By Neil
Armstrong
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| Photo contributed Chimwemwe (Happy) Mussa gives a blanket and some kitchen ware to a community member |
A school in Malawi named in
honour of a Jamaican-Canadian philanthropist is being used as the hub of relief
efforts in a village in the aftermath of Cyclone Idai which struck that
country, Mozambique and Zimbabwe in March.
“Described by the UN as ‘one of the worst weather-related disasters in Africa’, it has caused extensive damage and devastated the lives of more than 2.6 million people in Mozambique, Malawi and Zimbabwe,” the organization said.
Oxfam International said the full scale of the cyclone is still unfolding. “Massive floods waters have destroyed homes, hospitals, schools, farms and agricultural land, damaging roads and washing away bridges. Thousands of people are still isolated in difficult to reach areas, some only accessible by helicopter or boat.”
Through a chance encounter with
a 22-year-old Malawian man, Chimwemwe (Happy) Mussa, in a market in Cape Town, South
Africa in March 2016, Jamaican-Canadian Kamala-Jean Gopie, a retired teacher
from Toronto, has built a school in his hometown in Malosa, Malawi.
She notes that since the cyclone
hit funds have been sent to Malawi through the People Bridge Charitable Foundation,
headed by Jamaican-Canadian Diana Burke, to help those in need in that town.
There is a memorandum of
understanding (MOU) with the foundation to work with her on the project.
The
Gopie Community School, the centre of a sewing project and a youth development organization, has
become an emergency shelter for families left homeless by Cyclone Idai.
Gopie said Mussa informed her
that the community was flooded from March 5 before the cyclone struck and that
six people had died and ten families were homeless.
Since Cyclone Idai, there have
been 28 families left homeless in Malosa, which is approximately 140 people,
70% of whom are women and children.
“They need food, they need
shelter, they need water,” said Gopie in an interview on CBC Radio’s Metro
Morning program.
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| Photo contributed Kamala-Jean Gopie speaking at Toronto's City Hall |
She has sent $1,500 CAD which
was used to buy 28 bags of maize for each family, 28 blankets, tarpaulin,
containers to store water and plastic plates.
“They want to rebuild their
homes. The reason why many of the homes have been destroyed is because they
have thatch roofs and there are bricks, but without cement holding the bricks together, so once you get
rain and wind the roof goes off and the bricks disintegrate.”
Gopie says the school is being
used because it has a zinc roof and it has cement between the bricks.
Calling her chance meeting of
Mussa (Happy) in South Africa the ‘$10 miracle,’ she said he told her his
father was dead and he was there in the market trying to earn money to support
his six siblings, his mother and his grandmother.
“In the course of the
conversation, he told me that he wanted to be a teacher. Well, I was a teacher
so it struck a chord and in leaving I gave him $10 and he put his hands
together, his eyes filled with tears and he said, Oh thank you mam, may God
bless you,’ and I gave him my card.”
Gopie told Mussa that if he can
get back to a school that would take him she would support him.
On a subsequent trip, she
visited his family and also sent him to school in Blantyre for a year.
When she visited his home, Gopie
noticed that there was no water, electricity or roads and there were lots of
little kids.
Drawing on her years as a
primary school teacher, she sang to them and when she asked Mussa if the
children attend school, he told her that there was no school.
She came back to Canada and chatted
with a friend about the possibility of building a school.
After the idea of a school was
approved by the local chief, Mussa’s family donated the land and Gopie sent
funds which resulted in the school being built in August 2017. She attended the
opening in September that year.
Gopie said she was expecting 40
children but two days before she Canada to visit there Mussa told her the
number had climbed to 70 and the population went up to 180
three-to-five-year-olds who get a lunch every day.
She said when she got there and
saw the building she cried.
“I could not believe that with
$2,500 we built a school and for $500 a month we can support to get all these
little children their curiosity expanded,” said Gopie who got friends to donate
to the school’s funding too.
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| Photo contributed |
This year, there are 130 because
the 6-year-olds have moved on. The children now wear uniform so they have expanded
to a second classroom with women learning to sew.
As of December, they have put in
a maize mill so the young men can grind the corn and earn some money.
“It is truly appreciated by the
people in Happy’s community,” says Gopie about the funds sent to help in the
flood relief effort.
She is impressed that from that
chance encounter this little village is able to not only feed the community but
in the aftermath of a cyclone and
flooding there is some place where they can sleep, and she is able to raise
some money so that they can get shelter, food and water which will prevent an outbreak
of cholera.
[This story has been published in the North American Weekly Gleaner, May 16-22, 2019.]
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