Bismack Biyombo, returning to the NBA after a year as a free agent, has announced he will donate the entire $1.3 million value of his contract to the construction of a hospital in his home town in Congo.
Taking last season off to care for his sick father, who passed away in August of 2021, Biyombo said he became aware of just how fortunate he was simply to be able to bring his father to the hospital.
The announcement was made last Friday, two months after Biyombo signed a one-year contract with the Phoenix Suns.
The construction will be carried out through the Bismack Biyombo Foundation, which uses the star’s success as an NBA player to help those in the DR Congo. During the early pandemic, the Foundation delivered $1 million in medical supplies to hospitals across the country.
The Foundation focuses on creating initiatives in three areas to multiply opportunities for children in the DRC: athletics, education, and health. Its work results in 185 annually-granted scholarships, 150 higher education opportunities, and helps over a thousand patients every week receive treatment at Congolese hospitals.
“I told my agent my salary for this year would be going to the construction of a hospital back home to give hope to the hopeless,” Miyombo said in an interview released on his Foundation’s YouTube channel. “I want to be able to give them better conditions so that they can somewhat have hope that their loved ones will be able to live and see another day.
The hospital will be named in honor of the man whom Miyombo described as “my friend, my business partner, my mentor, and everything.”
The story is remarkably similar to that of Atlanta Hawks center Dikembe Mutombo, who donated $2 million of his NBA earnings toward the building of a planned $44 million hospital and medical center in his home town of Kinshasa, Congo in 1998. GNN reported that the donation was made through the Dikemebe Mutombo Foundation.
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”I’ve had an opportunity to live very well here in America—and to succeed,” said Mutombo. “But my success would be pointless if I forgot to look back at where I came from and help those who are still struggling for basic medical care.”
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