MADRA reach out to 2000 hunger affected families in Ntcheu with food packs donation

The Muslim Disaster Relief Aid (MADRA), a consortium of international and local non-governmental organizations has reached out to 2000 families in Ntcheu Central-Central East Constituency with a donation of food packs as a response to the hunger situation affecting people in the area.

The food packs valued at K180 million which contained 20kg of maize flour, 1 litre cooking oil, salt, soya pieces, and beans was donated in the area to help address the hunger challenges which came as a result of the last year’s inadequate rainfall which left many people in the area with nothing to harvest from their fields.

Apart from the food packs, MADRA also donated K5 thousand cash to every beneficiary and all these donations were contributed through the effort of the consortium which includes organizations like Muslim Youth United, Ashraful Aid, Limbe Muslim Jamaat, Bilaal Trust, Drop Compassion, An Nasiha, Al Mahmood, Blantyre Youth just to mention a few.

Speaking during the donation, MADRA Director of Communications and Public Relations, Ibrahim Mataya said the organization decided to reach out to the people of the area with food packs after getting concerned with the report of how people were suffering with hunger, a development which he said was forcing many people to be sleeping on an empty stomach.

Mataya further highlighted that as an association dedicated in charity works realized that it is very important to support the families as they believe that they also have a role to play in various challenges affecting the country by sharing with the needy in order to make Malawi a better nation.

“We have been doing similar initiative of food packs distributions to a number of households in districts like Thyolo, Chikwawa, Nsanje, Machinga, as well as Mulanje and overall we have so far managed to spend a total of K530 million.
“So after getting a report of a critical hunger situation in Ntcheu we decided to come in together with our partners so that we should help to save lives. Our target is to ensure that we reach out to 40 000 hunger affected people and through this process we expect to spend a total of K1 billion,” said Mataya.

Legislator of the constituency’s who is also Deputy Minister of Homeland Security, Norman Chisale applauded MADRA for providing support to the people of his area describing the development as a great gesture which will go along way in reducing the hunger problem.

He further emphasized that while the government is also fighting hard to end hunger in the country, it is very important for other well-wishers to step in with support across the country since government also rely upon partners to address other challenges together.

“Honestly, people from this area are greatly affected by food shortages but what MADRA has done is very commendable because people will now have something to eat after spending days without food. As a legislator of the area, I will not tolerate the behaviour of selling the donated items which some people are used to do and once one is found doing that police will take action because these food packs have been donated to help the affected households,” said Chisale.

In his remarks, Group Village Headman Msiyaludzu of the area encouraged the people to use the received food relief in a proper manner so that it should help them for a longer period.

Malawi President, Peter Mutharika recently made an appeal to all well-wishers to come in and start supporting hunger affected households.