The northern district of Karonga in Malawi has been hit by a series of earthquakes throughout December, the worst last weekend measuring 6.2 on the Richter Scale. The Government of Malawi has declared the area a disaster zone and has released a special appeal for NGOs to support the affected community by providing items such as tents, disinfectants, blankets and mosquito nets.

Smile Malawi's trustee in Malawi is Glad Munthali, who is also the MP for Karonga South district. He has asked for the charity's help to relieve the suffering of the children of his area. Yesterday Smile Malawi founder Elspeth Baecke spoke with him and he said 'It is the rainy season here and most residents are sleeping outside their homes for fear of structures collapsing on them. Hundreds of children have already been injured by falling masonry and the only hospital is overflowing. We need help with shelters, blankets and so on plus fuel to assist moving injured children to get treatment.'

Although this is not directly related to Smile Malawi and the Children's Centre, we felt that we cannot ignore the plight of these children and so we have set up this page to collect donations from generous supporters who may wish to help on this occasion.

Please dig deep and help Glad and his local children. We guarantee that all money and goods will be handled personally by Glad and that your help will go direct to the children.