The fatal mudslide that claimed over 500 people and left over 600 missing in Sierra Leone, and the landslide that killed 200 more in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, have moved a Plumstead teacher to initiate a relief campaign.
Ellen Fedele is collecting clothes, food, water, stationery and other life essentials for schoolchildren and others affected.
“The mudslide and landslide really touched a nerve with me, and I want to try to do something. I thought we as a City can do something collectively,” said Fedele.
“There are disasters every day in South Africa, but we are loving and giving, and I hope there’s still some compassion and giving left for the people affected.
”We are proud South Africans and we, as a nation, always send rescue teams and doctors etc when we have huge disasters happening in the world.”
The collected donations would be handed to registered charity organisations to distribute among the worst affected people, Fedele said.
Rescue officials in Sierra Leone have warned that the chances of finding survivors alive were decreasing each day.
Churches across Sierra Leone held special services yesterday in memory of the dead. The Inter-Religious Council called for the services.
Special prayers and recitals were offered in mosques on Friday and churches yesterday for finding survivors, including by the preacher at Buxton Memorial Methodist Church in Freetown, the capital.
In the DRC the death toll has risen to 200 in the landslide on Thursday in three villages in Ituri province in the north-eastern of the central African country.
“At least 200 people from about 100 households have lost their lives,” Pacific Keta, deputy governor of the province, confirmed. Rescuers have been hampered by difficulties reaching the area, which is in the mountains, and the search to find survivors trapped under the rubble has been abandoned.
Keta called for international mobilisation to help the hundreds of homeless men, women and children without food.
Fedele said she had contacted Air Kenya to fly the donations for free, if a large enough donation of goods was collected. She had also contacted DHL and FedEx.
Her request to Air Kenya came after the Gift of the Givers relief organisation had declined to become involved in ferrying the donations to Sierra Leone, she said.
Gift of the Givers founder Doctor Imtiaz Sooliman said Fedele’s request was declined as the disaster was relatively small in comparison with other much bigger tragedies in the world.
“That kind of disaster a country can normally cope with. And if a country finds it difficult to cope, neighbouring countries should be able to minimise the disaster quite easily,” Sooliman said.
When the Department of International Relations and Co-operation spokesperson Clayson Monyela was asked yesterday what the South African government was doing to assist in the aftermath of the mudslide and landslide, he said they would announce a comprehensive package of assistance today.
Last month Fedele had offered a reward of R10 000 for information on the killing of her former pupil, Siyamthanda Betana, 19, on July 20 in protests in Imizamo Yethu.
Because police on their own arrested three suspects, the reward was donated to Hout Bay’s Community Policing Forum.
She asked for those wishing to donate to do so as soon as possible, and at least by Monday. Fedele said she can be contacted on 078 203 7510. For more information e-mail her at [email protected]
Additional reporting by Xinhua and Reuters