Children Alone has been offering financial support to agencies in Africa for over ten years, often working with orphaned children. It is good to hear that as a school we have played a huge role in this. Through various activities we have managed to raise £12,644. At Rusitu High School in Zimbabwe our fundraising has facilitated the building of a school library to allow students to embark upon A Level studies for the first time. Money has also gone towards the building of a primary school in Kenya. As well as sponsoring individual students in their education, Emmanuel College prints the Children Alone newsletter free of charge.
Despite the many encouraging projects run by Children Alone and their partner organisation, ZOE, there are at present grave difficulties and the situation urgently needs our prayers. The terrible government policy in Zimbabwe of demolishing houses and other buildings is having its effect on the work of Children Alone and even more acutely on ZOE. Week after week since May, bulldozers have been flattening homes and driving out whole communities, both from high density areas in major towns and in less populous suburbs. People have been forced to sleep outside and have suffered from the freezing temperatures of a Zimbabwean winter. Lives have been lost, including those of children. Many of those who have been displaced are orphans, who were being cared for under the churches’ programme run by ZOE. The whereabouts of some orphans is now unknown. People sheltering in churches have been forcibly removed to camps where there is a lack of food, water and proper shelter. The Children Alone property at Dingle Road, where orphans and disadvantaged young people are cared for, was under threat, and money had to be paid to ‘legalise’ the recently completed extension. This is no guarantee of the building’s safety.
There is a severe fuel shortage in the country and inflation has risen to ridiculous levels, for example a Vienna sausage costs more than a 3 bedroom house cost 25 years ago; Colgate toothpaste in supermarkets is kept locked in a glass display cabinet otherwise it will be stolen. A 10 Z$ note is still in circulation: it costs over 3,000Z$ to print! Toilet paper costs 10$ a sheet; a monthly government pension would buy you one small sip of Coke, although Coke is not available to buy anyway.
This regime has brought great loss and fear to the people of Zimbabwe. Let’s remember them and pray that God will restore justice and peace to this troubled country.