Mitsubishi brings joy for all at Alex children’s home

Joy was written all over the faces of children and their caregivers at Leratong Joy for One Home when senior executives of a Woodmead company descended on the home with loads of goodies and other items for donation.

Japan-based chairman of Mitsubishi Hitachi Power Systems Africa, Eitaro Takayana and chief corporate officer, Bongani Mthembu, turned up at the 12th Avenue institution which is home to 20 children of both sexes and varying ages.

It is home to orphaned children affected and infected by HIV/Aids and those from child-headed homes who could not be left to fend for themselves without a loving home and mother and father figure.

Takayana and Mthembu brought various items ranging from food to linen and blankets, including sweet goodies for the children.

Briefing her visitors about the origins of the home, founder Peggy Chauke said the home started as a creche in 1990 by the Rosebank Union Church in Sandton.

Two or so years later, when the violence of the 90s in Alexandra intensified, the church decided to pull out, but she and other women of the church stepped forward and decided to run with it.

Chauke said they then decided to turn it into a home as they felt that there were many orphaned children who needed a loving place they could call home.

“I must emphasise that this is not an orphanage, but a home for the children. We Africans don’t believe that children are orphans. When the biological parents of the children all pass away, other family members and the community jump into the fray and take over the children and raise them as their own, along with their own children. This is why I don’t call this place an orphanage but a home for the children,” said Chauke.

“This is a small number [of children] which is manageable and allows you to bond with the children and offer them undivided attention for their developmental needs.”

Chauke is a former Democratic Alliance proportional representation councillor in Alexandra. “My attention was divided and clouded in a lot of things, hence I could not concentrate on the children,” she said.

Besides the home, Chauke said her institution also goes around to leading supermarket chains to collect perishables which she then distributes twice a week to grannies, granny-headed homes and other child-headed homes.

On behalf of his chairman, Mthembu said they appreciated the work she was doing in the community and that she should feel free to call on the company any time she needed assistance.

Details: Leratong Joy for One 011 264 0042; 084 021 1215.