WINNIPEG The family of a man who died from COVID-19 in Manitoba last November is remembering his impact on the Congolese community in the province on the day the country celebrates its independence. Jean Claude Dianzenza Bahati passed away at the age of 60 on Nov. 6, 2020, just days after testing positive for COVID-19. He was working at Victoria General Hospital at the time of his death as a health-care aide. Paolla Mangiri, Bahati’s daughter, said her father was a man who liked to help people. “If someone needed help, he worked to get that help if he could, and if he couldn’t, he would make sure that he was able to get someone to help them,” she said.
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Kate Dockeray/The Globe and Mail
Jeanceline Mangiri has 96 blue and white balloons she doesn’t know what to do with. They were the first decorations she bought for her father’s surprise 61st birthday party.
She had been planning the event in whispered phone calls with her siblings, afraid her two youngest children might overhear and snitch to their grandfather. She knew her father was desperate to see his grandchildren; they had spent the summer with him in Winnipeg, where he always kept his kitchen stocked with their favourite snacks: sausages, cookies and ice cream.