A VALEDICTORY SPEECH DELIVERED BY THE PRESIDENT DURING THE GENERAL MEETING OF DECEMBER 26, 1989

Good afternoon Chairman, members of Greenleaves Youth Club, distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen. I welcome you all to this memorable occasion which provides me a golden opportunity to address you all. First and foremost, my special thanks go to the almighty God who has spared our lives till today. I must not fail to express my deep appreciation to all members of this club for their contributions in one way or the other. I am also excited for your full support towards the successful organization of this Annual General Meeting (AGM).
The chairman and my distinguished audience, I want to crave your indulgence to tell you a short history of our great club. The club, Greenleaves Youth Club was established six years ago. At its early stage, most youths regarded it as a time wasting club that would soon die off. but today the club has been able to record tremendous achievements.
Firstly, our club has helped the community in so many ways. Before the inception of the club, our community had no good hospital I can remember that few years back, no fewer than one hundred people died of malaria fever in this community. Our community is about forty kilometres to the nearest city where our people can obtain good medical treatment. As a result of this, our club contributed money and raised fund for the building of a standard hospital for the community. Today. we thank God that the great edifice where our people can obtain medical treatment has been donated by our club to be used by the hospital In addition to that, we paid the salaries of the doctors, nurses and other auxiliary officials of the hospital for six months before it was finally handed over to the state government.
Secondly, we have constructed and tarred a few roads in the community. The only road which links our rural community to the nearest city was expanded and tarred while four streets were constructed and tarred Presently, we are still working on some other ones.
Similarly, for over two decades there was no standard market in this community. There was no place of contact between buyers and sellers and in the real sense of it there was nothing like the exchange of goods and services. In most cases. the agricultural products of our farmers got spoiled. but today our club has been able to establish a standard market for the community where farmers can sell their products.
However. in spite of all the achievements during my tenure as the president of this club, I also encountered a lot of problems. Actually. as expected. the major problem I encountered was lack of fund The club was financially handicapped especially when we were embarking on some of the capital projects mentioned earlier on. Definitely, we would have achieved more if we had much more funds at our disposal.
In conclusion. I thank all members of this club once again for the job well done. Our club has achieved a lot of recordable progress in this community. the financial crunch notwithstanding. As the President, I urge all our members to wake up anew and gear up to achieve more this year. My thanks go to all distinguished guests here present. Thank you and God bless.

Thomas Israel,
President, Greenleaves Youth Club