German Rotarians build a legacy
German Rotarians provide 'distance learning' facility
FROM their home base in faraway Germany, two medical men have been part of an ongoing project that has seen the establishment and growth of a mighty school in the heart of rural Zululand.
Rotarians Gerd Reichenbach and Reinhard Andreesen shared with the Richards Bay Rotary Club on Monday evening their journey through Africa that started on a Kombi trip from Algeria via the Sahara in 1972, the year they met.
It continues in the present at Bonga School in the Ngodini Valley close to the Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Memorial Gate.
As young men, the good doctors travelled over the years with their wives and children through the continent, serving internships at Baragwanath Hospital and various Lutheran mission hospitals in Swaziland and Hlabisa.
Gerd also spent three years working in the then Transkei.
Admirably, when they set up their respective medical practices – Reinhard is a haematologist and oncologist, and Gerd a general practitioner – they committed two percent of their future income to health care projects in Africa.
Having made contact with the fledgling Bonga School in 1999, where pupils were studying under a tree, the continued involvement of the Rotarians grew the school to its impressive present size that incorporates both a primary school with 380 pupils and 10 teachers and high school boasting 779 pupils and 27 teachers.
The sprawling, self-built complex includes a fully-equipped computer room, which sadly was recently plundered by thieves.
The partnership of over a decade has also seen Bonga School headmaster, Leslie Xaba visiting Germany at the invitation of Rotary.
In thanking the pair for their excellent presentation and the great success they have achieved, Richards Bay Rotary President, Chris Valentine said, ‘We feel uncomfortable about the fact that from thousands of miles away you have taken care of a huge need right on our doorstep.’
