SENIOR SCHOOL
NEWSLETTER Friday 29th March 2019 Nchima, Malawi and Cyclone Idai
Friday 5th April will be a casuals day in aid of the Nchima Trust
For some years now, the school has generously supported a small charity based in Malawi. As well as a substantial sum of money that was used to build a schoolroom and kitchen (thus enabling girls to stay for whole days at secondary school), Sibford has donated calculators and money for essential text books. Recent heavy rains in early March caused wide-spread flooding in Malawi; the arrival of Cyclone Idai turned an already desperate situation into a disaster. Pictures from the Mozambique port of Beira have given some indication of the massive scale of distress and destruction wreaked by the cyclone. It swept across Mozambique, into the neighbouring southern tip of Malawi as well as into eastern Zimbabwe, devastating crops, houses and infrastructure and killing people. In a report on 24th March, the president of the SADC said ’The economic cost and social impact of the Cyclone to the affected countries, and indeed the entire region, is immeasurable.’ The main hub for Nchima’s work is the small town of Thyolo, in the central-southern region of Malawi. Reports have indicated that the immediate area has not been too badly affected, though information received thus far suggests, at the very least, cracked walls in houses and hospitals, ruined crops and the spread of disease. Nchima’s work reaches beyond Thyolo District and ‘on-the-ground’ volunteers are able to access some of the more badly hit areas to the south and east. Commenting on the dire situation before the final sweep of the cyclone, a UNICEF report states that ‘the Government of Malawi declared a State of Disaster due to the severe flooding in across 15 districts in southern Malawi. At least 868, 895 people are reported to have been affected in 15 districts and some 86,976 people have been displaced. At least 56 people have reportedly died in the floods and another 672 have been injured.