•UTH head of Public Relations Natalie Mashikolo (right), Temweka Arms Foundation founder Bwalya (second from right) and Niza Mutalama Vlahakis (left) during the handing over of a donation to UTH.
I OFTEN sign off with the statement ‘be the change you want to see’.
Niza Mutalama Vlahakis is one such person doing exactly that.
At a recent strategic plan meeting where civil society was invited, I had a chance to interact with one of the members of her movement who was kind enough to introduce me to her.
Here are some of her thoughts.
Question: Please tell us about yourself and what motivated you to start this group?
Answer: My full names are Niza Mutalama Vlahakis, I am a Corporate Relationship Manager with Atlas Mara Bank, married and blessed with three beautiful children.
My love for God and the love he continues to show me motivated me to start the group mainly.
Charity is a way of me giving back to him – basically that is what motivated me to start the group.
From a young age, I have always had a passion for charity work and I was looking for a charity to take up.
I met a lady by the name of Bwalya who is the founder of ‘Temweka Arms Foundation’.
Bwalya has become a dear friend. She has lost a child to a neurological condition and being a mother, I empathised.
We have done a lot of work together under the neurological department at University Teaching Hospital (UTH) and one day God just spoke to me to dedicate my birthday last to charity, so we raised money and donated essential needs to DO1 within the hospital and there on wards we picked different charity cases not only with UTH but with several different cases across the country.
Question: What was your initial experience or feelings when you started working in the cancer space and how has it impacted your outlook on life?
Answer: Being a mother, speaking on behalf of all the mothers in my group, I have a lot of mixed emotions, it is touching, heart-breaking yet fulfilling at the sometime, it has been life-changing really, meeting different children with different cancer-related conditions.
It breaks our hearts as a group to have to meet these little souls knowing that, they may not live to see tomorrow and these are meant to be our future leaders.
We all know tomorrow is not promised to all of us but just knowing that you have a condition that may take your life sooner than expected, takes a lot of bravery to fight.
Our hearts break every time we walk into the cancer ward but also celebrate with the children on just how brave they are to fight the disease.
I have been fortunate enough not to experience the disease first hand but it certainly changed my outlook on life and the little things we take for guaranteed that means to someone who only has a day, or months to live.
I have learnt that you don’t have to go through something to show compassion, love, and support as a firm believer, that God blesses us and connects us all for a reason and for that reason we need to love our neighbours just as God loves us. I try to live by that.
Question: Please tell us something about your organisation in terms of how it started and who its members are?
Answer: It all started from the love I have for charity work. Before my birthday God spoke to me to share my birthday with his children.
I sold the idea to the ladies that attended my birthday party a year ago. I dedicated my birthday to giving back to children in DO1 at UTH and it grew from there.
We currently have 50 members, amazing ladies, a combination of friends, family and colleagues. Every month, a member of the group is tasked to pick a charity case of their choice and we donate money towards that to buy whatever is needed.
Our last case was a girl from the southern province Mary. Mary was born without an anus, lived seven years of her life using plastic bags tied to her tummy where an outlet was created as a baby to dispose waste. So when the case was presented to us through a journalist, John, who interviewed her father, someone from our group sent the clip and we decided to take it up.
We immediately partnered with UTH where Mary was examined and operated on after having stayed in hospital for three to four months.
We are pleased to say that UTH did a tremendous job as the operation was a success.
Mary is living a normal life currently thanks to the ladies who came on board to help support my dream. Thank you to the doctors that changed Mary’s life.
Question: What activities have you done so far and what is your strategic direction?
Answer: We have done quite a number of activities. Every member is tasked to pick a charity case of their choice, so we have done numerous donation of various items to different departments of UTH such as:
• Donation of diapers, wipes, clothes, feeding bottles/cups to the D Block;
• At the Cancer Diseases Hospital children’s cancer ward, we donated wish lists to children who were critically ill and these are things their hearts desired such as, clothes, toys, diapers, medication, utilities and medical equipment (tools);
• We also assist with daily necessities at the Cancer Diseases Hospital adult cancer wards;
• At the Provident home for the disabled children, we donated adult diapers, table mats and necessities;
• For individuals, we donated two bale of second hand clothes to a mother on the Copperbelt who has a child with a neurological condition who requires her full attention, being a single mother of three children with no support so we opted to help her buy the second hand clothes that would help her start a business so that she could support her children. She is currently selling at the main market in Ndola and is now able to buy medication for her child;
• Under Mary our special case, we support a child who was born without an anus currently lives a normal life after living eight years of her life being made fun of by her fellow children;
• From time to time, we have been contacted by UTH to buy medication for patients with different cancer related conditions;
• Our strategic plan is register the group and partner with international and local donor organisations that can help us help as many families. Currently, we use our own funding which can only help a handful of people.
Question: What is your wish list and what barriers have you experienced in fulfilling this wish list?
Answer: My wish list is to touch and change as many lives as we can, hopefully one day we can partner with donor funders (international and local) that can help us help a larger group of people because currently we use money from our pockets and we can only help so few people.
And I hope one day I can open up an orphanage.
Funding has been the biggest barrier.
Question: In your opinion, what is the role of civil society in the cancer space?
Answer: I strongly believe that the Government, as the major player in the health sector, should enhance the participation of the communities in the provision of information on early detection of cancer, ensure that information reaches our brothers and sisters in the rural areas.
Also ensure that medication is made available in hospitals, cancer medication is expensive and not everyone can afford it.
A number of people are dying because they cannot afford the medication. I also believe that cancer can be cured if detected early and if the right medication is found we can fight it together.
Also let us take it upon us to encourage each other to go for quarterly check-ups, sensitise everyone on the importance of early detection.
You don’t have to experience cancer for one to have a voice, let us all speak and take action.
The interview was conducted by Dr Dorothy Lombe, a Brachytherapist Clinical Oncologist based at the Cancer Diseases Hospital in Lusaka Zambia. Follow her on Twitter @lombe_dorothy and visit the cancer information blog Oncocurae.com on www.dorothylombe.com
