Yere helps PNG youths through English charity

A CHARITY started by a Papua New Guinea rugby league international in South Yorkshire, England, has donated rugby shirts and playing kit to his homeland.
Menzies Yere plays centre for Sheffield Eagles in the Championship.
He started personally donating used kit “back home” and as the idea spread the charity was launched in 2011.
A container with 120 complete rugby kits, 2,750 shirts, 350 balls and pairs of boots arrived in Papua New Guinea, where rugby league is a leading sport.
It is being distributed by the Rotary Club of Boroko throughout the country.
Before the charity was formed Yere, who came to the club in 2009, had started by buying two pairs of rugby boots every month and posting them home for players less fortunate than himself.
He collected shirts to take back to Papua New Guinea.
Following that initiative, Kits 2 Kids was set up by Yere and Sheffield Eagles director Chris Noble.
England Rugby League player Adrian Morley was one of the people who made a donation to the scheme.
Michael Saunders of the Rotary Club said the donations had made an impact on children living in rural areas of Papua New Guinea, where people were predominantly subsistence farmers.
Tauna Igala of Germorubu village sent a letter to the Rotary Club after receiving donated equipment.
In the letter Igala said: “It brings the youths together and energises them, which gives them no time to resort to illegal activities.”
Yere, a hard-hitting centre who has earned the nickname “Juke Box” played for PNG in the 2010 Four Nations, scoring two tries and should don the Kumuls jersey next year at the rugby league World Cup in the United Kingdom.
The 30-year-old was spotted by Sheffield Eagles scouts during the 2008 World Cup in Australia and is in his fourth season with the club. – BBC