Direct Aid Society has identified 1,500 people in Mpulungu district to receive free meat packages as Muslims celebrate Eidul adha.

The festival is in commemoration of Prophet Abraham’s willingness to slaughter his son in sacrifice to God.

Every tenth of the twelfth month of the Islamic lunar calendar, Muslims around the world commemorate Abraham’s sacrifice and relive it by slaughtering sheep, camels, goats and cows whose meat is shared amongst believers and the poor.

The slaughter is also signal to the end of the journey for those who travel to Mecca for Hajj.

Direct Aid Society Zambia office Field coordinator Musa Zemba said the organization would slaughter 50 cows and distribute in Mpulungu, while 230 cows would be slaughtered and distributed in other provinces and districts.

“From this particular program, we shall benefit 8,500 citizens directly,” he said.

Zemba said it was the first time Direct Aid Society wasdonating meat packages in Mpulungu, though the organization had been donating meat packages in other parts of the country in recent years.

In the past, Direct Aid Society, which has a presence across the African continent, sunk boreholes and has been running child care facilities, educational centres which offer free education to the vulnerable as well as constructing health facilities with free health services to the communities.

“Direct Aid supports every needy person regardless of their color race religion or political affiliation. We supplement the efforts of the government of the day in the elimination of poverty illiteracy and bad health,” Zemba explained.

He said the organisation also gave scholarships, direct food aid, empowering programs for the youth and widows.

Direct Aid is a humanitarian NGO whose donors, mostly Muslims, channel their Religious Obligatory charities through Direct Aid; Eid Meat Festival is one of them.

He said he was happy that his organisation was supplementing government efforts in various programs.

“We have a Modern Educational facility recently officiated by the former Minister of community development which has a child care facility (Orphanage) with 102 boarders. A primary School with 350 poor kids benefiting from free education. Vocational training center for both boys and girls, a health center catering for the medical needs of the surrounding centers and an awareness department which helps lift up the moral ethical and spiritual standards of the youth,” said Zemba in a statement, Sunday.