Local group brings Christmas to Zimbabwe pensioners

MALALANE – On December 7 the Zimbabwe Pensioners Supporter Fund (ZPSF) will make its last delivery for the year, known as the special Christmas delivery.

Boxes packed with everything from toothpaste to Marmite, cooking oil and baking powder will be donated to the elderly of our neighbouring country.

According to Ms Linda Shultz, warehouse manager in Malalane, the people of Darling in the Cape help them by sending products once a year and they then return the favour by sending them needed products that they have in excess. Shultz says they currently support

1 600 pensioners.

The ZPSF was established by

Mr Hannes Botha when he received an appeal for help from a senior citizen in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe in 2002. According to Botha, this pensioner had no funds and food.

He then decided to buy food and fill his car, took a week’s leave and drove 1 000km to Bulawayo to make the delivery.

A few months later he did the same and was asked to provide another elderly person with food at the Huisvergesig Old Age Home in Gweru.

He explained, “I arrived at the home and gave the pensioner the food parcels. I noticed that the other elderly people were staring at me. I realised that they also needed food.” Botha said it took him another eight months to buy enough food to supply 36 of them at this home.

“The people did not know that they would receive food, some of them were so overwhelmed that they even cried,” said he said.