AsandaPhozi2006

April 2006 saw the appointment of two paid SAEP employees for the first time in our recent history. Until then, SAEP had relied almost exclusively on local and foreign volunteers to carry out its core work. However, with an ever-expanding work load, and greater demand for its services, SAEP made appointments in two key areas. Asanda Lugalo is the Volunteer/High Schools Programme Coordinator, while Phozisa Alfred-Egwu is our Office Administrator. Phozi has her first child, a little boy, in December 2006 and is now working part-time.

Asanda Lugalo

Asanda Lugalo is the last born of seven children from Willowvale, Eastern Cape. At the age of six he moved to Cape Town to live with his father in the sprawling Khayelitsha township. He attended both junior and senior school in Khayelitsha where he excelled in maths, science and biology. It was through an inspirational maths teacher that Asanda realized the role that a good teacher can have in a learner’s school career.

Asanda passed his Matric in 2001 and enrolled at the Cape Technikon to study Electrical Engineering. However, he was forced to drop out after less than a year due to financial constraints. He then went back the Eastern Cape with the hope of studying Information Technology, but this also did not work out.

When Asanda returned to Cape Town in 2003, he was unemployed and living with his brother in Khayelitsha. Having always liked children, he decided to start a project in his neighbourhood, organizing team sports for local children to give them something positive to do in their spare time. At this time, he saw an advert in the newspaper for training in community development activities. This opportunity turned his life around.

An organisation called Educo Africa took Asanda and 40 other young people on a weekend selection course in the mountains. Asanda and 13 others were selected for the four-month intensive community development training course. On this course, also in the mountains, the participants were developed through team building, counselling, spiritual healing and life-skills training. They were taught hiking, bushcraft, map reading, conflict resolution and teaching skills.

Participants were then expected to undertake an internship at a community development organisation. In March 2005, Asanda joined the Zeekoevlei Environmental Education Project (ZEEP) in Cape Town. Completing his internship in July of that year, he became a full-time ZEEP employee, responsible for environmental education, staff training, team-building and nature hikes for learners in township schools.

In September 2005, Asanda hosted a group of 45 SAEP high school learners and gap-year interns for a camp at Zeekoevlei, and became interested in the work that SAEP is doing. In January 2006, after some meetings with SAEP directors, he was offered the newly created position of coordinator for the volunteer and high school programmes, which he took up in March.

Asanda says he joined SAEP because he realised that it was a great chance to develop and broaden his knowledge. He also realised that he was in a perfect position to mentor township learners having been through all their struggles himself. He enjoys coordinating the volunteers and leading learners on hikes.

“I believe SAEP is doing great work” says Asanda, “I grew up in the townships, so I can give the organisation insight into what learners require”. Of working with township learners he says “It is like a mirror of my life and I can help them not to make the same mistakes I made”. Asked whether he is enjoying the job so far he says “Yes, I am. It challenges me and keeps me busy, but that is what I like doing”.

Phozisa Alfred-Egwu

Phozisa Alfred-Egwu was born in Cape Town almost 28 years ago. At one year old she went back to Engcobo, her rural home in the Eastern Cape to live with her grandmother before returning in 1992 for high school. This she did in New Crossroads, on Cape Town’s Cape Flats where SAEP undertakes most of its work.

Having passed Matric in 1997, Phozi, as she is called at SAEP, undertook a year-long secretarial diploma in central Cape Town before enrolling with the Cape College for a Human Resources course. Family problems caused Phozi to drop out of the course after six months and seek full-time employment.

In her career, Phozi has had a number of jobs including work as an au-pair, a cashier at Woolworths, a receptionist at one of Cape Town’s biggest soccer clubs, Ajax Cape Town, a survey administrator, and an office administrator at an actuarial firm.

In 2006, wanting a change and to broaden her horizons, she took up her job with SAEP after spotting an advertisement on the internet. Phozi says she was attracted to SAEP by the community work they are doing and the chance for her to get more involved in community development activities.

“SAEP provides opportunities we never had when we were growing up” she says, “I wish I was a child now because I never had such opportunities”. She has spent the first month getting used to the way SAEP works and bringing some of her administration skills to bear on the office. In the afternoons she often goes out to the townships to transport volunteers to their work in the schools and ECD centres (crèches). She is also working closely with Jane Keen, SAEP director, in assisting the principals of the centres to reach their goals to become quality child care and pre-school education providers.

Phozi has been married for four years to Tony Alfred Egwu, from Delta Estate, Nigeria, who runs a printing firm in the centre of Cape Town and a mobile telecommunications unit in the townships.