MORE than $500 000 has been raised for the construction of Ezimnyama community clinic, 66 years after the project was mooted, but could not be completed due to successive generational bickering among the community members.
BY RICHARD MUPONDE
The clinic’s groundbreaking ceremony was done in 1953, when the farming community decided to build a health facility in Ezimnyama small-scale farming area.
However, efforts to complete the structure took long because there was no consensus among the villagers. So far, the project has spent 20 years on the slab level.
However, the Mangwe Rural District Council (MRDC) has revived efforts to complete the clinic which will serve villagers in wards 12 and 22.
Politically, the wards are in Bulilima West constituency and administratively they fall under Mangwe district by virtue of their positioning.
On Saturday, over $500 000 was raised at a fundraising ceremony held at the clinic site which will likely see the completion of the health institution more than six decades later. Mangwe RDC donated most of the funds for the project after devoting all its $510 000 devolution allocation to the clinic project.
Legislator Dingumuzi Phuthi, who was the guest of honour also allocated $20 000 from the Constituency Development Fund (CDF).
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Mangwe RDC chief executive Bongani Ngwenya said devolution would bring development to rural areas, but urged people to work hard to compliment government efforts.
“Devolution is a government policy which is being implemented so that each and every area gets an equal share of development. As MRDC, we sat down and decided to put all our $510 000 devolution allocation to the project. As communities, let’s support so that these government programmes succeed because they are for our benefit,” Ngwenya said.
Phuthi urged kraalheads to help organise the community to work on the project and stop bickering.
“We should work together as one people because this clinic will serve all people of this constituency regardless of one’s political affiliation. Let’s work for our development because we are the people who belong here,” Phuthi said.
His sentiments were echoed by the newly-elected Mangwe legislator Hlalani Mguni, who replaced her late husband Obedingwa Madlala Mguni, who died in June.
“We should be happy to work together as one. My late husband was born in this ward and it would be a befitting gesture for this clinic to be completed. It was something which was at his heart.
I will help to make sure it is completed,” Mguni said.
Several businesspeople donated cash and building materials for the clinic.
