Q&A with Gundo Mmbi

by | Apr 14, 2019 | Lifestyle

Gundo Mmbi, 27-years-old, is the principal at SPARK Soweto. Photo: Provided

Gundo Mmbi is a Wits BEd graduate and former Wits Education School Council transformation officer. She is a human rights activist and a proud member of the LGBTQIA+ community. She played an active role in the #FeesMustFall movement. In 2017, she became an assistant principal at SPARK Turffontein and is currently the founding principal of SPARK Soweto.

How did a young woman from Limpopo find herself at Wits?
I was told that the child of a cashier will never make it to one of the country’s most distinguished universities. I wanted to break barriers by securing a bursary. I studied hard to achieve acceptance to Wits University and secured a bursary from the housing department to study. That’s how my Wits story began!

You majored in mathematics and English. What factors motivated you to study BEd?
Growing up, I have always been curious about who was setting my exam papers and why the quality of the questions was the way it was. The standard of mathematics in South Africa has been lowered for scholars. Each year, I have watched as the pass mark declines, gradually dropping from 50% to 30%. I don’t think it is the teachers or the scholars, but our country’s curriculum leaders and education officials who may lack faith in our abilities.

Have you always been active in student politics and issues of social justice?
Wits is a world on its own, and you learn a lot there about who you are and what type of person you would like to be. Student politics exposed me to a world of leadership and holding people accountable for what they Wits is a world on its own, and you learn a lot there about who you are and what type of person you would like to be. Student politics exposed me to a world of leadership and holding people accountable for what they are responsible for. I was a shy village girl when I got to Wits until I stood up against my English lecturer when he questioned my gender identity: the activist in me was born.

How did your experiences at Wits lead you to where you are now?
A degree from Wits University enables you to proudly embrace your diversity while being proud of your unique individualism. Wits taught me it is okay to come from Limpopo and be raised by a single mother while fighting for free education.

At 27 you are the principal at SPARK Soweto. To what do you owe your success?
I owe my success to the freedom that was fought for by the people of South Africa. Knowing that their fight for my freedom opened doors to higher learning, I was able to go after what I want with no restrictions or prejudice. I owe it to all the teachers that shaped my life, who ensured that I became the best version of myself and not forgetting “my mother and father” (the National Student Financial Aid Scheme) for the financial support when I needed it.

What led to the move from Turffontein to Soweto?
I applied to be a tutor at SPARK Maboneng in 2015 while completing my degree in education. I then became a maths teacher at SPARK Maboneng and taught for two years. An opportunity to grow into school leadership was offered, and I applied for it. I became an assistant principal at SPARK Turffontein and now founding principal of SPARK Soweto. SPARK Schools has 21 schools across South Africa, and I am part of a group of young people who are changing the face of education.

FEATURED IMAGE: Gundo Mmbi, 27-years-old, is the principal at SPARK Soweto. Photo: Provided

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Transforming lives through theatre is no child’s play

by | Nov 11, 2018 | Indepth2018

The National Children’s Theatre is an old establishment shaping the futures of young artists.

LITTLE FEET stomp on the wooden floor above me at the National Children’s Theatre’s (NCT) during Saturday morning workshops. The old wooden ceiling below them squeaks, simulating their excited voices while revealing it has stood the test of time. It’s intriguing how an old building, a Johannesburg heritage site, has become home to the nurturing and development of youth’s theatrical talent.

It is 9 o’clock on a warm and cloudy Saturday morning at the NCT in one of Johannesburg’s wealthier suburbs, Parktown. The theatre consists of two houses separated by a parking lot for staff and visitors. Children aged 3-17 are being dropped off at the theatre by their parents. Some parents wait with their children until the workshops start. Others wait in the parking lot with their car doors open and seats laid back. The oldest children go to the main theatre. There are 12 of them, six boys six girls. All classes rotate around different skills: physical theatre, music and dance classes, all lasting 40 minutes each.

I arrive at the building housing the main theatre. The house is overcrowded with props overflowing from their storage rooms into the downstairs passages. The stuffy smell from the props, along with the creaking floors and staircase, remind one of the age of the building, as youthful and joyful screams can be heard from the main theatre, which is roughly the size of a classroom. Half the theatre is taken up by a stage with stained white tiles and dull green curtains.

OLD WORLD CHARM: The room where the audience congregates before shows.

The dusty and creaking stairs lead me to the theatre. The children are playing their own version of musical chairs where the music – South African hip-hop – doesn’t stop. Each person rushes hastily to fill a seat. There’s a rather shy-looking, tall, young man with a black puffer jacket on, this hot morning. While the rest run and scream at each other to fill vacant seats, he merely jogs in between to eventually fill a seat.

The young man’s name is Clayde Peterson. His father and grandmother are in one of the cars in the parking lot waiting for the workshops to end. At the end of the music class, the last 40-minute class for the day, the children from all classes make their way out to the waiting parents. It is raining. It begins to thunder as Clayde and I make our way to his father and grandmother. A little girl of about four years old cries hysterically at the clap of thunder, desperately searching for an adult to run to.

WATCHFUL EYE: The NCF’s emblem displayed in the waiting room.

As we sit on a dusty, stained couch in the veranda of the second house, Clayde’s father, Clayton Peterson, reflects on the personality of his son. The large, yet gentleman, says Clayde, has been coming to the theatre workshops for four years.  

OPEN DOOR POLICY: This heritage building houses the main theatre which holds an audience of about 100.

“At [age] nine he told me he wants to act. I went on the Jozi Kids [website], saw an ad and booked him for a holiday camp [with the NCT],” Peterson says. “He loves acting. He’s more involved by being here. His social skills have improved. He was very reserved to interact but now it’s much easier for him,” the 46-year-old says.

Clayde adds, “I’ve been more open and wanting to talk to people and learning different accents…I’ve been trying to get better at what I do here.” Neither as quiet nor shy as he had seemed at first, Clayde is rather outspoken, to my surprise. “The most significant thing I’ve learnt is to project my voice so that everyone can hear you. When I practice, my grandmother always tells me that she wouldn’t be able to hear me if she was sitting at the back,” the young Peterson continues.

HONOURS: A wall displaying the awards that NCT founder, Joyce Levinsohn, has amassed throughout her time at the theatre.

“He likes to watch different YouTube videos, practise acts and different accents,” Clayton says, and, chuckling, adds, “Sometimes he gets it right, sometimes he doesn’t.”

Clayton says that he likes to bring his son to the theatre. “The focus here is on the individual as opposed to school. At school there’s no time to focus on the individual. Since coming here, he’s been much more outgoing and willing to try new things.”

 Although Clayde is learning to act at a theatre, he hopes to pursue an onscreen career. “I would love to pursue a film career. For me it’s interesting. There’s lots of takes. With theatre you cannot make mistakes,” the young actor-in-training says.

Chief Executive Officer of the NCT Moira Katz, refers to the theatre as an educational children’s theatre. “Our motto is transforming lives through educational theatre,” she says.

The Petersons’ experience of the workshops reflects the objectives of the theatre as expressed by Katz. “We strive to transform children’s lives through theatre,” she says. “Our children’s lives have been changed and they’ve found a home. This especially for sports-orientated schools with artistic children. They have found a place in the theatre.”

Katz took over the NCT in 2012, succeeding Joyce Levinsohn who had run the theatre since she started it in 1989. Levinsohn had been involved in the world of children’s theatre from when she gained qualifications in the field in the 1950s (Encyclopedia of South African Theatre, Film, Media & Performance, 2018). At the time, Levinsohn took a chance, through her housekeeper, to educate black teachers about a technique called, ‘Theatre in Education’. The theatre has kept to this approach to this day.

Theatre in Education has earned the NCT recognition. The work done at the theatre saw it winning the prestigious Naledi Awards five times, the most recent being in 2016 for the musical, Khokho’s Treasure. The play is about the death of an old man who has left behind a suitcase of treasure. The lesson is that not all rewards are monetary. Fitting enough for the NCT, Khokho’sTreasure was heritage that was transported through the music of the likes of Miriam Makeba, Hugh Masekela and Johnny Clegg.

RECOGNITION: The theatre has won numerous awards.

The incorporation of the fun side through learning is a consistent element in the production and teaching at the theatre. While the children may enjoy the approach to learning, the teaching doesn’t come across as strongly. The trainers are recent graduates from university, mainly the University of the Witwatersrand. To an observer, the workshops seem to lean more towards a Saturday social activity rather than training in theatre.

The NCT carries with it a rich architectural history. The first building, Ridgeholm, is a white single-story house with a thick black strip covering the bottom fifth of the wall. The house marks the first time that Cape Dutch gables were used in Johannesburg. It was designed by architects Leck and Emley and constructed in 1902 for an attorney, Richard Baumann, who served on the committee responsible for the return of the British after the Anglo-Boer war (The Heritage Register, n.d.). Today it houses the administration of the NCT, a small theatre and music room. 

The second, and asymmetrical, double-storeyed building was designed and constructed on the same grounds over a decade later in 1913. The house was designed for a Mr Gregory who was a messenger of the court, who lived in the house with his wife until 1931 (The Heritage Register, n.d.). Both houses boast large bay windows. The municipality purchased the property in the 1970s with the plan to demolish the buildings and build the M6 motorway, but instead leased it out to the NCT for 50 years.

The plays reflect the edutainment approach. Eleven-year old Angelen van Heerden attests to this, saying that she started attending the workshops shortly after seeing a play at the NCT. “I came to see Pipi Longstockings two years ago as my friend was in it. The play taught me that it’s okay to be yourself. Pipi is a strange girl and she’s okay with it. Sometimes if you’re like everyone else, you’re a sheep. That’s what my mom says.I don’t like to be like everyone else. I feel like I’m being a sheep.”

Van Heerden says she feels more at home at the NCT than she did at her previous dance school. She says she was pushed too hard and felt as though she was not ready to be where her instructor needed her to be. “[At the NCT] they’re friendly, they don’t take everything so serious. It’s a nice environment. I like the fact that it’s more chilled.”

HISTORY: The blue plaque marking the National Children’s Theatre as a Johannesburg heritage site.

Media liaison officer Sydwell Koopedi, who has a background in musical theatre, has been with the NCT since 2004. His work is more on the public relations side. Koopedi describes his job as being inclusive of press releases and bookings for upcoming shows, arranging auditions, organising casting briefs, liaising with agencies, confirming bookings with schools, organising tours and sending out advertisements.

He says he faces challenges with the advertising since newspapers such as The Star did away with theatre sections. He adds that a lack of funding has negatively affected the theatre’s advertising.

Koopedi also assists with funding, as the NCT is a non-profit organisation that relies on funding and ticket sales. Tickets cost between R100 and R120 and can make up to R8 000 on a full-house. The National Lottery and Department of Arts and Culture are the major funders of the NCT. Koopedi’s duties include writing up budget reports, collecting invoices and filling out forms. “Its about four to five files,” he says with pride.

As he continues, his colourful character brightens against his black and white outfit. “I do tours. This year we did My Children! My Africa! for grade 12. It’s for setwork. When we’re doing our social programmes, I’m the one who books the schools and ensures that everything is booked: what time they get there, who to contact when they are there. So, it’s quite a lot!” he says as he shares how underprivileged schools are challenging in terms of organising, paying and communicating with the theatre.

A five-minute walk up the road from the theatre is the Netcare Park Lane Hospital. A security guard there, Sandile Mdluli, says that the area is not safe. “During the week it’s busy and quiet on weekends.”

I found this to be true. The narrow Junction Avenue where the theatre is situated has barely enough room for cars to drive through, because of cars that are usually parked on both sides of the street. On weekends, however, parking is the least of one’s worries. There seem to be more of the patrolling security guards for the corporate buildings between the theatre and Park Lane, and the French-speaking car guards than parked cars.

“This is a high risk area. They steal cars like no-one’s business,” says the 37-year-old Mdluli. “We’re next to Hillbrow and Alexandra. Since the car guards got here two years ago, it’s been better. They used to steal one or two cars in a week. Now it’s maybe a car per month,” the Servest guard says.

Mdluli says that to tackle the crime problem, the security guards from Park Lane, Wits Junction (Wits University student residence), Life Brenthurst Clinic, Charlotte Maxeke Academic Hospital and security company ADT communicate regarding security related issues. He says that it is mandatory for them to help each other out to curb crime.

Although there are safety concerns about the area where the theatre is situated, it has become a home away from home to some children, a treasure for children’s arts. However, the heritage houses do not portray that image. Old, dusty and cluttered, the houses need to reflect the work being done inside, otherwise they just blend in with the surrounding rundown area.

While the weekend workshops set the theatre apart from other youth centres and theatres, the lack of focus on the skill in some of the workshops needs addressing. The NCT may struggle with funding, but to its credit, the theatre has been consistent in ensuring that such issues do not affect the children, reflecting the safe place and home that the theatre has become to many children.

FEATURED IMAGE:  The room where the audience congregates before shows. Photo: Onke Ngcuka.

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The ABCs of building a brighter future

by | Nov 11, 2017 | Indepth2017

The youth of the small community of Kliptown, in Soweto, face many issues in their daily lives. These include substance abuse, lack of basic facilities and rampant crime. Despite this, however, there are centres all around the area that aim to assist these youths in building better lives and securing brighter futures.

Walter Sisulu Square, a monument designed to mark the creation of the Freedom Charter and South Africa’s movement to democracy, stands proudly in the centre of Soweto’s Kliptown district. Small groups of children shuffle restlessly across the monuments’ vast courtyard, on their way home from school, passing droves of tourists snapping pictures in the shade of the Soweto Hotel.

They chatter among each other as they hop between the train tracks that separate the dream-like opulence of the hotel, at the edge of the square, and the reality of their lives in the tiny zinc houses of the region of Kliptown known as Emva Kwe Sporo, meaning the place behind the railway.

Despite the shine on their school shoes and the smiles on their faces, this is a reality that is rife with substance abuse, crime, violence and significant school drop-out rates, explains Faith Dhlodhlo, a social worker at the Kliptown Academic Citizenship and Economic Development Centre.

“I don’t know whether the area doesn’t have enough recreational facilities, or something, but mostly the youth are finding themselves in these situations because they lack employment, or they leave school early and then they are unemployable,” she says.

TRYING TIMES: The people of Kliptown live in impoverished conditions, despite the promise of rights such as education and sanitation being enshrined in the Freedom Charter.

This despairing tale of a community filled with forgotten children is, however, anything but the Kliptown narrative. Centres and programmes that attempt to help youths refrain from engaging in criminal activities, by providing them with positive alternatives, are dotted throughout the area.

This is a community that embodies resilience and determination to secure a brighter future for the youth.

Regarded as the oldest township in the Johannesburg region, Kliptown was initially established in 1903. The Freedom Charter was, thereafter, signed in the area in 1955. Today, however, Kliptown is a far cry from the rights outlined in the document.

The living conditions, which lack rights ranging from housing and electricity to running water, provide for a visual which would make the signatories of the charter tremble with anger.

The heat of an African summer afternoon continues to beat down relentlessly, blurring the tiny shacks that sprawl out into the distance. Packed as tightly as cans on a shelf, these make-shift homes yield only to narrow dirt streets.

“Kliptown is largely an informal settlement and in that type of scenario, the unemployment rate is very high,” explains Dave Shuba, the overall chairperson of the Greater Kliptown Community Policing Forum.

“I don’t know how many government officials came to this area, we’ve engaged with so many people. I don’t know how many presidents came here and we spoke to them, but nothing’s changed,” he continues with a look of sadness clouding his face.

Shuba works to educate the community and aid the Kliptown police in fighting crime. He explains that his organisation deals with youths, as young as 16, who become involved in crimes such as theft and substance abuse.

“It’s purely because the community is on a poverty bend. It’s a survival type of crime,” he shrugs.

Dhlodhlo, whose work revolves mostly around youths that are in conflict with the law, is often confronted with first-time offenders being provided a second chance by the courts.

She has seen the effects of the poverty in the area first-hand in her work with young adults, who speak of their beginnings in substance abuse from “very tender ages like 12 and 13. It’s disturbing because it’s like a norm, everybody has to either drink or drug,” she explains.

According to Dhlodhlo, community and youth centres in the area play an integral role in ensuring that youths are kept occupied and away from crime, because Kliptown contains very few recreational facilities like parks and playgrounds.

“Most of the things that they do, like if they do crime, it’s when they are bored. When they do drugs, it’s also boredom at most times. When they are busy, they don’t have time for that stuff, so it does help,” she explains.

Feeding hungry mouths and nurturing hungry minds

The afternoon begins to cool in Emva Kwe Sporo, as the clock approaches 2:30pm. Small clouds of dust rise from the dirt as the school-uniform-clad children take turns to jump, dodging the small rivers of dirty water that trickle down Station Road.

Their pace quickens as they approach the white-washed walls of the Kliptown Youth Programme (KYP), the smell of fresh pap and chicken wafting out of the centres’ kitchen and drawing them in.

FOOD FOR THOUGHT: The Kliptown Youth Programme provides members with two meals a day, one in the morning and one in the afternoon.

The promise of an afternoon meal has drawn the now 460-strong membership of the KYP to the centre, since its establishment on May 27, 2007.

For many school-going youths the centre forms the axis of their lives by providing access to homework assistance, sports and cultural activities and daily meals.

“Food should not be a privilege, it should be a right. Unfortunately, not every family in our community have food for their children every time, so we had to introduce the programme,” explains KYP executive director, Thulani Madondo, who has won many humanitarian awards for his work at KYP, including the CNN Top 10 Heroes award in 2012.

Catering to any person who is still enrolled in school, regardless of age, the centre is often flooded with people by 3pm. This is a time characterised by the faint sounds of spoons scaping against plates, trying to capture that last grain of rice.

The quadrangle of the programme, filled with colours and laughing children, lies in stark contrast to the destitute surroundings of the centre. A faded mural at the entrance to the kitchen that perfectly epitomises the aim of the programme, even ten years after its initial creation, reads: “Inspiring positive change.”

According to Madondo, who was born and raised in the Emva Kwe Sporo region, “We started the programme because we wanted to be the generation that breaks the poverty cycle in our community. The main purpose of our organisation is to see young people become the architects of their own exit strategy from this type of environment.”

Seventeen-year-old Buntu Kalipa, who aspires to be a commercial pilot, has spent more than half of his life as a member of the programme and is also currently involved in the centre’s gumboot dancing team.

“Being at KYP for nine years, it is home for me. If something happens, my mom asks if I was at KYP and then she contacts them because she knows when I am here I am safe.

“KYP is like my guardian parents. If my parents aren’t here, they are like my parents and they look out for us. I have been in the experience where my ex-friends wanted me to join drugs and drinking every week. To get out of that space was hard, but KYP was there for me,” he explains with a tiny smile brightening his eyes.

The centre is funded by multiple organisations, such as the KFC Add Hope campaign, KitKat Cash & Carry and The Oppenheimer Memorial Trust. Madondo and his co-founder, Thanduxolo Bezana, plan to secure further private and corporate funding so that the centre can continue to develop and refine the available programmes.

Small bodies, big dreams

Nine hundred and fifty meters away from the KYP, in the Tamatievlei area of Kliptown, stands yet another testament to the community’s dedication to improving the prospects of the youth.

The Mighty Evolution Kids daycare centre, which was established on January 13, 2016, aims to cater to children who are not yet enrolled in school. The small corridor of three classrooms that make up the centre is characterised by the cheerful and ever-present day care principal, Candice Madondo.

Madondo, much like her namesake at KYP to whom she is not related, exhibits an unbridled passion for the children in her care.

“It’s not difficult for children to get involved in crime, because there’s so many things that they see happening around. There’s burglaries, there’s fights that they see happening outside, so we need to make sure that we block off all of that. An early childhood development centre is foundation phase. I believe if the foundation is set right here, the child goes to school and they get a positive mindset,” she says as she organises a mess of papers in preparation for the centre’s December graduation ceremony.

MOTHERLY LOVE: Candice Madondo, the principal of Mighty Evolution Kids, believes that love and positive reinforcement can change a child’s life.

The daughter of a local pastor, Madondo, describes the centre as her form of ministering to the community and plans to expand the daycare to include after-school programmes and facilities, such as a toy library.

“We do have centres such as Khayalethu, PUSH [Persevere Until Something Happens] and the Kliptown Youth Programme, but for our children in this area it’s too far for them to go to those centres. I don’t want to open a centre like those and compete with anybody, but I’d like to have people who assist children with homework. It will also create employment for young girls who are at home struggling to get work,” she says.

The daycare has no full-time sponsor and continues to struggle financially, however, donations from private companies and individuals have ensured that Madondo is able to realise her dream of growing the centre. This is evident in the creation of a small soccer and recreational field, which is underway in an area directly outside the centre.

Madondo is also using this project as a means of assisting older youths in the broader Tamatievlei community, by providing former criminals and addicts with employment.

Twenty-seven-year-old Marco Harrington, a former drug addict and gang member who is assisting Madondo, believes that this work ensures these youths do not have to become reinvolved in crime, so as to support themselves and their families.

According to Harrington, the day care also “helps keeps them [children] out of trouble. They don’t see things that they not supposed to see, because if you grow up seeing things you aren’t supposed to see, you end up doing them. I’m talking from experience.”

Evangeline Fourie, a mother whose two-year-old son Shepard attends the Mighty Evolution Kids day care, agreed with Harrington’s positive outlook on the impact of the day care on the youths.

JUMP FOR JOY: Lamiah Moodley plays outside
the Mighty Evolution Kids daycare centre where her father,
Marco Harrington, works.

“I see big aspirations in a lot of children here. Children have dreams, but their dreams get crushed by things that they see on the outside. When I look at the children in their classrooms and I look in their eyes, I see presidents and doctors. There’s one boy who always says he wants to be a soldier and when I look at him, I really see a soldier in him,” she smiles.

Left behind, but not forgotten

The impact of centres such as KYP and Mighty Evolution Kids, continues to touch the lives of countless youths in the Kliptown area. However, the flaws of these programmes are too often felt by youths who find themselves in need of medical facilities, such as drug rehabilitation centres.

Each day, as school children scamper their way across Walter Sisulu Square towards the various youth programmes, these young men and women return to places such as the Kliptown scrapyard. A place to exchange empty bottles for money that they can use to buy drugs and get their next fix.

John Williams*, a twenty-eight-year-old nyaope addict, began his descent into drug abuse in his first year of high school.

Despite attending programmes similar to the KYP, Williams was not dissuaded from using drugs as a means of escaping the hardships he faced being raise by a financially-struggling single mother.

“A programme for the youth? I’m still going to be here in the area, they just going to let me come there every day. There’s nothing there that will keep me away from drugs, so a rehab is a little bit better, because there’s no drugs and they going to give me medication that’s going to help me to detox. There’s no detoxification here in any of the youth programmes,” says Williams.

The satellite office of the South African National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence in Eldorado Park, located 2km from Walter Sisiulu Square, is the closest centre that can assist these youths. However, “at the moment, I think, they are overwhelmed. It’s too much to carry and they do need help,” says Dhlodhlo.

The satellite office of the South African National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence in Eldorado Park, located 2km from Walter Sisiulu Square, is the closest centre that can assist these youths. However, “at the moment, I think, they are overwhelmed. It’s too much to carry and they do need help,” says Dhlodhlo.

Despite this downfall, the youth centres are “trying their level best,” explains Dhlodhlo.

Centres, such as KYP, continue to reach out to youths involved in crime and drug abuse through their various programmes.

The hordes of children that retreat from these centres into their homes each afternoon is a clearly indication of the importance of the centres to the community.

Their foundations providing a starting point for a better, brighter future for the young people who pass through their gates each day.

FEATURED IMAGE: Educator delivers lesson to pupils in class. Photo: Files.

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