‘Dash Me Store Foundation’ Rekindles My Love for Vulnerable, Needy People, Says Adeosun

Former Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, has explained that the ‘Dash Me Foundation’ and its online thrift-for-charity initiative known as Dash Me Store were established to give hope and better life to the vulnerable and needy in Nigeria.

Adeosun made this known yesterday when she responded to media inquiries from her base in the United Kingdom.

She said the Dash Me Foundation and Dash Me Store have rekindled her love for the vulnerable and the needy in Nigeria.

According to her, “A N20,000 sales that will pay for the medical treatment of an abandoned child gives me so much excitement despite having handled transactions worth billions of dollars for Nigeria.”

Vice President Yemi Osinbajo had on June 14, 2021, launched the Dash Me Foundation to raise funds for small orphanages, Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) camps, domestic violence shelters and groups working with the vulnerable and needy in Nigeria.

Adeosun disclosed that the Dash Me Foundation was working closely with charitable organisations at the grassroots to ensure that funds and materials donated via the Dash Me Store get to the actual beneficiaries.

She said: “The thrift-for-charity store is a unique model which does not just give to the needy in the conventional way of merely handing out donations.

“It is an innovative and structured way of aggregating donations to earn income to transform the lives of the vulnerable and needy people in Nigeria while also creating jobs in the process.”

The Foundation, according to the former minister, ensures that beneficiaries are genuine and have a track record of performance.

“It also makes sure that the funds granted are utilised in accordance with agreed terms. Efforts are made to screen out opportunists and ensure that every naira counts.

“The Dash Me Foundation currently operates two thrift stores in Nigeria-one is an upscale boutique located in the highbrow Lekki Phase 1, and the other is Discount City in Ogba, both in Lagos State.

“The boutiques are filled with shoes, clothes, furniture and accessories which were donated by generous supporters in New York, London and Nigeria. Revenue from sales of all items in the boutiques goes to support the needy,” she added.

The most recent grants from the Dash Me Foundation showed a range of deserving beneficiaries with projects spread across the country.

A major grant beneficiary was the Feet of Grace, an organisation providing false limbs to amputees on low incomes and wheelchairs to polio victims in Kano, Nasarawa and Cross River States.

Other beneficiaries include Peculiar Saint Orphanage, provided with a fully-funded cerebral palsy therapy room, and Sought After Women, which received funds to resettle women who had been trafficked.

The rapidly expanding foundation is registered in the UK, New York in United States, and Lagos.

The vice president had in June 2021, during the launch of the Dash Me Foundation, lauded the former minister for the initiative, describing it as the first of its kind in the country.

He had said: “I am excited to be here for several reasons, but most of all is because of Adeosun’s commitment to the notion that all service to man is actually service to God, and she took that very seriously.

“This is why, as a minister, she prioritised the Social Investment Programmes, when for the first time, the country voted almost N500 billion of our annual budget to welfare programmes, which are called the Social Investment Programmes, which engaged 500,000 young men and women, and also giving microcredit to about two million traders as well as home-grown school feeding programme for 9.5 million children daily in public schools across the country.”