The Sunday News
Sukulwenkosi Dube-Matutu, Gwanda Correspondent
THE Gwanda Local Peace Committee is mobilising resources to assist vulnerable people whose plight has been worsened by the national lockdown.
In a statement, a pastoral peace ambassador in the committee who is also the Matabeleland South Provincial Peace Committee deputy chairperson, Pastor Phathisiwe Dube said they had started the Feed Gwanda Project in a bid to assist vulnerable people in both rural and urban Gwanda. She said the project sought to reach out to as many people as possible.
“As the Gwanda Local Peace Committee we came up with the Feed Gwanda Project as a response to this emergency that has arisen in our country. The country has been under lockdown for over four weeks as a way of curbing the spread of Covid-19. During this period, we have noted a significant rise in the number of vulnerable people in our community who have literally run out of food supplies.
“We believe that Gwanda can unite to help feed some of the vulnerable living under extreme conditions. As a committee we are working on mobilising resources from various stakeholders. Our aim is to assist the vulnerable with food and other essential services. We have engaged the business community, church leaders, local authorities, farmers, community leaders, civic society organisations, faith-based organisations and service providers among other stakeholders. We are mainly targeting the disabled, elderly and orphans,” she said.
Pastor Dube said the project will have different phases and a particular number of households will be targeted in each phase. She said they will be working with the Social Welfare Department to implement the programme. Pastor Dube said the committee was still working on how to effectively co-ordinate donations from various stakeholders and distribute them while observing the rule of social distancing.
“We have created a WhatsApp platform where we are working on modalities on how to collect the donations. We are considering setting up food bins across main shopping areas and churches where people can leave their food donations. We will engage the Social Welfare Department and churches in the identification of vulnerable community members.
“We will set up as many distribution points as possible to ensure that we have as few people as possible at each point and we will ensure that PPEs are available for this purpose. Social distancing will be maintained throughout this entire process,” she said.
Pastor Dube urged various stakeholders to participate in this cause. The Gwanda Local Peace Committee is a church-led community initiative aimed at promoting peace and non-violence in Gwanda through peaceful interventions and community-centred approaches.
@DubeMatutu
