Update from our agent Valencia in South Africa:

Yesterday was one of the most difficult days for us as an Organization (Mount Olive Outreach) when interacting with the community. This was not due to the community being unruly or unsupportive, we just found it difficult to show people away from our gates. As we could not provide them with any food assistance, at Khaya Centre we had to show more than 100 people away and at Khaya Le Themba (Thembelihle) the situation was worse as more than 300 people came to our centre and we only had food parcels for 130 households.

The situation in the community has worsened in the past few days. We are aware that the government has promised on all the local new stations of the funds that have been put aside to provide food relief for the poor. But we have been unable to obtain any of this relief. Through our local councilor for entire Ward of Region G 122, only a mere 100 food parcels were given, and these were finished even before any of our beneficiaries could benefit from this relief. We have registered on the national government site as well as other sites in the private sector for food relief of any sort. And we have been unable to get any assistance at this point, we currently rely on the funds provided to us by our current donors to assist but this is now running very low.

We would like to thank our partners, families and friends that has been helping us to ensure that we were able to provide more food parcels to our beneficiaries.  However, the situation has become more and more difficult for us to stand in front of a mother who pleads with you to give her something to feed her child. This is not an easy task; it is not easy for us to walk away from the gate and one can still see hundreds of people who will take anything that you are able to provide them with that will enable them to feed their families

If you are able to help – every bit counts!