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Umzingwane villagers plead for food assistance
Savious Kwinika, The Standard (Zimbabwe)
October 17, 2004

http://www.thestandard.co.zw/read.php?st_id=779

UMZINGWANE - Traditional leaders and Zanu PF councillors in the drought ravaged Matabeleland South province are appealing to international food relief agencies to urgently return to the region and start feeding thousands of villagers on the verge of starvation.

Speaking to The Standard during a tour of Matabeleland South last week, several Zanu PF councillors, chiefs and people living with HIV/Aids complained that the food situation had drastically deteriorated thereby worsening conditions of people living with HIV/Aids.

The Standard visited Umzingwane, Esigodini, Mawabeni, Mtshede, Msizini, Sikoveni and Gongo-Zolo communal lands in Matabeleland South.

The villagers bemoaned the withdrawal of World Food Programme (WFP) and its supporting agencies such as World Vision Zimbabwe and ORAP (Organisation of Rural Associations for Progress), which were mainly involved in food relief operations targeted at thousands of starving villagers.

Zanu PF Ward 3 Councillor for Gongo-Zololo in Umzingwane, Nathaniel Mhlanga, said the food situation in the area had been worsened by insufficient grain at the sole Grain Marketing Board (GMB) depot in the district.

"The food situation is very bad and we need urgent assistance. We have a GMB depot here, but the grain comes once a month, and in most cases the is insufficient for the needs of the entire district.

"Villagers have exhausted the little grain they harvested and from July 2004 up to the present moment (October) people have been buying grain while others go for days without food," said Mhlanga.

Village head for Sikova, Reuben Ncube (65), said government departments, including the Agricultural Rural and Extension Services (AREX) officers in the area, were aware of the acute food scarcity but nothing was being done about it.

Ncube said he feared the situation might have contributed to untimely deaths of those living with HIV/Aids.

He appealed to the WFP and international food relief agencies to urgently revive the abandoned food redistribution programme and rescue an estimated 700 000 people in Matabeleland South region from starvation.

"We have been knocking at the government doors on a daily basis for food relief but there is nothing concrete in sight. The government always tells villagers to wait for the grain but once again, the grain that comes once a month is too little for thousands of people who would have gone for days without food.

Mtshede village head in Esigodini communal lands, Moffat Chisali, said the rate at which people living with HIV/Aids were dying could be worsened by the acute food shortage.

"There is little grain and people living with HIV/Aids are suffering. They are weak and they need food," said Chisali.

Pelina Sibanda, a volunteer community worker told The Standard at Sikoveni communal lands that the situation was desparate.

"The situation is pathetic, especially for those living with HIV/Aids. Some may be dying before their time comes due to lack of food," Sibanda said.

Contacted for comment last week, the World Food Programme (WFP) spokesperson, Makena Walker, said the chiefs, headmen, villager heads and Zanu PF ward councillors in the drought stricken Matabeleland South province should not direct their appeal to the WFP but to the government.

"An appeal for food aid should not be directed to us (WFP) but to the government. Once the government approaches us for food relief, we will act to avert the suffering.

We have done that before and we will always help when called in.

"Currently we are we not distributing food aid to everybody. We are channelling our aid to the vulnerable people in the countryside, especially children whose parents have died of Aids.

"Personally, I understand the difficult situation the people of Matabeleland region are going through but there is nothing we can do unless they (villagers) have made a strong appeal to the government, then we will come in and act," Walker said.

She said the World Food Programme had covered the entire country to assess the food situation and filed their findings for future references.

Efforts to get comment from Matabeleland South governor, Angeline Masuku, proved fruitless. Her secretary continuously told this reporter that the resident minister was out of office.

Recently, the government threatened Bulawayo city authorities and the independent Press over stories on the acute food shortage in the country, which have resulted in several children under the age of five and some elderly people in Bulawayo dying as a result of malnutrition.

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