Community Development and Action International

"In the early 1980s a NGO called CODA Community Data was formed in Nottingham to make access to computers and computer training available to community groups and unemployed people. The impetus for this was to ensure that technology could be used for social change and that no one should be excluded from access to new technology.

"At the same time that the Nicaragua Solidarity Campaign (NSC) was sending brigades to Nicaragua to support the revolution and publicise its achievements, an NGO in the US called TecNica" sent skilled volunteers on short placements, often working within one of the government ministries. On their return they talked about their experiences to provide a counter to the adverse propaganda around Nicaragua and to persuade people to reject US government policy.

TecNica's work was so successful and inspiring that, by the late 80s, it was expanding its operations to work in Southern Africa. Through links with the Nicaragua Solidarity Campaign, TecNica also recruited volunteers from the UK.

"People from CODA Community Data in Nottingham and from the NSC in London came together in 1989 to form CODA International Training (CIT, as it was originally called). Some of them had been brigade members, or had experience of living and working in Nicaragua. Very soon, close links were established with TecNica.

"From the beginning, it was envisaged that CODA would work not only in Nicaragua but in other countries like South Africa. It was seen as a vehicle for redistributing the riches of Northern countries, in whatever form they took, to the South.

"In Nicaragua the situation changed irrevocably in 1990 when the Sandinistas lost the election. The solidarity movement in the US collapsed and, very soon after, TecNica itself wound up its operations. However, people in Nicaragua were adamant that support be continued, and that in many ways, with the eyes of the world turning elsewhere, it was more important than ever.

"In South Africa fundamental change was taking place at the same time. The situation here was one of hope and exhilaration because change had been achieved without a collapse into violence and civil war.

"CODA decided to carry on its activities in both countries and to continue seeking new countries to work in. The first funding CODA secured was for a project in South Africa with the trade union, COSATU. In Nicaragua, volunteers kept the profile of CODA alive, sending English teachers and an economist to work at the universities and in private companies, and women construction workers to a women's building project. Eventually, in 1994, a project to establish a community health database, working with the Nicaraguan Community Movement (MCN), was funded by the Overseas Development Agency, now DFID."


 * Samira Yussuf - Executive Director

Trustees
Accessed December 2011:


 * Sulemana Abudulai 		Chair
 * Kevin Caulfield
 * Guy Fisher
 * David Francis
 * Joanna Howard
 * Oliver Kemp 		Treasurer
 * Marina Spiegel
 * Laura Ylatalo

Patrons
Accessed December 2011:


 * Nelson Mandela
 * Desmond Tutu

Contact
URL: http://www.coda-international.org.uk