Family Counseling and Development Foundation Ignites its 10th Candle
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The FCDF celebrates its 10th anniversary in its two branches in Sana'a and Aden, which falls on January 8th each year.
At the ceremony, Dr. Bilqis Jubbari, founder and president of the Foundation started her speech saying: "God bless you all and our dear country, Yemen, and happy anniversary to us all.
Today, together, we celebrate the nine-year anniversary of the establishment of the Family counseling and Development Foundation (FCDF) and starting its tenth year. A day which is not like the rest of the days in my personal, social and professional life. It is a day when I recall a series of successive events that the Foundation went through before it reached this level of success that you are witnessing today, and through a long journey of difficulties and struggles, joy and pain, success and failure... Over the past nine years there has been a lot of effort and work that made the foundation appears in its beautiful state that it is today.
I started the foundation with a big dream that I had for years to help people and get them out of their suffering and pain. I specialized in psychology, then I was assigned as an assistant at Sana'a University and continued my master's and PHD’s studies. However, all my studies did not provide me with the necessary skills and knowledge to provide psychological assistance to those in need. I went into the field of therapy and psychological counseling in the United States of America, worked at one of the psychotherapy and counseling centers, and there I gained the knowledge and skills which I wanted.
I returned to my dear homeland with all the help tools, knowledge and the right scientific skills and enthusiasm to work and provide assistance in this field. And then Family Counseling and Development Foundation came into light on 8 January 2011.
The start was very modest and simple with a team of 6 specialists and secretaries. I would not hide from you that my dear husband, Dr. Mohammed Al-Mutaimi, is one of the most important elements of success for this Foundation, who has been providing all forms of moral and material support for the success and continuity of this Foundation, and he has been doing so to this day. His conviction of the greatness of the role that I play and the Foundation makes him make use of all his potential and his local and international relations to help me start from founding FCDF and then getting the toll-free number (136) from the prime minister's state of that time (Professor Ali Mujauar), and through helping me getting all the funding that arrived for this Foundation. Me with my vision, my certificates and my high experience in the field, and him with his relationships and his strong presence with the donors, the most recent of which is the arrangements for my visit in Geneva to meet with the Director-General of the World Health Organization... Which I think will soon bear fruit. Our efforts are integrated to serve this beloved nation.
In the first four years of the founding, I was a therapist in the foundation's clinics, a hotline specialist, and the only donor to this Foundation. I have been carved into the rock and I was very hopeful that the day must come when a donor pay attention to the importance of our role and our efforts. I worked hard to present this foundation and publicize it by all means to local, regional and international organizations and institutions and to promote its activities and humanitarian efforts until they our foundation is pointed at as one of the best centers for psychotherapy and psychological counseling in the Middle East.
Over the years, the Foundation began to grow and many employees joined it, including those retreating in the middle of the road, and those who continued and struggled with determination and sincerity with us till this day. Some of them made a great contribution and were a real help to this institution until it reached maturity today, and some of them conspired against it and tried to destroy it out of envy and greed or seize it in ways that are, to say the least, miserable. I did not bend or weaken for a moment when those pitfalls or conspiracies were standing in my way, but I was drawing strength from the Creator ‘ALLAH’, and I am confident that the prayers of the beneficiaries will be the impregnable fortress. With this faith and determination, the Foundation has reached what it is today, thanks to God, and the efforts of the loyal members of the Foundation who have faced with me all difficulties and pitfalls with dedication, faith and sincerity.
Today, the Foundation has the initiative to contribute to the treatment of mental health diseases in Yemen and is credited with breaking the stigma attached to mental illness and psychological disorder and reaching the most remote areas of the Republic of Yemen. Our Foundation never discriminates between patients, male or female, old or young, and is committed to independence and neutrality to all individuals, whoever they are and from any region.
To all the donors, who have contributed and supported this Foundation in its various stages, all thanks, appreciation and praise, especially the Dutch government, which was the first to pay attention and support the mental health and psychosocial support project in Yemen and gave its grant to the mental health program, which is still today one of the most important Programs of the FCDF in Yemen. I also thank UNFPA as the main supporter of the Yemeni Centre for Family Counseling program in Sana'a and Aden. Tens of thousands of beneficiaries have benefited from its services. They have all the thanks, appreciation and praise from me and you.
I must thank the Government of the Republic of Yemen for its efforts to present this service in the best way. I would like to thank the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology, which directed all telecommunication companies to cooperate in opening a toll-free hotline for the foundation as a contribution to the service of the community and to ease the burden on the Yemeni citizen who needs access to us and cannot afford it.
Thanks, and gratitude to phone companies, Hatefi, Yamen Mobile, Sabafon, MTN, and Y, for adopting the free service connection to the hotline, which is one of the biggest success stories of the Foundation. It is a significant and invaluable contribution to those Yemenis who are experiencing the horrors of mental or psychological disorders and find in the hotline an effective and productive means of receiving treatment and psychological counseling from anywhere, anytime.
Excuse me if I took a lot of your time, but I am happy to see the Foundation and see you on this day. I have been free to express what is on my mind, and I will not forget on this dear occasion to all our hearts the people who have played a great role in the success of this Foundation, led by Mr. Abdulquddos Harmal, Executive Director of the Foundation. He joined the foundation after receiving the first project from the Dutch government and struggled and struggled by my side to make this Foundation successful and get it to where it is today. He is a tireless person, a seasoned leader, a gentleman, a generous man of creation who puts the interest of the foundation above all considerations, and he has all the thanks, appreciation and gratitude.
Nor can this Foundation be mentioned without mentioning Dr. Seif Eddin Al-Miri, who is an essential pillar of this Foundation and a solid pillar of its stability and development. His reputation, professionalism, knowledge, and great experience were important assets for the foundation and its success.
As for Mr. Nabil Al-Khayati, god bless him wherever he is. His knowledge, his experience and his great dedication to the foundation were one of the most important reasons for the qualitative shift that has taken place for the foundation in the last two years.
Mr. Mahmoud Al-Rubasi, a glorious man who has never postponed today's work until tomorrow, is meticulous in his work governing religion and high morality in all his actions.
I do not forget here the mountain of the majestic mountain in the Foundation Mr. Taha Al-Rahabi, who, with his noble and magnanimous attitudes and wise actions, is supporting and pulling the foundation and all those in it to the safe shores.
And the dynamo of the Foundation and the engine of all its activities, Dr. Najla Jubbari, who has the love and respect of all, fair to everyone within this foundation, and has a strong logic and insight, who, if spoke, says nothing but truth.
Each one of you in their name and description has been and continues to have a great and valuable role in the success of this foundation. There are also other individual and institutions have contributed and continue to contribute to the success of this foundation, and I cannot mention them all.
To all of you and to all those who have contributed directly or indirectly to the success of this foundation, thanks, appreciation and gratitude.
Today I am proud not only of the establishment of the foundation and what it has reached, and not only of the thousands to whom the foundation has provided high-level services ,thanks to you all, but I am also proud that I made a name and a reputation in Yemen of this field and was able to gather, under the same name (FCDF), the best staff in the field and the largest number of specialists, and I was a major reason to draw the attention of the state and society, and international organizations to the importance of integrated mental health and psychosocial support services. Before the FCDF, mental health services were only private clinics for few expensive psychiatrists, a nursing department within a hospital with lacks of proper psychiatric care, or psychiatric clinics and a neuropsychiatric hospital that people suffering were afraid of the stigma of going to them.
With the efforts of each and every one of you, our Foundation has provided a high-end integrated service that preserves the patient's privacy and dignity.
Peace be upon you and god's mercy and blessings."