Elizabeth Hiyolwa
MUSESE – A renowned businessman in Kavango West region, Winnie Metzeger of Metzeger Drilling, who is also the current operator at the Musese Green Scheme, fulfilled his corporate social responsibility by donating 4 000 bags of maize meal to Kavango West Regional Council on Monday.
The donated 4 000 bags of maize meal valued at about N$320 000 will benefit critically drought-stricken households in the eight constituencies of the Kavango West region.
This aid was rendered after the regional council pleaded to the business community in the region to meet government halfway, by assisting those severely affected by drought whilst they wait on the Office of the Prime Minister for national drought relieve measures.
“These are our neighbours and these are our councillors and the councillors are running around and seeing what is in the ground and they see the same thing that I see; people are just hungry because Kavango West region received very little rain,” he stated.
Metzeger narrated that initially, they started with feeding school learners as a collective decision with the villages and schools’ leadership as efforts to alleviate hunger at schools and by doing that keep learners in class.
The Kavango West Regional Council chairperson, Joseph Sivaku Sikongo applauded the gesture by the businessman and urged other farmers and businesspeople in the region to follow his footsteps by assisting the needy.
“The government encourages working together as stakeholders and helping it where it cannot help. This farmer, Metzeger gave a very good example to other farmers who are farming in the region. What we want to see is that all farmers or business personnel emulate this example,” Sikongo noted.
“This are the critically affected people; critical in the sense that, they don’t have food as we are speaking. They don’t have any government grant and they don’t have any family member to support them” stressing that, “those are the ones identified as critical people who will get the first beneficiaries for these food items donated.”
*Elizabeth Hiyolwa is a journalist with the ministry of information in Kavango West region.