Habitat for Humanity supports 350 Families with Emergency Shelter Kits in Chikwawa
Habitat for Humanity Malawi (HFHM) with funding from Habitat for Humanity International (HFHI) has supported 350 families in Chikwawa with Emergency Shelter Kits (ESKs) and non-food items (NFIs). The families supported with the ESKs are from Group Village Head Matsukambiya in Traditional Authority Ngabu in Chikwawa. These are some of the families whose homes and properties were destroyed by the Tropical Storm Ana and Gombe. The families have been living at the Camp since January 2022. The families were failing to go back to their communities to start a new life and find a way out of the rubble because they could not find resources on their own to build back better and stand on their own. Everything they had was lost.
Habitat for Humanity provided the families with shelter kits to make immediate transitional temporary homes and move from the camp to their homes. The items which were packed in a shelter kit includes Tarpaulin: sheets of heavy-duty tarp to be used to create walls and roofs, rope(s). The families were also supported with NFIs such as blankets, mats, plastic backets and working tools.
Speaking during the handover ceremony, the National Director of Habitat for Humanity Malawi, Anock Kapira, expressed gratitude to Habitat for Humanity International and all affiliates for supporting the survivors of the disasters with ESKs and NFIs in Chikwawa. The people have been at this camp since January 2022 and were helpless and could not go back to their communities to start a new life on their own. This help will support the families from this camp to go back and build transitional homes while awaiting building permanent homes.
Receiving the donation on behalf of the community, Group Village Headwoman, Matsukambiya, danced to express her joy for the support they have received to go back to their communities. We are so excited with this donation, and we are happy to go back home and build the transitional homes with the ESKs which we have received today, she said.
The families were also trained in the guidelines on participatory approach to safe shelter awareness (PASSA), which aims to raise the awareness on how communities can foster locally appropriate safe shelter and settlement practices.
Government is planning to relocate the survivors of the disasters to high land areas.
