Dear Editor – A 20 foot container with equipment supplies worth more than NZ$37,620, is on its way from New Zealand and is expected to arrive in Honiara on 11 March.
The donated contents of the container were requested from Take My Hands Charitable Trust, based in Auckland, following appeals made for assistance from local NGO’s and the Hearts of Hope Charity (HOH).
The inventory supplied to me today, includes more than 690 boxes of clothing and footwear destined for the HOH on Malaita, over 3000 pairs of spectacles, given by Lions Clubs (NZ) for the Honiara Referral Eye Centre, many items of office furniture for the SIDT, wheel chairs, walking frames, crutches and other disability aids for the Association of Persons with Disabilities, kitchen utensils, a micro wave for the Women’s Refugee Centres, and a multi-power box that could be useful to aiding a disabled person in his/her work.
The container was initially paid for by a kind donation of the SFA and the past President of the SFA, Mr J Sy, has again offered to cover the landing and wharf fees once the container is off loaded from the container vessel.
In the course of sourcing the equipment and supplies for this ‘one off’ container, TMH has managed to open up new donor sources in New Zealand for clothing and furniture and it is hoped that in the future additional help for local NGO organisations might be possible.
I would like to take this opportunity of thanking TMH in responding to the call for help and to the SFA and to Mr. J Sy for giving me the support to have initiated this project.
I thank, too, Lions Clubs (NZ) for once more helping the needy in the Solomon Islands with eye glasses.
Frank Short
Bangkok, Thailand
