Have you ever received a call that changed your situation, or just made life easier? Not many people have received that life-changing call. However, 510 communities across Nigeria can stand up to and say that a call just like this was the start of a new life for them! These communities were recipients of MTN’s What Can We Do Together initiative (WCWDT).

You need to hear the stories from the nominators and feel the joy from helping out your community - it’s infectious. Ahmed Bala {real name withheld], a student of mass communication in UNILAG nominated his community in Nasarawa state for the What Can We Do programme, and shares his story from the very start, “I was in class when my best friend sent me a link to a story. The first thing I thought about was New Nyanya. I grew up there and I appreciated every moment. We don’t have much, but it’s filled with good people who put the community first. The town school that I attended for my primary education is in a really terrible condition and we have never had an ICT lab. I saw it in the story, and I wanted us to have that. I sent in my text and prayed.”

So, what happened when he finally received the call and found out that his community had been selected? “I was happy! The community had to go through the verification process for MTN to verify that the community was in fact interested and would cooperate with the renovation process. Then I received a call that I was one of the ones selected! I called my grandmother immediately; she didn’t even know what a lab meant but she was happy! [laughs]”, he answered with a glimmer in his eyes.

His excitement about how the initiative changed his life was palpable, “I won’t lie, it changed a lot of things! The children now have more to learn and it has shown in a year. We are thankful - I am not sure we would have this without MTN. We cannot thank them enough at all.

Thankfully, MTN Nigeria has begun the fourth edition of its massive nationwide What Can We Do Together campaign. It’s an initiative that invites Nigerians to nominate their communities to receive interventions such as boreholes, ICT labs for schools, etc. For What Can We Do Together, you nominate your community by sending a text or via an online application, then you select either the ICT lab or borehole you want for your community. These people are called nominators.

Since 2015, the foundation has received over 190,000 nominations from Nigerians! This means that 190,000 people decided to put their communities first. So, head over to https://www.mtnonline.com/whatcanwedotogether/ or send MTN to 321 to nominate your community. Who knows, it might just be your turn for that call?