By Mary Kabay
Caritas Freetown in partnership with Manos Unidas, on the 3rd June 2022, donated hundreds of baby food items, sanitary kits, diapers, and soaps to female fire victims in one of the biggest slum communities in Freetown, Culvert -Camp Know Strain.
The donations were made as part of Caritas’ disaster relief programs in ensuring that affected persons in disaster-prone areas are taken care of mentally and emotionally and provided with temporal basic needs.
229 affected women and girls above 13 received sanitary dignity kits; 116 babies received diapers and baby food, and another 245 women received laundry and bathing soaps slippers, lappa, touch lights, toothbrushes, paste, and more.
Culvert -Camp Know Strain is a slum community located in the East End of Freetown. The slum community is divided into six zones. As clustered as the zones are it’s clear to tag the slum community as a disaster-prone area.
It could be recalled that on Thursday, April 28th, 2022, at around 1:00am, disaster struck one of the zones; zone three.
One of the houses in the said zone caught fire which later spread to the other houses leaving over 100 houses burnt down to ground level. The unfortunate and unprecedented situation left a thousand and more people homeless including children as young as zero-year-old.
The relief items that were donated brought the curtain down on Caritas’ support to the fire victims but it was not the first.
Caritas has been supporting disaster-affected areas in Freetown since its first day of operations in Sierra Leone. For Culvert -Camp Know Strain community, hundreds have lost almost everything that was in their possession as some were left with little or nothing to buy food.
However, as an organization whose principles are built on Christ’s love and compassion for all, Caritas supported the fire victims with cooked food for a period of two weeks.
The Chairlady of the affected community, Madam Hawa Sesay expressed profound thanks and appreciation to Caritas Freetown and Manos Unidas for their timely intervention and unflinching support since the inception of the fire disaster.
Hawa Sesay, with one of the purest smiles as she was happily expressing her gratitude, said: “Caritas is one of the first organizations to reach out to us upon hearing the distressing news.”
“I am happy, very happy for what they have done for us today. The fire disaster took everything, not even a single piece of lappa was left for me to cover myself. But today, with this donation, my people now have at least something to comfort them,” she stated with gratitude.
For the young girls who were also affected by this disaster, it’s a double disaster for them as their caregivers are now left with zero Leones to buy sanitary pads. As the new month has just begun, some of these young girls were worried as their menstrual cycles are on the way. They therefore appreciated the gesture gladly.
Esther Brima Jah, a student who is probably in her early 20s, is one of the young girls affected by the fire incident. She remarked that she is extremely happy with the donation received. “When I heard ‘fire!fire!’ I ran through the door without anything in my hand, I lost everything! the only thing I could get out was the nightwear that I wore. But I thank God for this support as it is timely. I started seeing my cycle two days ago, sadly, I could not buy a pad because there is no money on me. But with the sanitary pads offered I am super grateful.”
“As an organization that seeks to restore the lost dignity of those we seek to serve, we are happy to have provided these support today to these women and girls here at Culvert,” stated Ishmael Alfred Charles, the Programs Manager of Caritas Freetown.
