Billionaire YouTuber MrBeast Drills Free Boreholes In Zimbabwe
The world’s most subscribed YouTuber, MrBeast, recently came to Zimbabwe to drill boreholes in rural communities.
Mr. Beast, real name James Donaldson, was on a mission to drill 100 boreholes in African rural communities that have no convenient access to clean water. Some 18 of those were drilled in Zimbabwe. The other boreholes were drilled Kenya, Uganda, Somalia and Cameroon.
In Zimbabwe, they his team drilled 18 boreholes in places including from what we can tell in a video he released on his YouTube channel.
He also donated what looks like 10s of Buffalo bicycles to school children in a Lalapansi village.
MrBeast’s initiative is part of a wider MrBeast Philanthropy initiative in which he does things for people that cannot afford them. Things he has done include, adopting an orphanage in South Africa, paying for cataract surgery for 1000 people, helping amputees walk, and building houses for families.
His charity however has also attracted criticism with some describing it as self-enriching “kindness for clicks“. For his video about how he helped 1,000 blind people see, which generated 160 million views, he was criticised for benefiting financially more than the cost of the charity and video.
In response to the criticism, he said that his average video in 2022 made a $1.5 million loss. MrBeast’s charity has however largely been praised for raising awareness on human needs that governments and society are not paying enough attention to.
In Zimbabwe, the average price of fully kitted solar powered borehole is US $3000. For the 18 boreholes, MrBeast therefore have paid roughly US $54,000. A Buffalo bicycle is priced at $250 and so some 100 of them would be $25000.
The government of Zimbabwe has been on its own mission to drill boreholes in urban and rural areas across the country. Recently, President Mnangagwa said promised that every village would have a borehole in 5 years, the length of his current presidential term.
The name MrBeast is not a stranger to Zimbabweans that spend some time on YouTube. Aged 25, he has some 207 Million subscribers on his YouTube channel. MrBeast has valued his YouTube channel at $1.5 billion.
