Our story

Professor Joaquim Silva

Professor Joaquim Silva, the namesake of our organization, was a teacher at the Catholic Mission in the 1970s. As a teacher, he helped train hundreds of children from Jugudal. At the time, some parents would not let their children go to school due to work in the countryside and the War of Independence. Professor Silva used his influence with the parents and persuaded them to send their children to school. While teaching at Jugudal, he resided in Mansoa with his family.

In 2003, due to his precarious health, he moved to Bissau. He lived there until his death on December 25, 2011, waiting to be transferred for medical treatment in Portugal.

About Mansoa

Current situation of education and health in the city of Mansoa

Centrally located between four regions in Guinea-Bissau, Mansoa is a village with more traces of Portuguese colonial presence than many. Although its colonial history has diluted through time, some architecture — the bridge, the prison, the administrator's residence, and the Balanta's soccer club, to name a few — still remains. Called the "Green city" for the quantity of flowers and trees that surround it, some of its landscape is still scarred with the shrapnel of PAIGC bombs nailed to its canopies since the country's liberation war.

With a population estimated at 35,616 inhabitants, the city is mainly composed of young people — and soccer is its greatest passion. One can see this not only in the local team (the Balantas), but also in the packed stands full of mothers and children at the regional and national games.

Currently, education in Mansoa ranges from preschool to year twelve, with one teacher-training institute created by the local Catholic mission in 2014. Some students, if they have the means, can pursue additional education in Bissau, the capital, about sixty kilometres away. Those who do not have this luxury are unable to finish their education.

Quemo Mane High School is the one high school connecting all four sections of the region. Students must travel great distances from villages across the region in order to attend this single school. Teaching materials are nearly nonexistent — there is no laboratory in this sector, and the only library has shut down, so students have no place for research. Most schools do not have a single computer, and most are without books, desks or manuals to support the students.

Mansoa contains the regional hospital that covers five sectors, serving an estimated 226,000 locals. It faces a lack of logistical materials, like beds, laboratory supplies and an ambulance to transport patients to Bissau, sixty kilometres away, for more intensive care. When it is in use, other patients must wait until it returns — which has led to preventable deaths and worsened health conditions.