A Congolese community leader is urging people to support the family of a young man who drowned on Christmas Day.
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Congolese man, 18-year-old Julius 'Jules' Lunanga was swimming in the Murray River at Albury's Noreuil Park when he went underwater, but didn't resurface.
Pastor Kalwindi Mbele and GoFundMe team members Innocent Rutebeza and Kilimo Mukamba have set up the fundraiser to provide money for the family while they were grieving.
Mr Mbele said the Lunanga family was in financial woe and the teenager had been the only breadwinner.
"No money can replace the loss of Julius," he said.
"After Julius's death the whole family is now in the time of mourning and they are desperate.
"They're asking 'what next, who will be helping us?'"
Mr Mbele asked the Border community to sympathise with the family and to support them.
He said many people from the Border Congolese community were currently working at Tumbarumba or in the Goulburn Valley picking fruit, but the Lunanga family was in too much grief.
"As they are searching for the body, [the family are] praying in the house," he said.
"No one has the strength to come out and go somewhere to pick fruit."
Less than 24 hours after the GoFundMe was started, nearly 60 people had donated to the cause with more than $7000 raised.
The money will go to the family to cover living expenses, food, rent, bills and try to provide the space for the family to process and grieve their enormous loss.
Mr Mbele said he hoped to raise $30,000 for the family.
"[Julius] was holding a licence, so he could go do shopping, to the supermarket and different places, to churches," he said.
"Everywhere they went it was him with the licence.
"Now that he's dead, his family is actually in trouble financially and they're also grieving the loss." Mr Lunanga was employed at Coles and as an apprentice at the Twin City Truck Centre in Wodonga.
The GoFundMe page noted that since Mr Lunanga and his family had arrived in Albury-Wodonga they had also been involved in the local community.