"Giving help and care a labour of love" (original title) (picture of Nelson Mandela and Dr. Imtiaz Sooliman)
Published in: Times Live (Johannesburg), Feb 14, 2010 11:45 PM | By JUDY LELLIOT
Bombs rained on Bosnia and floods swept across Mozambique. A volcano erupted in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, a tsunami hit Sri Lanka, wars made their way across Rwanda, Chechnya, Iraq and Kosovo. A month ago, Haiti was levelled. These are some of the places Imtiaz Sooliman's Gift of the Givers foundation (Africa's largest NGO, having granted roughly $27 million US to 22 countries over 13 years) has responded to.
Sooliman, commended for his work by President Jacob Zuma in his state of the nation speech last week, formed the foundation following a mystical directive by a Sufi to help those in need.
The work the foundation does is ubuntu in its purest form. When xenophobic attacks swept across the country in May 2008 in a haze of fire and murderous intent, the foundation was first to offer a helping hand.
It has only one priority: to help those in need, something that was demonstrated by its quick response to the Haitian capital, Port-au-Prince after the earthquake struck. A group of South African medics, engineers, doctors and search-and-rescue specialists left their friends, family and home comforts to offer help.
Born in Potchefstroom, Imtiaz Sooliman qualified as a doctor in 1984. A trip to Turkey in 1992 changed his life.
"A Sufi instructed me to form the organisation to serve humanity unconditionally. He said he could see in my soul that I loved serving people and his instruction would be to serve humanity unconditionally for the rest of my life," said Sooliman.
A tall order, but one he is meeting so far.
"At that point, war was raging in Bosnia. The foundation began as a disaster-response organisation, sending 620 tons of food to the country. Soon after that, we developed and deployed a unique containerised, fully operational hospital, a feat of South African engineering."
Humanitarian work is like dodging bullets, some metaphorical, some political, some literal. That summed up the situation in Bosnia, said Sooliman.
"It was a war zone with too many warring factions, no respect for international law and pure ruthlessness among the warring parties."
The "soldiers" in Sooliman's humanitarian corps are ordinary South Africans, compelled to offer their services in every way they can - counsellors, doctors, paramedics, search-and-rescue personnel - the list of volunteers can run into several hundreds.
According to Sooliman there are three criteria for choosing when and where to get involved.
"First, it depends on how massive the destruction is; second, whether there is a call for international aid; third, whether the assistance from nearby countries will suffice. If not, it's time to get involved."
The latest endeavour, in which several teams hauled themselves to Haiti, came at a price. It was the first time an expedition had a marked effect on team personnel.
"The destruction, the loss of life, the hardship, the men, women and children, the suffering has left an indelible mark on the members of our team, who now require trauma counselling."
They brought home with them harrowed memories of mass graves spread with lime, filled with countless, nameless dead. Twenty-nine-year-old Andre Keyser, a paramedic for Gauteng's Emergency Services, recalls this about the mercy mission: "All those kids, I don't think anybody will ever know how many died there. People are just throwing their children away."
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