Champions Champions Sister Priscilla Dlamini
Sister Priscilla Dlamini |
 |
 |
|
 Sister Dlamini started the Holy Cross Hospice in Emoyeni, KwaZulu-Natal in 2000, which today looks after 40 in-patients, 200 AIDS patients in their homes and over 1000 orphans in the community. Sister Dlamini is a woman with a vision that keeps on growing, in spite of the enormity of the problems and challenges she faces on a daily basis. Priscilla joined a convent at the age of 15 and then went on to train as a nursing sister. Passing up the opportunity to work in well-resourced urban medical facilities, she moved in 1990 to the poor rural areas north of Durban where most of the country’s sugar cane is grown. When she discovered that some of the first people to suffer from AIDS were being turned out of their homes and were living rough in the sugar cane fields and begging for food, she decided something must be done for them. Her vision centred on providing a hospice for these people, a vision she doggedly pursued for more than eight years before it became a reality
Things started to happen when she was given some very dilapidated and run down stables in Emoyeni. They had not been used for over 15 years and had plants growing up through the floor. Undaunted, and armed with a donation of 10 000 rands and a steel will, she set about converting these stables into habitable accommodation. She spent most of the year fixing the stables, often sleeping only three hours each night and living from hand-to-mouth herself. The poverty-stricken people living in Emoyeni shared what little they had with her. Finally the Holy Cross Hospice opened its doors to the first AIDS patients in 2000. Even more astounding is the scale of the orphan outreach programme that has become an important part of the Holy Cross Hospice work. The tragic result of the AIDS epidemic has been the growing number of child-headed households. The hospice currently helps to look after 1 300 orphans from 522 child-headed households in the areas of Gingindlovo and Mtunzini. All of these households are provided with monthly food parcels (at a cost of 15 000 rands/month). The children are also given help in establishing their own ‘door-sized’ food gardens so that they have fresh vegetables to eat throughout the month.
In fact all the children have to grow these food gardens in order to qualify for assistance. Sr Priscilla also gets them to help out at the hospice with a variety of chores such as sweeping the yard. She adds, “It is important that these children learn self-reliance and do not think that they can sit back and get something for nothing. They need to learn motivation and commitment or they will not survive”. This tough-love policy pays off and most of the older children continue to attend school every day while their younger siblings are collected to attend a crèche that is run at the Holy Cross Hospice. These orphans are lucky enough to have become part of Sr Dlamini’s vision, but she will not rest while there are still so many that have no one watching out for them……….
|