US-based philanthropist gives back to her childhood neighbourhood

Simba Jemwa, Online Reporter

LOOKING around US-based Ms Elizabeth ‘Liz’ Nyoni’s effect on the social capital of her childhood neighbourhood of Mzilikazi, you can feel the excitement as elderly locals gather around and begin chatting with one of their own children.

As Ms Nyoni who is based in Pennsylvania, USA explains to them the vision and objectives of her Elizabeth Nyoni Foundation (ENF), they all break out with smiles, and one by one they hug her and ask about her well-being.

Ms Nyoni, known by her community as NaPatience, is in the country back from her base in the United States and all she wants is to help. On 13 September, she brought people together from all walks of life in Ward 8 and her foundation donated various foodstuffs to the under privileged and vulnerable members of her community.

The foundation’s Basic Goods Hamper Distribution Program aims to bolster food security in the community of Mzilikazi (Ward 8) by distributing basic commodity hampers to 500 vulnerable households ranging from US$20 – US$50 per household over the course of 2022 to the first half of 2023.

“Food insecurity is a lack of a consistent access to enough food for an active, healthy life and it usually refers to a lack of available financial resources for food at the household level. My interactions with the community of Mzilikazi and research that was done in 2021 during the Covid 19 pandemic lockdown, revealed that food insecurity is a complex problem. Many households in Ward 8 do not have the resources to meet their basic needs; challenges which increase a family’s risk of food insecurity,” Ms Nyoni told Sunday News.

“Unfortunately, food insecurity does not exist in isolation: that low-income families are affected by multiple, overlapping issues such as economic/social disadvantages such as chronic or acute health problems, no access to healthy nutritional food and little to no access to income earning opportunities. Therefore, based on the recommendations of the survey, the Basic Goods Hamper Distribution Program was formulated as one of the key interventions to address the food insecurity challenge faced by vulnerable households in the community of Mzilikazi,” she said.

And to help to mitigate these challenges the Elizabeth Nyoni Foundation identified 25 beneficiaries who were then gathered inside P Square in Mzilikazi and received hampers with an assortment of basic commodities comprising 2 L cooking oil, 10kg mealie meal, 2 kg sugar, 2kg rice, 1kg salt, 1 bar green soap, 2L Mazoe, 1kg sugar beans, 6 pack candles and 1L of milk.

One of the beneficiaries, Mr Mpofu expressed a deep appreciation for the foundations efforts revealing the hamper would enable them to get into the next month and welcomed the initiative noting the current harsh economic climate.

Mrs Leah Dube, another beneficiary added that she had emptied her food stocks and so the distribution of the hampers was timely and covered a huge “gap” in her kitchen.

In her closing remarks at the donation, Ms Nyoni pledged to continue to support Ward 8 and expressed her wish to expand the program to cover more of the community so that the 500 listed beneficiaries all benefit from the program.

Founded in 2018 by Ms Nyoni, the Elizabeth Nyoni Foundation is a non-profit making organization that focuses on fostering food security and securing sustainable livelihoods at household level. The organization works with the most vulnerable members in communities around Bulawayo with special focus on the elderly, orphans and the unemployed to assist them move from poverty to self-sustainability.

Having grown up in a community steeped in poverty and faced many perilous challenges in life Ms Nyoni founded the Elizabeth Nyoni Foundation (ENF) to inspire others that poverty and hardship are not permanent and that everyone of us has the will power: that fighting power within, to alter their situation.