Suzanne Kana and her godchildren – Fondation Kana’s inspirations and initiators
The history of Fondation Kana is strongly connected to life and spirit of Madam Suzanne Kana. Suzanne Kana, also being called “Maman Mokolo“ was born around 1937 and died on 4th February 1996 in Yaounde, Cameroun. Not descending from a rich family, she decided to go to Yaounde (Mokolo) to work for a better life. A better life she wished not primarily for herself though, but mainly for the many children, she supported during her whole life. She gave all she had. As she had no own children, she supported needy children: some of them she raised in her own home, of some she became sponsor, others she helped in other ways. Supporting so many children, she did not know tribalism: everybody was welcome in her house and heart (Suzanne Kana spoke 5 local, Cameroonian languages, Pidgin and English). Her credo for her task was: give all you have without asking for anything in return for it.
She not only supported children so: she also got involved for women’s concerns and initiated several organizations for this aim.
Her love for taking care of children was so great that several of them named their own children "Kana" to honour Suzanne Kana’s memory.
Some years after Suzanne Kana’s death one of these children, Joseph Kana, moved to Germany to become an engineer. He returned to Cameroon in 2001 to do his university-internship in his fatherland. He worked at an informatics company. Was it destiny or chance, which leads an employee of the orphanage Fondation Fact to this company at the same time? Anyway he asked for help in fixing the keyboard of one of their computers. Joseph Kana was assigned to do so and visited Fondation Fact for this reason. He saw the supported children and the members of Fondation Fact explained to him the structure of the orphanage and the background of the children. Joseph immediately wanted to support their work and the children and developed the idea of sponsoring. Back in Germany he and the other members of a working group called New Generation put the idea into effect. Since 2002 the number of their sponsored children has risen each year.
To cope better with the situation in Cameroun, Fondation Kana was founded at last. It is not working any more only in the area of sponsoring, but also in education, health and environment protection. The sponsoring thought of Suzanne Kana continues to be the basis of its work though. The credo of “Maman Mokolo” to give everything you have without expecting anything in return for it is carried on by the foundation that is a professionally working team under the coordination of Mr. William Fedjo.
