At work till noon, and I had reconciled the cashbook for January (yippee). And I was off to audit this charitable organisation in Prai called Food For Life. The gate was locked when I got there, or rather that I couldn't push it open. Somehow managed to open it, when the person I was supposed to meet came out. His name is Kalesh Das, but he looked Chinese to me. (I think he is Chinese, just an identity-complex issue). He's the chairman of the organisation.
After spending a couple of hours with him, I realised a few things
- People only get involved in NGOs for pure interest in the work of the organisation and not to do any extra work i.e. you would spend some time to help organise a talk or an event, or arrange some chairs, simple tasks like that, and not contribute on a continuous committed basis like maintaining the accounts of the organisation.
- Money is the essence of survival. Without money, who wants to contribute to an NGO?
- If a regular donor skips a monthly donation, it's hard to ask them why they missed. It's the balance of egos in place, and also the fear of offending the donor that there may not be future donations if the donor is irked by the enquiry.
So many things to put you off from contributing to an NGO. As if there's a dearth of things to drive you nuts in your everyday life that you want to get involved in this mess. I know I'm sounding pessimistic and all, but that's the perception I gathered from Kalesh.
Hmm.. And that man is a civil servant, and yet uses 2 of his off days to contribute to this course. He even comes after working hours on weekdays to tend to administrative affairs.
I don't think I could do what he does. Trust me, it is a lot of headache to run a place when you have to worry about an illiterate doing your accounts and having negative balances almost every other month.
Hope the finances improve once the new building comes up.
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