since January 2010, initially known under the name Organisation for the Development of Muslim Youth and the abbreviation EDUFUND. However, as EDUFUND was perceived as a group for the elderly, the name was changed to MYA after consultations with various stakeholders in Wa municipality, including the Regional Chief Imam, the Municipal Chief Imam, the Yerinaa (Chief of Muslims) as well as various imams of the Ahlus-Sunna.325
MYA’s mission is to provide a platform for Muslim youth in Wa “towards a more sustainable understanding and appreciation of Islam,” and to evolve into an “organised body of excellence in the pursuit of discipline, high moral standards and religious responsibility among Muslim youth towards the development and appreciation of Islam.” The association concentrates on three focal areas. Its first objective, to popularise the study of the Qurʾan by supporting and, ultimately, establishing Islamic teaching and learning centres, has been met by occasional donations of Islamic learning and teaching material, such as whiteboards, markers, benches and Qurans, to Islamic studying centres.326 To achieve the second objective, to spread the true message of Islam to eliminate religious misconceptions, media myths and anti-Islamic prejudices, the Association has organised annual seminars for the youth on topical issues.327 The Association is keen on highlighting its third objective, to encourage the study of Islam among Muslim women, as they will become the teachers of future generations “with a vision for multiculturalism and peaceful coexistence.” Therefore, it arranges the Annual Ramadan Ladies Seminar and takes an interest in establishing separate madrasas (or rather weekend courses) for women only.328
The Muslim Youth Association collects monthly membership dues to finance its activities. Whether MYA defines such donations as sadaqa is not farfetched, as it has posted a quote by Imam al-Tirmidhi, “Sadaqah wipes out sins like water extinguishes fire.” By mobilising monthly donations, MYA set as its goal in 2019 to purchase a vehicle for medical emergency services,329 and to establish a modern centre for Islamic learning with boarding facilities and a health centre. The kick-off for the latter project was in June 2019, when MYA acquired 50 plots of land at Sing.330
Another local initiative in Wa is the campaign by the Islamic Brotherhood for Bayt al Mal Foundation to establish Limaniya Radio Station. The Foundation is a daʿwa organisation and was registered in 2019. It launched the Islamic radio project in 2021 with calls to support the construction of the premises of the radio station posted on Facebook.331 The Muslim Intellectuals Network (MIN), lastly, is a local initiative to encourage academic excellence in the Muslim youth. Inspired by the Muslim Youth Summit held in Wa 2019, the network has organised the annual MIN Award Scheme to celebrate pupils and students who have raised the standards in their various fields of educational endeavours since 2022. In addition, it has organised several entrepreneurial forums.332
See, e.g.,
Farooq Aziz, Muhammad Mahmud and Emad ul Karim, “The Nature of Infaq and its Effects on Distribution of Wealth,” KASBIT Business Journal 1, no. 1 (2008): 44–48.
“The Doors of Sadaqa,”
“Tips for charity (sadaqah),” 18.5.2016,
“What is the best way to give sadaqah?”
“About sincere charity for Allah sake,”
“What is sadaqah jariyah?”
Iftar and Eid programmes by international Muslim charities in Ghana are discussed in Chapter 2.4.
Grain of Hope distribution of food items in Nanumba North District, posted on FB24.10.2016.
Adnan Abdul-Hamid, “Awakening Muslimah Zakat ul-Fitr ’20,”
“Ramadan: About 190 Muslims receive donation from German-based group,” 12.5.2021,
IPASEC, ‘Fundraising for Charitable Items Needed Before, During and Immediately After Ramadan’,
“Light Foundation donates food package to Muslim communities in Accra,”
Video on Facebook: fasting breaking, donations by a philanthropist 1441 AH; photo and comment posted on
See further Dorte Thorsen, Children Begging for Qurʿânic School Masters. UNICEF Briefing Paper No. 5 (Dakar: UNICEF West and Central Africa Regional Office, 2012); Fuseini and Daniel, “Child Begging.”
Copy of Certificate of Incorporation, dated 28.7.2017,
“Muslim coalition initiate establishment of Education fund,” 31.7.2013,
The Mercy Islamic schools complex is an institution established by the African Muslims Agency (Direct Aid), comprising of an orphanage and schools including an senior high school, see “Ghana: Mercy Islamic School Gets Management Committee,” Accra Mail 14.3.2006,
“Turkish students renovate schools in Ghana,” 26.8.2017,
“Saudi philanthropist builds orphanage for Muslim Community,” 15.4.2016,
“ASWAJ Efiduase Asokore Zongo Ghana commission orphanage center,” 4.7.2023,
Interview with Imam Khidir Issah, Majid Ar-Rasul, Nima, Accra, 19.10.2022.
See FPO’s 2021 West Africa Ramadan Food Distribution,
Poster on Facebook, 17.9.2020,
“Foundation seeks to build orphanage as it feeds over 200 orphans in Kumasi,” 12.10.2020,
Orphanage Centre For Education And Moral Training, Facebook account established 13.1.2021 with 661 followers,
“Tamale Muslims donate land to Salaam Ul-Muslimiyun, Ghana,”
See IUR Annual Report 2019, available at
“Help Complete the Orphanage in Ghana (Sadaqa Jariyah),”
“Fund raising in support of orphanage in Techiman,” 15.12.2019,
“Orphan Day 2017,”
See video about 2019 event,
“About,”
See, for example, “GAMP gifts food items, toiletries to orphanage,” 10.5.2022,
The Kumasi-based Ummah Foundation receives donation from a Muslim FBO in Germany, the German Charity and Orphan Foundation (unidentified!), to support orphans in the Old Tafo Zongo,
“Society fetes needy persons,” The Mirror, 6.6.1998, “Reception held for orphans, physically challenged,” Daily Graphic, 8.10.2005; “NGO provides water for 3 communities,” Daily Graphic, 1.5.2006; “NGO donates to physically challenged,” Daily Graphic, 22.9.2014, “SAFOAD donates to Muslims,” 26.6.2017,
“Al-Mannan Charity Foundation fetes 80 orphans to mark Eid-ul-Fitr,” 27.5.2022,
“Ghana Muslim Mission fetes over thousand orphans in Eid ul-Adha celebration,” 12.8.2019,
Project of Eid Cover for Orphans and Needy People; posted photo, 16.9.2019: donation of money (ca. 40 GHS each), pencils and note book to orphans,
Islamic Centre for Future Women donation, 31.8.2018,
“World Orphans Day: Rayuwa Foundation hosts 500 children,” 4.5.2019,
See further video clip “Haske Bisa kan Haske Queen Luky,”
“Muslim Inmates Receive Relief,” 22.2.2016,
Issah Alhassan, “Ghana: Muslims Clothe Prison Inmates,” 28.9.2009,
The items included 200 packed food, 12 cartons of soft drinks and 15 bags of sachet water, see Gilbert Mawuli Agbey, “Swedru Muslims support Osamkrom Prisons,” 14.8.2013,
Nadima Umar Uthman, “Sadaqa Train donates to Nsawam Prisons,” 9.7.2015,
Figures quoted in “Muslim Inmates Receive Relief,” 22.2.2016,
Raissa Sambou, “Ghana: Muslim Inmates of Nsawam Prisons Receive Food Items,” Ghanaian Times, 31.5.2019
“Muslim inmates at Nsawam prisons gets CCF support during Ramadan,” 12.5.2020,
Fundraising video by Ibrahim Baba Maltiti,
Photo of coupon,
“Ghana Academy of Muslim Professionals donates to James Camp Prisons,” 31.5.2020,
Afedzi Abdullah, “Ahmadiyya Muslim Mission donates to inmates at Ankaful Maximum Prisons,” 30.4.2021,
“Bamba Islamic Institute donates to prison inmates,” 6.6.2017,
Call for Prisons Iftar 2017, retrieved from
Insert by Adnan Abdul-Hamid,
“Annual Ramadan feeding,”
“Awakening Muslimah Serves Meals for 220 Muslim Inmates,” 21.4.2021,
“Awakening Muslimah Serves meals for 320+ Inmates,” 20.5.2021,
“Sadaqa Train Pays Ramadhan Visit to Ghana Prisons,” 19.5.2019,
“2nd Lady Fetes Muslim Inmates At Nsawam Prison,” 27.6.2017,
Rita Avoka, “Muslim inmates of Bawku Prison receive food,” 22.4.2021,
“Salaga South: Hajia Zuweira Donates Items To Aged Constituents To Mark Eid Al-Fitr,” 23.5.2020,
“Chief Imam Provides Water For Prisoners,” 11.3.2019,
See, e.g., the GIYSA video posted 3.6.2020 (“these are items we received so far …”),
Michael Baffoe and Mavis Dako-Gyeke, “Social Problems and Social Work in Ghana: Implications for Sustainable Development,” International Journal of Development and Sustainability 2, no. 1 (2013): 349–350. Figures taken from the 2006 Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey and the 2010 Ghana National HIV and AIDS Report are from Baffoe and Dako-Gyeke.
Jeff Grischow, Magnus Mfoafo-M’Carthy, Ann Vermeyden and Jessica Cammaert, “Physical Disability, Rights and Stigma in Ghana: A Review of Literature,” Disability, CBR & Inclusive Development 29, no. 4 (2018): 5–24; Magnus Mfoafo-M’Carthy, Jeff Grischow, and Nicole Stocco, “Cloak of Invisibility: A Literature Review of Physical Disability in Ghana,” SAGE Open January–March 2020: 1–8,
Ghana Statistical Service, Disability in Ghana (Accra: Ghana Statistical Service, 2014), 28.
The Social Welfare Service Directory lists the Maktab Nuur Foundation, an Accra-based NGO specialized in training and teaching persons with autism and speech problems (
Dr Hashim M. Ali Mahdi, “A Journey Through Islam: Muslims have come up well in Ghana,” 1.3.2013,
Jessica E. Lambert et alii, “The Treatment of Mental Illness in Faith-based and Traditional Healing Centres in Ghana: Perspectives of Service Users and Healers,” Global Mental Health 7 (2020), e28: 1–7,
Lily N.A. Kpobi and Leslie Swartz, “Muslim Traditional Healers in Accra, Ghana: Beliefs About and Treatment of Mental Disorders,” Journal of Religion and Health 58 (2019): 833–846. For a critical commentary on Muslim healers, see Adu-Gyamfi et alii, “Muslim Healers and Healing.”
Al-Bushra Foundation: About,
A. Potter, O. Debrah, J. Ashun, K.J. Blanchet, Eye Health Systems Assesstment (EHSA): Ghana Country Report (Accra: Ghana Health Services and International Centre for Eye Health, Lightsavers, 2013).
Nana-Kwadwo Biritwum, Dziedzom K. de Souza, Odeme Asiedu, Benjamin Marfo, Uche Veronica Amazigo & John Owusu Gyapong, “Onchocerciasis Control in Ghana (1974–2016),” Parasites & Vectors 14, no. 3 (2021).
Annette C. Moll, A.J. van der Linden, M. Hogeweg & W.E. Schader, “Prevalence of Blindness and Low Vision of People over 30 Years in the Wenchi District, Ghana, in Relation to Eye Care Programmes,” British Journal of Ophtalmology 78, no. 4 (1994): 275–279.
Akrongpong School for the Blind, New Horizon Special School (Accra), Dzorwulu Special School (Accra), Cape Coast School for the Blind and Deaf, Asebu School for the Deaf and Blind, Wa Methodist Bind School.
Louis Dogbe, “The Consequences of Being Blind in Ghana,”
“We need integrated schools for the blind in Tamale—Ghana Bind Union,” 30.1.2014,
Sadaqa Train Annual Report 2019, available at
Donations to the School of the Blind @ Aburi, 28.7.2019,
I have not found any traces of this organisation, perhaps to be spelled ‘Disabled Muslims Network’ (?), on the Internet.
Nilay Kar, “African Muslims seek aid for education of sight-impaired children,” 9.11.2019,
Interview with Mustapha Ibrahim, founder of Janat-ut-Firdause Charity Foundation, Accra, 16.10.2022.
See further
Interview with Mustapha Ibrahim, founder of Janat-ut-Firdause Charity Foundation, Accra, 16.10.2022.
Mahmud Mohammed-Nurudeen, “Islamic school for the blind under construction in Accra and Kumasi,” Myjoy Online 5.8.2021,
E.g.,
Posting 29.8.2021,
“First Islamic School for Blind Muslims in Ghana,”
Abdul-Saatar, “Help the blind celebrate Eid al-Adha.—Ali Amir Foundation,”
Mahmud Mohammed-Nurudeen, “Getting visually imparired kids off the street a dream come true—Ali Amir Foundation,” 13.2.2022,
Posting 9.9.2022,
Interview with Mustapha Ibrahim, founder of Janat-ut-Firdause Charity Foundation, Accra, 16.10.2022.
Ghana Statistical Service, Disability in Ghana, Table 7.1.
Mama Adobea Nii Owoo, “Sign language needs policy protection in Ghana,” 21.1.2019,
Iddrisu Mukhtar passed away in 2019, see
The parent organisation Global Deaf Muslim (GDM) was established by Nashiru Abdulai from Ghana in 2005 (
“NGO to champion rights of deaf Muslim inaugurate,” 17.9.2012,
GDM claims to run the only Zakat Fund dedicated to the needs of deaf Muslims exclusively. Although the MDD Facebook does not list any Iftar or Eid postings after 2015, annual calls for zakat al-fitr donations for Ghana are found on the GDM Facebook, the latest one posted 15 July 2021; see
See GDM call for supporting activities of MDD,
See, for example,
LaunchGood, Masjid for the Deaf,
See, for example,
See, e.g.,
Comment sent by Sadaqa Train founder Sharif Shaban to the author via WhatsApp, 18.10.2022.
In 2015, Sadaqa Train was accused for spreading extremist ideas during its tours in the mass media which resulted in a public outcry and denial by the organisation, see “Sadaqa Train vehemently denies extremism allegations,” 27.8.2015,
“KNUST graduate joins ISIS,” 25.8.2015,
“Islam is not an extremist religion—Dr Konney,” 9.9.2015,
“I’ll not disband Sadaqa train over ISIS claims—Leader,” 30.8.2015,
“Sadaqa Train, Group Linked with ISIS Recruitment in Ghana, Denies Allegations,” 2.9.2015,
Interview with Sharif Shaban, founder of Sadaqa Train, Accra, 8.10.2022.
See financial statistics provided in the annual reports,
See
See Sadaqa Train Annual Report 2020.
See Sadaqa Train Annual Report 2021.
Figures taken from Annual Report 2017, 2019, 2020, 2021.
See Sadaqa Train Annual Report 2021.
“Sadaqa Train donates equipment to hospitals in Northern, North East Regions,”
See Sadaqa Train Annual Report 2018, 2019; “Sadaqa Train GH, in partnership with VIOMIS Aid Denmark, have constructed a Masjid with wells for the people of DC Kuraa in the Mion district of the Northern Region,” 20.8.2019,
I have not been able to identify this group/foundation.
See Sadaqa Train Annual Report 2019; “ST Southern Sector partnered with Islamic Ummah Relief to visit the Nsawam prison yesterday,” 19.5.2019,
See Sadaqa Train Annual Report 2020, 2021.
“Sadaqat Train Foundation constructs GHc50,000 Mosque at Kaanfehiyili,” 22.9.2021,
“Iftar at Kukpehi,” 9.5.2021,
“Eid clothing distribution,” 10.5.2021,
Interview with Sharif Shaban, Accra, 8.10.2022.
MHP homepage,
Announcement of kick-start of vocational skills project in Kumasi as well as call for donations, 20.10.2017,
Myhereafter Project Ummah Welfare Fund,
Group interview with members of the Muslim Access Movement—Umar Muhammed, Abdul-Aziz Ishaq, Yunus Muhammad and Imam Mahmood Afari Yeobah—in Kumasi, 15.9.2018.
Though active, the Facebook account of MAMPHEC,
“MAMPHEC to end the year with Hospital Donations—Support Now,”
“Our main aim is DAWWAH & DONATIONS to the rural areas, villages, deprived communities & hinterlands. We travel to villages to propagate Islam , we convert non-Muslims to Islam by the will of Allah, we aid in providing potable water for the needy, feeding the poor, sponsoring of orphans & widows, feeding the street beggars, donating clothes to the poor, helping to building of masjids, and assisting the basic needs of the poor & needy Muslims in the villages,”
“Why entrust your sadaqa (charities) to GIYSA?”
Signpost photographed by author in Kumasi, 16.9.2018, author’s archive.
Group interview with Daybreak Daʿwah Center members Dapai Emanuel, Idriss, Charles and Kevin, Kumasi 12.12.2019.
Announcement of start of THF Ramadan Sadaqa 2021,
Mohammed Gadafi, “Tiyumba Hope Fpoundation distribute food items to widows, orphans for Ramadan,” 20.4.2021,
See
Interview with Ayuna Huudu, founder of SAP, Accra, 18.10.2022.
Interview with Ayuna Huudu, founder of SAP, Accra, 18.10.2022.
Interview with Ayuna Huudu, founder of SAP, Accra, 18.10.2022.
For the 2020 and 2021 Feed the Street campaigns, see further
“Brief history about this whole campaign,”
“INFORMATION FOR NEWLY ADDED MEMBERS,”
“ISLAMIC COMMUNITY ASSOCIATION (GHANA),”
Deen TV, support to One Million Pesewa A Month Campaign, 20.9.2018,
Link to Deen TV call and support on Al-Noor Ghana Foundation Facebook account, 15.8.2018,
20.5.2017: ONE MILLION MUSLIMS 60 PESEWAS A MONTH CAMPAIGN
16.9.2018, and “KNOW YOUR REGIONAL REPRESENTATIVES FOR THIS PROJECT,” 27.9.2018,
“A million Ummah 60 pesewas a month fundraiser Update,”
Financial report for the month ending 31st September 2019 (delivered on 6th Oct, 2019@7:00 PM), 7.10.2019,
See postings on
“Current List of Members,” sayfudeenfund.simplesite.com/433852373, accessed 3.7.2021. The homepage has not been updated since its launching in 2017.
“General List and Targeted Projects,” sayfudeenfund.simplesite.com/433950535, accessed 3.7.2021.
“Construction of a masjid at Tampei Kukuo,” 12.5.2017, sayfdeenfund.simplesite.com/433952461, accessed 3.7.2021.
“Celebrating This year’s Eidul Fitr with the poor,” 14.6.2017, sayfudeenfund.simplesite.com/433852303, accessed 3.7.2021.
Interview with Sheikh Jamal Deen Omar Muhammad, Imam at Tamale Central Mosque and President of Aris Social Center, Tamale, 10.4.2019.
Interview with Sheikh Dr Tamin, General Secretary and Headmaster of Anbariya Educational Complex, Tamale, 10.12.2019.
Interview with Sheikh Dr Tamin, General Secretary and Headmaster of Anbariya Educational Complex, Tamale, 10.12.2019.
Tim Afrik, “Anbariya Islamic Institute donates to NADMO,” 4.11.2018,
Interview with Sheikh Dr Tamin, General Secretary and Headmaster of Anbariya Educational Complex, Tamale, 10.12.2019.
Tamale Charity Association:
Interview with Sheikh Abdul Majeed, Secretary of Imam Dawah Organization, and Sheikh Abdul Falah, member of Imam Dawah Organization, Tamale 10.4.2019.
A BRIEF HISTORY OF MYA, 10.3.2019; THE GENESIS OF MYA, 22.9.2019,
CONTINUATION: Muslim Youth Association, 7.8.2019; [donation of teaching materials],
CONTINUATION: Objective No. 2,
CONTINUATION,
Islamic Brotherhood for Bayt al Mal Foundation Ghana,