The Sunday News
Mncedisi Buhali Sunday News Reporter
THE Voice of Africa, an organisation run by Botswana-based Zimbabwean youths, has donated stationery to Emthunzini Wethemba Children’s Home in Mzilikazi, as it continues to fulfil its “inspired to make a difference” motto.
Speaking during the donation event recently, the founder and executive director of The Voice of Africa, Miss Mpho Mpofu, said they decided to come and celebrate Christmas with the children as they were unable to do so on their own.
“We came here to celebrate early Christmas with these children. What we noted is that they do not have families to celebrate with. We wanted to be that family, hence this is the difference we are talking about,” she said.
“We realised that these children are also the least noticed in a society, but they have the potential, judging by their good end of year results.”
Miss Mpofu and most of the members in the organisation live in Botswana.
“They registered the organisation in Zimbabwe in September.
“We have just recently started but we have had two events, one in Botswana and the second is this one we are witnessing today (last Saturday). In Botswana, we were actually doing a campaign against early child marriages.
“We discovered that, Botswana regards early child marriages as part of their culture, thus we were trying to educate people on what is right,” said Miss Mpofu.
She added that the idea of bringing the stationery while they were celebrating early Christmas with the children was to encourage them to be more serious about school.
“We realised that this donation will one way or the other contribute to these children’s future, rather than just coming with the fancy presents which will not even last,” she said.
Emthunzini Wethemba volunteer Miss Anita Dick appreciated the organisation’s donation, especially the books.
“This stationery will actually help the children a lot because sometimes we have a crisis when it comes to books,” Miss Dick said.
Miss Dick said Emthunzini Wethemba had 62 children, 27 girls and 35 boys.
The children had a chance to be taught life skills by the Zimbabwe National Family Planning Council sister-in-charge for Bulawayo province, Mrs Felistus Moyo, who was also the guest of honour.
