Gift was born on the 21st April 2010 in Nkhata Bay. When we were introduced to him, he was living in a dilapidated house situated in an eroded and dirty surrounding together with his mother Ellah, a woman who could not even take care of herself and thought death is much better than life. When Gift was born Ellah had a job, but because of her health conditions her life changed in a miserable way. Gift’s father denied any responsibility on his son, leaving Ellah alone. She got married again and got a daughter, Mercy, but this new marriage did not survive her chronic illness and her husband divorced from her taking Mercy with him but not her brother, since he was not his own. For a couple of years, Ellah and Gift fully depended of Ellah’s brother, Martin Kaunda, who was also poor, uneducated and jobless. Moreover, he was a very weak person, with no strong mind on family issues.
At that time Gift was a quiet and polite boy who did not get the chance to go to school. His mother was too weak to bath him or wash his clothes and all the chores were done by well-wishers. At first Marajowi supported Gift by providing money for some basic needs (e.g. toiletries and rice). Later on, thanks to the donations of IWCU (www.iwcu.nl), Marajowi was able to enrol Gift to a boarding school, the Wukani Education Facility in Mzuzu. Soon afterwards his mother passed away. Nowadays Gift’s grandparents takes care of him when he is in Nkhata Bay, whereas Gift stayed in with Clement’s family for all the years of primary education. In June 2023 he successfully graduated from primary and in September of the same year, he started the first year of secondary school at Kumyanja Private in Nkhata Bay. Here he still is a border, but he is close to his grandparents if needed.
