Paraffin fire safety incidents tackled
Nie Cele
Shack and house fires could soon be a thing of the past in under privileged rural areas, thanks to giant leading petroleum company, Engen who are driving a campaign about safe handling and storage of paraffin, as well as what to do in an emergency situation.
The initiative uses industrial theatre to disseminate the information and has received praise and thumbs up from school principals. Organisers said, some principals believed that it was interactive, energetic and entertaining way of taking education out of the classroom.
The message is propagated by school kids using the stage name ‘Engen Klevakidz’. According to the company the campaign took paraffin safety to 99 schools, reaching 30 000 learners in 2014.
Kicked off in the Northern Cape in May and ran for a month before migrating to rural Limpopo, visiting 40 schools. A second phase started in the Eastern Cape in July, visiting 59 predominantly rural schools by the end of August. Tasneem Sulaiman-Bray, Engen’s General Manager Corporate Affairs, told this publication that since its incepetion in 2008, the campaign has reached 110 000 learners in 349 schools “The Klevakidz initiative delivers an empowering message about safe handling and storage of paraffin, as well as what to do in an emergency, said Sulaiman-Bray”.
Bray also highlighted that its aimed at young children and travels annually to poor and rural areas where the use of paraffin is widespread and accidents are common. “Over the years we have learnt that increasingly younger children are given the primary daytime responsibility of caring for households. It is with this in mind that we target primary school learners with the message of safety,” Bray continued. “As a leading provider of petroleum products in South Africa, we take this to heart and are honoured to contribute to the livelihoods and safety of people”, concluded Sulaiman-Bray.
