GAIA courts partners to fill K117m deficit

Global Aids Interfaith Alliance (GAIA) on Thursday night held a fundraising meeting with various stakeholders in Blantyre to seek financial support for its activities in 2024.

GAIA board chairperson Josiah Mayani, in an interview on the sidelines of the fundraising meeting, said the organisation faces a deficit of about K117 million.

He said: “Our budget is over K500 million annually, so at the moment, after all the fundraising events we had in some countries like the USA [United States of America], we have this deficit.”

Mayani said some of the activities GAIA seeks to effectively carry out in the forthcoming year include mobile health clinics in hard-to-reach areas as well as scholarships for struggling nursing students.

He said the mobile health clinics help people access health services with ease while the scholarships go a long way in bailing out needy nursing students in the absence of other scholarships, including government sponsorship.

NBS Bank plc head of corporate banking Frank Nakoma said in a separate interview that the listed bank is keen to support the organisation as they have done on numerous occasions.

“At NBS Bank, we believe it is very important for us to support such causes because they are the ones working out there in the communities and promoting good health,” he said.

Nakoma said as a bank, their brand also benefits from the support they render towards such initiatives as a healthy workforce helps to develop the country.

He said their support towards GAIA will, therefore, never come to a halt as the impact being made on communities is worth noting.