Hotel adopts Mpilo ward

A leading hotel company, Holiday Inn, has adopted and completed the extensive renovation of the B6 male ward, which was closed down more than five years ago. Before the closure, the 40-bed ward was a health hazard rather than a place of treatment, with obsolete equipment, peeling walls and broken floor tiles

Speaking at a hand-over ceremony at the hospital last week, Mpilo’s chief executive officer Lawrence Mantiziba applauded Holiday Inn for coming to the rescue of the hospital. “Last year, we launched our resources mobilisation strategy at the hospital after realising that government resources were not adequate to fund our activities. Today, I am glad that Holiday Inn has heard our plea and decided to swiftly move in with this magnificent assistance,” said Mantiziba.

“It is easier to destroy than to construct. Let us jealously guard this ward so that it can be used as well by generations to come.”

Speaking at the same occasion, Holiday Inn Group CEO Shingie Munyeza urged Zimbabweans to desist from the “donor syndrome” and to stop blaming other people for failures.

“I have extensively travelled throughout the world, but wherever I go, I do not carry the attitude that other people should have mercy on us. We have this tendency of assuming that other people owe us something. This year we will assist the hospital with another project and we will not wait for the International Monetary Fund to do the project,” he said.

Sandi Moyo, Bulawayo provincial affairs minister, in a speech read on her behalf blamed the so-called sanctions on the crisis facing the health sector.

“Mpilo Central Hospital chose to stand rather than sit and bemoan the effects of the illegal sanctions in our hospitals by engaging the corporate world and the community to find ways to raise funds, and that is commendable,” she said.

Renovations of the ward started last May. Apart from the refurbishment, Holiday Inn also donated hospital linen and a plasma television for the ward.

Since taking over the administration of the hospital in October 2012, Mantiziba has brought the hospital back from the verge of collapse.

He has presided over the revamping of the dilapidated buildings and addressed the acute shortage of drugs, medical supplies, food and linen and the issue of overcrowding.