Matabeleland youth network pass a helping hand to Haiti victims
Posted by Nxwala on March 4, 2010
From victim to victim, youth from Zimbabwe are helping those who are in pain after the earthquake that almost destroyed Haiti. The Matabeleland Youth Network (MYN) met on 27 January to donate money to the victims in Haiti, which was broadcast on South African television. These youth are victims of Zimbabwe violence and the Gukurahundi genocide that swept their parents from 1982 to 1987 and killed more than twenty thousand people in Matabeleland. They know what it means for twenty thousand people to die at the same time but for more than a hundred thousand, like what happened in Haiti, is really serious and hard to imagine. Since they are in a foreign land they decided to raise money for Haiti, although not much since they are victims of Mugabe’s government.
MYN managed to raise R1000 from its members, most of who are not working and have no suitable income to support themselves. They know R1000 is nothing compared to what happened in Haiti and they wish they could help more. The situation needs people to come up with huge amounts of money so that the country can be rebuilt and to provide counseling because I do not think those people sleep well. The MYN is still waiting for other members to bring more donations, which will be forwarded to the victims via the SABC.
The group has plans to rebuild Matabeleland but they stopped concentrating on these plans to pass a helping hand to the Haitians. If people do not understand and fail to donate money to the people of Haiti, the whole country will fall apart and dead bodies will be left unattended, much like the twenty thousand bodies in Matabeleland. Even now you can find these bodies and bones in caves and during road construction. Such things can traumatize people for life. We have a reason to donate as we do not want bones of dead people to be seen around because the memory will always be there and people will find it difficult to forget. This is the situation for the people of Matabeleland. Until someone comes and apologizes and buries the dead bones, it will be difficult for people to forgive and forget. This was said by the MYN spokesperson.
I don’t know whether the Zimbabwean government made a donation to the Haitian victims and I will not be surprised if they do not bother themselves as they have tortured many of their own people. The other thing is they do not know what it is to be a victim; they are always victimizing. The MYN leaders have a vision to rule and be acceptable worldwide, unlike our leaders in Zimbabwe who do not have a clear understanding of other nations, even African countries. The organization claimed in future they would visit the embassy of Haiti to show their support and sympathy and to express their wish that this not happen again to any other country in the future.
These leaders want to bring back confidence to Matabeleland, which was tarnished by the Zanu sponsored dissidents and later Gukurahundi. This practice made Matabeleland very poor because it lost investor confidence in the early eighties. Now, by engaging in international disasters like Haiti, they are trying to make the world understand them and know their background, even though during the Matabeleland genocide, no other countries stepped in to help.
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