CHIMANIMANI (Zimbabwe), March 23 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Eunica Simango sits with downcast eyes as she waits at a relief centre in Chimanimani.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A week ago, everything she owned, including a poultry run where she kept chickens, was swept away by a mudslide when Cyclone Idai, after lashing Mozambique, turned its wrath on eastern Zimbabwe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Yet this material loss is nothing compared to the gnawing absence of her teenage daughter, who was washed away in the raging tide.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
She is one of nearly 200 people who are listed as missing, 30 of them schoolchildren, in addition to 139 confirmed dead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“I lost everything,” Simango, 34, said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“My house, my property, chickens. I am now surviving on handouts something I never imagined myself doing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
“The most painful thing is: I don’t know where my daughter is.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Well-wishers set up the temporary shelter in a conference room at a local majestic Chimanimani Hotel to feed victims of the storm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But resources in this impoverished country are slender, and there is no guarantee that the centre can stay open.‘<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n At another relief centre, food too was meagre.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “Do with the little that we have,” volunteer Daina Mandevhana told the hungry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “We should not expect to eat until our tummies are full or complain saying ‘at my house I used to have my tea with milk’,” she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “This is the situation we have, and we should accept it.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Fears are growing of starvation in communities that have been cut off after winds and torrential rain smashed bridges and swamped or destroyed roads.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Families in Chimanimani are still rummaging through debris, hoping to recover remains of missing relatives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Some people on long-term treatment for conditions such as HIV have lost their medication and appealed for urgent supplies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n President Emmerson Mnangagwa, after touring the area, said he had seen “unmitigated despair”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Zimbabwe has declared a state of disaster and appealed for assistance. According to the UN, 200,000 people have been affected.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Crops and livestock have been destroyed, threatening enduring hunger and poverty for those who do survive.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “There are people who have lost their homes and property places in places like Kopa and Rusitu,” said Shawne Kidd, a local businessman who is helping in relief and recovery efforts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n He and other volunteers are running a feeding centre, in some cases digging into their own pockets to buy food for victims who lost their homes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “The villagers want food but we have limited means of getting in and out. Roads were damaged and bridges broken.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n Kidd said the big problem was not lack of willpower, but the means to move things.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “There are hundreds of organisations willing to help,” he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n “There is plenty of aid outside. The problem is getting it in. There is no airstrip. Helicopters are being used to bring in medical supplies.” — NNN-AGENCIES<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" CHIMANIMANI (Zimbabwe), March 23 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Eunica Simango sits with downcast eyes as she waits at a relief centre in Chimanimani. A week ago, everything she owned, including a poultry run where she kept chickens, was swept away by a mudslide when Cyclone Idai, after lashing Mozambique, turned its wrath on eastern Zimbabwe. Yet this […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[213],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15701"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15701"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15701\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15701"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15701"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/namnewsnetwork.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15701"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}