PMA Patron, Lord Tangi o Vaonukonuka FRACS, says that following the disaster, food, clothing and accommodation were the urgent needs, while school supplies only recently became a priority. Lord Tangi helped to design and deliver a project to organize school supplies for villages in Tongatapu and Ha’apai.
“We had a lot of aid coming in to support villages that were wiped out and we realized that the effect on school children hadn’t been addressed. We designed a project to provide school bags filled with stationery to the villages that were badly affected. Each child received a school bag.
We didn’t have many funds but as we worked towards getting supplies for the kids, PMA kindly made a donation of $10,000 Pa’anga,” says Lord Tangi.
The donation made by PMA also went towards school packs for children in the village of Tu’unga, one of the villages badly affected on the island of Ha’apai. The school packs contain books and stationery to support students’ learning for the year.
Through the project, 335 students across villages in Tongatapu and Ha’apai have been provided with school supplies.
“This cost about 14,000 Pa’anga, so the donation by PMA was a big help for us. This is one less worry for the families and they are so grateful for the school packs.
We are so thankful to PMA for their donation. We didn’t ask for it, yet they provided it with no hesitation. On behalf of all these families, we are so grateful and appreciate the support from PMA,” advises Lord Tangi.
CEO of PMA, Mrs Debbie Sorensen, says she is pleased the donation has been used to address families’ needs.
“The intent of our donation was to ensure families did not have to worry about whether their child had their school books and supplies and that they were going into the school year prepared.We also acknowledged the support from HMNZS Aotearoa who delivered our donation in person within a week of the eruption.”
PMA continues to support Tonga in their relief efforts and are also preparing to send over a container of medical supplies to support Vaiola Hospital and the Ministry of Health with their Covid-19 response.
“We’ve had a request from the Ministry of Health in Tonga for supplies for the hospital. These include books and activities for children that are in hospital, equipment such as pulse oximeters which are used to monitor people who have Covid and various equipment that the hospital needs” says Mrs Sorensen.
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Date: Saturday 19 March 2022