New shelters for pupils after disaster

HELPING child victims of this year’s floods with monthly grocery vouchers and school uniforms was one thing.

But as the Umkhumbane Schools Project (USP) non-profit organisation lent more of an ear to pupils’ needs in the Cato Manor area, so the need for disaster management and the link between housing and education became more apparent.

The organisation has gone about erecting new, durable shacks, especially in the informal housing area on steep slopes in Cato Manor, across the road from brick houses with title deeds and leading down to the veggie garden-lined Mhkambane stream.

Pupils linked to the project were living in “extremely substandard conditions”, the organisation said.

Residents have repaired walls of flood-damaged shacks with mud and other material.

Many dwellings would be as vulnerable in a third storm. However, the seven that the USP has erected enjoy concrete foundations.

They are corrugated metal structures more firmly built but not much bigger than those in the sea of shacks that surround them, many with concrete bricks weighing down their flimsy roofs.

“It would be illegal to build brick (in this informal settlement zone),” said operations manager at USP Precious Ngcobo.

The USP structures cost R7 500 each, labour included.

Siphiwe Sikhosana, 19, who has no parents and was at home, ill with flu, when the Independent on Saturday visited, will write his matric next year while living in his new shiny metal abode.

He recalled the day the April floods struck. “I was sleeping. One side of the house came down. I started to freak. I tried to move my things to another house on higher ground. The wall went. Just like ‘boom’. I was so scared,” he said.

On the opposite bank of the Mhkambane stream, another new shack, shining silver ahead of being painted to prevent rust, will be Andile Ngema’s room.

“When the floods came the rain flowed down the slope like a river,” said his brother, Menzi. Andile was in class at Mayville Secondary School.

Sikulile Gwala, who is in Grade 9, has a new USP shack that needed the ground underneath to be raised so it could be more resistant to flood damage on the steep slope.

Her grateful mother, Patricia Mbatha, who is bringing up four children on her own, tearfully recalled the day of the floods.

“Water entered the house, above and below the house. We lost all our belongings. Food was wasted. There were six of us in the house, including the children,” said Mbatha.

“I’m very happy, and thank you to everyone who contributed to us. This project has helped me a lot as I am in need. You can continue to help others,” she added.

Unemployment is high in Cato Manor, as is youth pregnancy, said Ngcobo. Breadwinners, on average, bring in R3 500 while many people survive on grants.

When it realised that disaster relief would mean addressing problems outside of its normal scope, the UPS raised R159 807 from international donors reached via social media and through its presence on the GlobalGiving online philanthropy platform.

A major donation was collected in Durban from individuals working at the Africa Health Research Institute.