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Declan Stanger (12) on Friday 31 January 2025 won the Zimbabwe Community Trailblazers award for a Young Disability Advocacy Champion of the Year at a colourful ceremony at the Harare International Conference Centre (HICC).
Declan Stanger, a Grade 6 Scholar at Ruzawi School, heard that his friend Simbarashe Pako would need to be enrolled at Jairos Jiri School in Rusape for disabled children due to his hearing disabilities.
Simba, whose parents work for Declan’s father on their farm, was no longer able to attend the local farm school, and as such his fees would be higher. Declan requested to do a fundraising bicycle ride of 38km from Halfway House, Headlands, to Rusape in the hopes of raising money to assist Simba in getting the necessary tests done to establish the extent of his hearing disability and hopefully to contribute towards any treatment possible and school fees for Simba.
He completed the ride on Saturday 9th March in 2 hours 30 minutes. This initiative went viral before and after the ride and a total of $6,500 was raised by donations from across the world. It also reached an ENT specialist, Dr. Clemence Chidziva who pledged that if Declan completed the ride he would do a free assessment on Simba, inclusive of all tests.
This only encouraged Declan further to complete the ride. Dr Chidziva did the tests and then further through his charity organization fitted Simba with hearing aids for environmental awareness as Simba’s hearing loss was severe. He was also inspired by Declan’s initiative to help his friend and further said he would support also through his charity WizEar to hold a free ear clinic at Jairos Jiri in Rusape and any children who would benefit from hearing aids would have them fitted for free. The ear clinic was held on Friday 17th May 2024 and of the 32 children with hearing disabilities enrolled there 15 children were fitted with hearing aids.
The next initiative is to help set up a computer lab at Jairos Jiri in Rusape to assist in the education of these children and further their possibility of being included in the community despite their challenges. Declan fully embraced the opportunity and helped the team when they were doing the tests and took the time to get to know some of the children who were being tested and fitted.
“Declan is a community champion. Imagine going to that extent to help a friend. We need such generous people in the community. He is a disability advocate and champion who deserves such a recognition,” said Albert Masaka, the Director of the Zimbabwe Community Trailblazers Awards.
