Summer 2023:

In the summer of 2023, the president of NADEUM (Austria) contacted Denis Mitei from Kenya.

September 2023:

Over the course of the year, it became apparent that a branch office in Kenya could be established at an acceptable start-up cost. After Vienna found Denis, an African who had the perseverance and determination to take on the challenges of founding an NGO/NPO, we decided to take this step.

We already had a contact in West Africa, in Sierra Leone. However, by 2023, he had not implemented our concept for 2025. We realised that, although he had cooperated well initially, he probably had other ideas. Like many Africans, he is keen to obtain as much financial support as possible from the so-called rich North – meaning Europe. This became increasingly clear to us when an Ethiopian living in Vienna explained this system to us in more detail, which can also be described as a clientele system.

Autumn 2023:

Denis inquired about how to set up an NGO in Kenya. However, we soon realised that setting up an NGO in Kenya, and probably in the rest of Africa, is not so easy. This is because the association authority in Kenya required all future board members to provide a certificate of good conduct. This had to be applied for at the district police administration. Denis was able to recruit the following people for a future branch of NADEUM.

The board:

Denis Cheruiyot Mitei, Ebeneza Kipngetich, Eli Kiprono, Purity Chepkoech, Moses Kipngetich-Yebei and Rebby Cheptoo.

The first four board members applied to the police authority for a certificate of good conduct. All certificates were issued in March 2024.

Information is only available via the Internet.

Denis inquired with the privately run association authority in Nairobi about the requirements for establishing a national or international NGO/NPO in Kenya. It turned out that there is a big difference depending on the type of NGO that can be established. Originally, we did not want to provide financial support. We thought that accepting outside help would be contrary to pride. However, we quickly realised that Africa is primarily interested in using foreign aid to create better opportunities for itself. As the executive committee, we had to go through a learning process to better understand the African system.

The authorities only allowed one international NGO.

They searched the internet to find out whether there was already an NGO called NADEUM. They quickly found what they were looking for. Denis and his board were informed that there was an international association in Austria with the name NADEUM and that if they wanted to establish a branch, they would have to comply with the same status. Thus, it was clear that this founding price category was not affordable for our NADEUM members.

Please send us an application so that we can provide you with financial support.

We recommended that Denis and the future members of NADEUM KENYA AFRICA submit an application to us, describing exactly what they needed. We were amazed at how quickly they managed to do this, because sometimes we feel that nothing is moving forward or that communication between two very different cultures is very difficult. But when it comes to money, Africans are extremely flexible and resourceful. Obviously, they are not as sluggish as they sometimes appear to be.

Submission for approval to establish an association

Mr Denis had to justify why he wanted to establish an NGO in Kenya. He justified this by saying that it would enable him to establish better foreign connections and achieve more with his sports club, SHG Soth-Rockies-Baseball5. The authorities instructed him to first draw up the future statutes in order to demonstrate the objectives of the future branch.

The NGO statutes

These are specified by the association authorities. They must be adopted for the most part and can only be adapted in terms of orientation, i.e. what the association wants to achieve for itself and others through its activities. Denis did an excellent job here. We at headquarters then received a copy. We reviewed it to determine whether it complied with our statutes. After we had certified that it did, Denis submitted it to the association authority. In August 2024, we received a request to transfer the registration fee to the authority.

After payment, the association was approved to commence its work.

However, after payment, we had to wait until December. We Austrians were already somewhat impatient, because in Austria, an association is approved within a month, provided that all the documents submitted are complete and not objectionable. Here, we had to be patient. For the Africans themselves, this founding process was very quick, as we later learned. For CBOs and SHGs, i.e. small national associations, a period of up to five years may be required.

In December 2024, the association ‘NKA_Branch’ finally commenced its activities.

In the same month, a first general meeting was held, at which the future members discussed all the tasks they wanted to make possible through the association. They also decided that each member should pay an annual fee.