A United Kingdom based church has donated food stuffs to 135 families Ward 17 Umguza district amid calls for the government to distribute subsidised mealie meal to rural communities.
Hope Church of Newham were represented by Patience Ndebele Omiji while two local well wishers Tonderai Shoko and Sipiwe Shewete also contributed towards the donations.
In an interview with CITE, Ward 17 councillor Loit Ncube said the villagers were finding it difficult to access food as most of the shops in area are too far.
“The subsidised mealie meal that the government introduced during COVID-19 has not reached us until this day and the only option they have is to go to Bulawayo and they need a pass to get there which is impossible,” said Cllr Ncube.
He added that while the food stuffs will go along way in ensuring that the families have a decent meal, there was need for a long term solution.
“We are very grateful for these donations that have been made to us but as you can see it will only last only a day or too its too little to sustain the villagers,” he said.
He also reiterated that government should look into issue of delivering the subsidised mealie meal to Umguza area.
“We just want government to also bring us the mealie meal so that when people sell their goats they can be able to buy for themselves and not keep depending on donations,” he said.
Meanwhile, Gift Sanyamahwe who was distributing the food stuffs to the community on behalf of the well wishers revealed that the food stuffs benefitted 135 families particularly widows, child headed families and the disabled.
“We distributed the food stuffs to 135 families in total we were targeting child headed families, widows and the elderly because this is a remote area were people do not have the means to travel because the main road to any towns are far away and the COVID-19 situation does not allow them to travel, ” said Sanyamahwe.
“So it is hard for them to access their basic commodities on a daily basis so we decided to extend a helping hand and assist the community.”
