Cyclone Idai Follow Up
Our Crisis Response Team deployed to Chimanimani, Zimbabwe in March 2019 following Cyclone Idai. Whilst there, the team identified children who had been orphaned by the disaster. Some of them attended Ngangu Primary School and some Chimanimani Secondary School, which is next door.
As part of our response, we don’t just help in the emergency situation, we aim to set up long term care for the children. We also emphasise that the way we deliver care often impacts the whole community, not just the orphans individually.
The team went back to Chimanimani in November 2019 to follow up on their previous visit. We ensured that the children we had identified as being orphaned were in school and that they were connected with the Ministry of Education and the Ministry of Social Welfare. We also ensured that there was no duplicate funding for the children and that the school knew who is funding each child.
We have made a long term commitment to paying the school fees for 5 primary school children and 4 secondary school children and the money goes directly to the school.
Part of the trip was to establish how we could strengthen the community – what issues do the schools face? We were informed that the secondary school needed new desks and chairs and the perimeter fence of the primary school had been destroyed by falling rocks and floods during the cyclone. There are bars in close proximity to the school and this meant that adults (often drunk) were walking through the school grounds during school hours.
With our Keep a Child Safe mandate in mind, we managed to secure funding for a new perimeter fence. One quarter of this came from within Zimbabwe and three quarters from the UK. We worked with our local partners to find a contractor who has now done an incredible job of erecting a new fence over the Christmas holidays. This work includes over 850m of fencing plus 2 gates, has been completed to an excellent standard and will benefit over 500 children. Everyone pulled together to make this possible and affordable with the contractor even offering a discount. There has been no loss of funds and no corruption – every penny has gone towards the project.
This response puts us in good standing with the local government who have seen that we were there at the disaster, have returned and kept children safe and learning. This gives us more freedom to operate in this region in the future as we have seen to be trustworthy. We have not imposed what we think is needed but have listened to the local practitioners on the ground and delivered strategic help.
Huge thanks to our partners, the contractor and donors for making this team effort a huge success.
