December 31, 2024
Humanitarian Influencer, Dora Moono Nyambe, Who Built A School In Zambia, Dies At 32
Nyambe built four schools in Zambia to house over 500 kids and provide them with food and resources. She was working on purchasing a new bus.
Humanitarian and TikTok star Dora Moono Nyambe, founder of the nonprofit Footprints of Hope School, is dead at 32.
“It is with a heavy heart that we announce the sudden departure of our beloved Dora,” a Dec. 27 Instagram post read. No cause of death has been revealed. However, the message read that Nyambe will be remembered as “a loved mother, heroine, peace philanthropist and an extraordinary woman.”
The 32-year-old influencer drew over 4 million followers on TikTok, who followed her journey as she documented her work as a humanitarian and educator in Zambia. Daily Mail said Nyambe launched her nonprofit, Footprints for Hope School, in 2019. In an Oct. 10 video, the humanitarian influencer explained that she initially came to her friend’s village, Mapapa Village, while she waited for her visa to be approved.
After she observed the conditions of the kids in the village, she decided to stay and build a school in Zambia to provide them with resources. “When I came here, I saw that there were a lot of kids getting [sexually assaulted], there were a lot of kids that had babies; just a lot of bad things happening.”
Nymabe’s resources attracted many children from the village, so she built four schools to accommodate over 500 students.
In a follow-up video, Nyambe, who said she did not have biological kids, revealed that she adopted the younger kids in the village while the older kids moved on from her schools and were able to sustain themselves.
With a lack of resources and no government funding to accommodate all of the kids in the village, she used her social media platforms to raise awareness as the community continued to grow in its demand for resources.
“I can’t turn any kids away,” she said then. “I don’t operate like that.”
Before she died, she was raising funds for a new bus to replace the old one gifted to the school. The bus, which picked up kids from four different villages and transported food and supplies for teachers and staff to run the school, repeatedly broke down, making it difficult to transport the school’s supplies. According to a GoFundMe set up for the bus funds, the school has raised $47,545 of the $80,000 goal.
A fellow teacher for Nyambe’s nonprofit announced the death of her colleague in a video posted on TikTok. “I am officially announcing the loss of my beloved CEO, director, manager and founder of Footprints of Hope School, who died on Wednesday, Dec. 25 2024,” she said.
Burial services for the social media personality were scheduled for Monday, Dec. 30, at 12:00 p.m. at Footprints of Hope, Mapapa Village in Mukushi, Zambia.
Footprints of Hope provided contact info to a family representative and school administrator on Instagram for those who wished to support.
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