Shungu Dzevana Trust Children’s Home

Shungu Dzevana Trust Children’s Home is a private voluntary organisation that was founded single handedly by Reverend Sister Mercy A. T. Mutyambizi (pictured) in April of 1992, having been approached by 3 children living on the street who needed food and shelter from her because she was a nun.  Sister Mercy Mutyambizi is the current National Director of the organisation and she is ably assisted by a 10-member Board of Trustees that has a Chairperson.

Shungu Dzevana is a Shona phrase that means “passionate concern for children”. Shungu Dzevana Trust was founded in April 1992 and was registered as a Welfare Organisation on the 29th of September 2000; Registration Number: PVO 3/2000. We are also registered with the City Health Department under the Private Voluntary Act and officially opened by Right Reverend Patrick Mutume on 9 December 2001.  The children’s home is a member of the Archdiocese of Harare Catholic Children’s Homes.

Our aim when we started in 1992 up to 2002 was to cater for children in the streets. Offering rehabilitation services, education, skills training and connecting them with foster parents in a bid to normalise their lives. Appreciating the work that we were doing, the Department of Social Welfare requested us to open a Children’s Home because of the increasing number of cases for children being dumped and abandoned in the streets. We knew it was always going to be a difficult task to pull together resources for the new venture. We started taking in children referred from the social welfare department.