It’s not rare for people to donate small amounts of money here and there to special causes. However, one NBA player is making a generous donation to his home country. NBA star Bismack Biyombo is pledging to donate his entire $1.3 million salary this year to build a hospital in his native Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Biyombo, 29, said in a video released by his Bismack Biyombo Foundation that the project will honor his late father, François Biyombo, who died last August. The Phoenix Suns player, a Christian, told his agent he wanted to come to an agreement to play this year that would allow him to advance a positive cause. He initially stopped playing basketball and re-evaluated his life and career after his dad’s death.

Biyombo said, “While I was trying to figure out how to find something that would motivate me this year, I remember one day, I picked up the phone and called my agent. And said the only way I would do it this year was if we find a situation — one, that I fit in and two, that I would play for something.”

Biyombo reflected on his father’s health struggles before his death and his ability to take his dad to Europe to seek better treatment due to his resources. He also contemplated the lack of medical care available in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and wanted to instill hope and a lasting memory of his father.

“I wanted to make this year about my dad because my dad spent most of his life making his life about me, my brothers and sisters, and servicing people,” Biyombo said. “What I told my agent was my salary for this year would be going for the construction of a hospital back home to give hope to the hopeless.” He said he wants to give people from his home country “better conditions” and hopes to “save as many lives as possible.” Biyombo intends to build the hospital in his father’s honor.

“This is the best way I [think] that this year will be meaningful to me. It’s not just the desire to go for a championship, but also the desire to save lives,” he said. “And at the end of this season, I really want to be able to look back and say, ‘I dedicated this season to my dad.'”

This kind deed comes as poverty ravages the Democratic Republic of the Congo. As The World Bank noted, “In 2018, it was estimated that 73% of the Congolese population, equaling 60 million people, lived on less than $1.90 a day (the international poverty rate).” What Bismarck Biyombo is doing is a fantastic kind gesture. Instead of keeping his salary for himself, he wants to help other people that he knows don’t have access to the resources he does. What’s even more precious is that he’s doing so in honor of his father. He may not be here to witness the construction, but Biyombo’s father is looking down from heaven, beaming with pride for his son.