NRZ donates cricket equipment to Robert Tredgold

By Allen Khumalo

The National Railways of Zimbabwe (NRZ) yesterday donated cricket equipment to Robert Tredgold Primary School in Bulawayo as part of the company’s corporate social responsibility thrust.

The donation comes in wake of the school sending two pupils to recite poems at the commissioning of new NRZ wagons last week.

Among the items donated were two cricket helmets, two cricket bats, two pairs of gloves, two cricket balls and two pairs of leg pads.

“This is part of our social responsibility so that we uplift those who are less privileged. In our schools we have students who come from families that cannot afford to buy this equipment because it is costly.

“By this donation NRZ is trying to promote the sport to be as popular as soccer. We therefore appeal to the corporate world to make a difference in people’s lives,” said NRZ acting public relations manager Martin Banda.

“These are future workers of NRZ so if we neglect them now we have no pillars. This company has been very active in sports and at one time we sponsored Railstars FC, but pulled out due to financial difficulties.”

Robert Tredgold headmistress Carol Moyo said: “It has been a struggle to do our sessions due to the lack of equipment. You can’t tell students to bring their own training equipment because they are very costly.

“Now that we have these tools, we hope to make good use of them and promote the sport. We are glad NRZ managed to identify our plight and assisted us.”

The school sometimes makes use of the Old Mutual Health Streak Cricket Academy to conduct their training sessions. The school started playing cricket last year and is targeting to have a girls’ team as a way of promoting gender equality. Chronicle