Carnival Queen 'Dananai Chipunza' to help children in need

DANANAI Chipunza, who was crowned the inaugural Carnival Queen Zimbabwe in May this year, has embarked on her first charity project which shall see her assisting underprivileged children from Harare.

The model conducted a door-to-door survey in some of Harare's high density suburbs and discovered orphans who were infected with HIV and were not only unable to get access to education, but were also deprived of treatment because of lack of resources.

"I identified 25 children from Highfield, Dunsten Farm and Glen Norah suburbs in Harare who are in the hands of caretakers.

"Some of them are schoolgoers, but others are not because they don't have school fees or non-governmental organisations supporting them.

"This influenced my decision to assist them," she said.

Chipunza said as an entrepreneur specialising in culinary arts and having worked with various societies in Harare, she realised that most organisations had the tendency of assisting children at established homes instead of those in communities who needed more help.

She added that she discovered there was a growing number of underprivileged children, particularly due to the economic hardships the country had been facing of late, hence her decision to embark on this project.

To fundraise for her project, the beauty queen will on October 9 host a charity dinner at the Rainbow Towers hotel VIP lounge dubbed Fund A Future Charity dinner.

The dinner, which is an initiative designed to mobilise funding and resources for the underprivileged children, will see people pay $1 000 for a table of 10 or $100 for individuals.

"The proceeds from the initiative are anticipated to facilitate a stable living environment that harnesses these children's full potential and equip them to face the world through the provision of school fees as well as sustainable health conditions," she said.

The dinner will be special and unique as Chipunza, who is a renowned chef and pioneer of the first ever food festival in Zimbabwe, will be using the fruits of her expertise to light the candle of others in society.

Guests will be treated to a flurry of dishes including Zimbabwean, Chinese, Italian, Portuguese and Brazilian cuisines prepared by six local and six international chefs.

The local and international chefs will work hand-in-hand to create dishes outside their comfort zones.

The chef with the best dish will be presented with a top chef award, which shall be voted for by the guests.

Chipunza appealed to well-wishers to contribute to her noble project in donations, cash and by attending the dinner to help raise funds.