Engen said their fuel donation would hopefully assist Gift of the Givers to deploy team members faster in an emergency.
Cape Town – Many more lives will be saved and improved after a three-year contract was signed between Gift of the Givers and Engen on Tuesday which will support the organisation’s humanitarian efforts.
Engen donated R2 million and 150 JoJo tanks to Gift of the Givers, which will speed up their disaster relief work.
Engen chairperson Dato Sri Syed Zainal Abidin said: “The premise on which Gift of the Givers was founded is providing unconditional humanitarian assistance despite religion, race, colour, class or geographical boundaries. The organisation resonates well with what we’d like to do as a corporate, as we intend to play a part in touching lives in communities.”
Abidin said their fuel donation would hopefully assist Gift of the Givers to deploy team members faster in an emergency. “Natural disasters are more prevalent today and less predictable, including heatwaves, droughts and floods. These disasters are expected to get worse over the decades. It’s our collective responsibility to make a sustainable impact.”
Gift of the Givers founder and chairperson Imtiaz Sooliman said the enormous value of the fuel partnership was obvious, considering the organisation’s humanitarian relief in all provinces of South Africa.
The organisation recently assisted residents of Alice in the Eastern Cape, providing relief to victims of the flooding, in Calvinia in Northern Cape, where farmers and farmworkers have no resources available for themselves or their animals, in Graaff-Reinet, where resources and water were provided to victims for their survival and Ntinini in KwaZulu-Natal, to feed the hungry.
Sooliman said: “Fuel was a major issue for us over the last few years as the bill was going through the roof. We were debating where to get fuel from and this donation has filled this need.”
He said the organisation’s convoys travelled long distances to deliver relief to those most in need, which was why this commitment from Engen would strengthen their ability to make an impact on the lives of people.
A three-year contract was signed between Gift of the Givers and Engen on Tuesday which will support the organisation’s humanitarian efforts. Photography: Tracey Adams/African News Agency (ANA)
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Cape Argus
