Muslim group donates food to impoverished First Nation

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Dr. Susan Ghazali and Hussain Guisti with boxes of food and clothing their Muslim charitable organization is sending to Garden Hill First Nation. (PHIL.HOSSACK@FREEPRESS.MB.CA)

A Winnipeg-based Muslim foundation, moved by news of the death of a Garden Hill First Nation baby, has flown a load of food to the remote reserve.

Last night, the Zubaidah Tallab Foundation, created in 2007, flew 450 loaves of bread from City Bread and 240 pounds of chicken bought at a discount from the Clearview Colony to Garden Hill.

Once there, the bread and chicken were to be distributed by the band council to reserve members who most needed it.

Hussain Guisti, the foundation's general manager and chief financial officer, said it has sent two smaller donations of food and clothing to Garden Hill in recent weeks, but this is the first large shipment.

"A charity is finally working up in Garden Hill to help them," Guisti said on Tuesday.

"We have charities working overseas and there is poverty here. Maybe this will raise the eyebrows of other charities and they will also help."

Garden Hill Chief David Harper said he is grateful for the help from Zubaidah Tallab.

"So far they're the only ones that have helped us," Harper said.

"We are very pleased."

The charity is best known for spearheading the construction of the Masjid in Thompson, the province's most northern mosque.

Under the charity's objectives, it says it wants to relieve poverty by helping needy refugees, students and the poor in Winnipeg.

But Guisti said the charity's executive decided to expand that objective beyond Winnipeg after he was encouraged to visit Garden Hill in the wake of the death of a six-month-old child from there.

Last March, Chace Barkman died of a rare form of meningitis that wasn't diagnosed at the nursing station.

The child's parents, and the reserve's chief, blamed the health care treatment given the child by the reserve's nursing station.

The chief said non-aboriginal communities the same size as his have hospitals instead of nursing stations.

Guisti said when he met with Harper to see how his charity could help, the chief invited him to the reserve to see for himself.

What Guisti found out first is flying is the only way to get goods into the community of almost 4,000 residents, 615 kilometres northeast of Winnipeg, at this time of year. The only other way is through a winter road.

Guisti said that's why food is so expensive there, including $4.95 for a loaf of bread, $10 for two litres of pop, and $12 for a gallon of milk.

Cheez Whiz is $15 a jar.

Guisti said he has seen with his own eyes how much help the reserve needs.

He said 500 homes need to be built and because there is no running water and sewers there, residents use outhouses or buckets.

"It's just appalling," Guisti said.

"I saw one house with 25 people living inside. They use pails to defecate in. I didn't think this happened in Canada.

"There isn't an inch of paved road. There is no industry."

Garden Hill has had 36 young people commit suicide in the last eight years while another 300 tried to kill themselves.

kevin.rollason@freepress.mb.ca

Republished from the Winnipeg Free Press print edition June 10, 2009 A3