Double amputee voter gets limbs

Robin Muchetu, Senior Reporter

A DOUBLE amputee whose video went viral during the recent harmonised general elections where a polling officer demanded to ink his stumps as he has no fingers, has received a pair of prosthetic hands that will enable him to lead a more independent life than before.

The man, Mr Knowledge Kambarami, who lost both his hands in a road traffic accident in 2012 was identified by an America-based Zimbabwean philanthropist Advocate James Bayanayi who saw his video trending on social media. He assisted him with a pair of bionic hands and now leads an improved lifestyle following the donation of the hands.

Sunday News spoke to Adv Bayanayi from his USA base who said he was touched by the plight of Mr Kambarami who was exercising his democratic right to vote but had trouble when he was supposed to be marked on his finger, proof that he had voted, notwithstanding the fact that he had no fingers.

“I am passionate about making a difference and creating the change I want to see. I have been doing a lot of charity work for a couple of years now. I have a scholarship running in Zimbabwe. I have donated hundreds and thousands of books for children back home. I decided to enlarge my contribution to the needy in Zimbabwe by donating some prosthetic limbs to amputees. When I saw Mr Kambarami, he was struggling with his situation while he was voting. They (polling agents) did not know what to do and struggled to assist him. I decided again to make a difference in his life and sent him limbs. It wasn’t him alone, but I have sent for 30 more people who may need them,” said Adv Bayanayi.

He said this was not the first time he had assisted his countrymen with prosthetic limbs. The first time I was moved to assist people with missing limbs, I had heard of a case of a woman in Zimbabwe who lost both hands after a hyena attack in Mwenezi. When I heard her story, I was touched and secured some limbs for her and shipped them to Zimbabwe. I am happy that she is able to do a lot more things that she couldn’t do after the attack,” he added.

The shipment of 30 prosthetic hands arrived in Zimbabwe last week and Adv Bayanayi said there was a lot more he could assist with.

“I am hopeful that once we have distributed the 30 sets, we should also be able to send more. Our target by next year this time is to have helped 500 people who are in need of prosthetic limbs in Zimbabwe.

We are currently working with those with missing hands but in future, we are hoping to get prosthetic legs as well,” he said.

While he extended his kind gesture of sourcing the limbs for Mr Kambarami via his social media page, some social media users were out to dupe the man with a disability by pretending to know him and get whatever benefits were being extended to him.

“It was so hard to locate Mr Kambarami, I made a post on social media trying to find him, and you know there are a lot of scammers around. A lot of people wrote to me saying they knew him and the bulk were scammers, the most interesting one was a woman who sent me a message saying she was his sister and I probed her in a bid to see if she was authentic and I could read between the lines that she was not being truthful.

“She was trying her luck, I asked her to give me Mr Kambarami’s phone number but she offered hers instead. My team members in Zimbabwe contacted her and we asked her to bring Mr Kambarami so that they could meet him and she kept saying he would come to no avail. She ended up telling us that

Mr Kambarami said he would prefer to be assisted with food and other things than to have prosthetic hands. When we finally located him, he said he did not even have a sister, he did not know the imposter,” said Adv Bayanayi.

In the video, Mr Kambarami who is from Epworth on the outskirts of Harare, is seen arguing with an elections official who wanted to mark his ‘finger’ as per regulation, and he can be heard saying there is no place to mark, but the officer insists that he be marked. He then suggests they can mark his forehead.

But finally, they marked his upper arm to show that he had voted. Mr Kambarami said he was grateful for the new set of hands.

“I would like to thank Adv Bayanayi for the set of hands that I have been given, I am grateful for his help as I can now help myself. I can now do many things I could not do before. God bless him,” he said.

Through his organisation, Zimbabwe Youth Development Foundation Trust, Adv Bayanayi is assisting vulnerable people in Zimbabwe. — @NyembeziMu