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[ PRE-SCHOOLS ]

Situations

Due to the fact that the Kingdom of Swaziland has greatly affected by HIV/AIDS many children are becoming orphans, the government through the Ministry of Education has put aside 40 million Rand towards school fees for the orphans and vulnerable children and also provides free stationery for Primary Education. Swaziland Conference of Churches has two Pre-Schools which are situated in the most droughts stricken Area of Swaziland (Gamula and Ndzevane).

Parents Contribution

Parents of the pre-school kids have been encouraged to contribute something towards the project. They bring in firewood once a month.
Those who fail to pay fees for their children we ask them to come and work at the centre once a week. The majority of the parents are members of the Self Help Groups. They so much committed to the work and we are noticing that they want to take the Pre School to another level.

Financially

School fees for the majority of the children are paid Kinder Nothilfe (KNH) because the rate of unemployment in the area is very high. Few individuals are able to pay the fees for their children. This means the Day Care Centres depends upon KNH as the main Partner.

The garden Project

The two Day Care Centres have got some gardens where they produce some vegetables to give a balanced diet for the children. The only challenge in this part is that the Region is drought and there is no rain and people depend on bore halls and this is too expensive for our Centres.

Challenges

We had higher hopes that we would get some funds to drill bore halls. At the same time as a centre we need enough clean water.

Enrollment

This year 2007 we have 120 children in our two Day Care Centres and most of the children are from the same Region. Most of the children depend on the food that they eat at the centres because there is no food at home because of drought.

A Story of a Child

[ SELF HELP GROUPS (SHGs) ]

Swaziland Conference of Churches is a Christian Organization that was established in 1929 and it is the largest Christian body in Swaziland. It has 85-registered member denomination’s representing more than 2000 local churches countrywide. Swaziland Conference of Churches is therefore uniquely positioned to spread HIV/AIDS education and prevention messages through its extensive networks that reach even the most remote villages in Swaziland and also involved in community development with the help of Kinder Not Half popularly known as KNH. They are based in Germany. They introduced a Self Help Approach Concept in our Organization and now they are phasing out by July 2007 and this is challenge to the organization about sustaining the projects.

SELF HELP GROUP CONCEPT

This is a Community Empowerment Approach where very poor members of a community are organized to form a Self Help Group. It is the duty of the entire community to help in selecting the poorest households among them using the criterion that is developed by them with the help of a Facilitator. One group range from 10 – 15 members from those poor families, which are from the same Social Economic condition with the same sex.

Their basic requirements are to hold weekly meetings to save what they can afford and deliberating on social issues. Their meeting together gives each of them a new identity. The poor member who have all – along been treating him/her inferior, powerless and having no direction in life, soon discover her/his potential and realize that she is not alone anymore. He/she starts seeing a new meaning and purpose of l ife. They start sharing their problems and difficulties in the group and social issues are addressed. A new relationship of trust and togetherness develops in contrast to former state of being poor and loneliness. The process of social development is initiated. Members usually save at least the minimum amount agreed upon by the group every week. Cash that is received during the meeting is handed over to the moderator of the day. Members are issued loans and promptly repayment is encouraged among the members. These kinds of groups are informal in nature

Their weekly savings brings in a financial discipline in the members as they have made a commitment to save and committed themselves at it. They are committed to work more and raise more money/resources. An attitude develops in them that say, “I can do it”.

From this concept a lot of capacity building inputs are provided to the members as well as the groups and their leadership qualities are developed. The whole process is slow and no spectacular results that are seen immediately.

HOW THIS CONCEPT DIFFERS FROM OTHER SELF HELP GROUPS

• This kind of approach is different to other Development Initiatives because there is no external material resource that flows in the initial stages of t he process. Although the people are very poor, their inborn potential to manage their lives have to be brought out and also help them to manage their own resources in a much disciplined way.
• They are non-Political as there is voluntary participation, Rotational leadership, Affinity among the members, Common interest in all activities, the group members form Bylaws and a Bank Account is in the name of the group.
• In this approach all members in a group must be from the same community and of the same language while in other approaches communities are not selected and membership is open to anyone in the community. In this approach also very poor families are selected.

SHG LEVELS

This kind of approach has two other levels, which are The Cluster Level Association and the Federation.

The Cluster Level Association: 6 – 8 groups’ form this level.

All of the groups must be represented from the Cluster Level Association. 8 – 10 Cluster Level Association forms a Federation. The Cluster Level Association is for the SHG’s by the SHG’s.

The Federation:

It is formed by 6 – 8 CLA’s. This is the people institution that leads all the groups to Economic, Social and Political empowerment. The empowered people’s Institution can question and challenge unjust systems and structures. At this higher-level larger issues affecting the communities are solved. It is also where linkages with other developed Institutions and service providers are established. The Federation also provides identity to the SHG and the CLA.

STATUS OF THE SHG’S

Currently Swaziland Conference of Churches has 117 Self Help Groups. Each group ranges from 1 – 15 members and 11 Cluster Level Associations. The groups are situated in the Lubombo Region (the Lowveld) and Part of the Shiselweni Region. SCC has got 2 Staff members and has 6 Community Facilitators

The Swaziland Conference of Churches (SCC) represents the original organization of churches, Missions and Church related bodies in the Kingdom of Swaziland, which was established in 1929. Swaziland Conference of Churches has a burden to be involved in the Social Welfare of members and communities.

Self – Helps Groups

In this project the poorest of the poor are targeted. KNH was training and supporting the pioneers who go to rural and remote places to establish small groups. These are groups of poor women who save the little they can afford with the hope of borrowing later and start a self-help project, eg some save R2.00 per week.

The women are selected from neighbors to avoid the need for attending meetings as the meeting areas are next to their homesteads. The women have been taught on how to run a business and also on how to resolve conflict in a harmonious way amongst themselves and their customers. They have annual action plans whereby schedules of meetings are decided to avoid poor attendance in meetings. Dates of harvesting and ploughing of cotton are not used for meetings, as some may not be able to attend.

The groups report to the mother bodies and the mother bodies monitor their SCC office does the monitoring visits to the sites coordinates and report.

Problem Statement

• Ndzevane and Gamula areas are situated in the Lubombo region of Swaziland (Southern Part), which is situated in a desert like place where rainfall is scare. It is almost impossible for any crops to grow in this area. If at all rain comes and the people plough maize, the minute the sun comes the crops are destroyed. The only crop ploughed is cotton, which one hectare is supposed to yield 26 bails of cotton but in that area it yields only 2 bails of cotton. The money the cotton farmers get from selling this cotton is used to pay debts. The area has no water, for drinking water the residents have to walk for about 10km. As such they cannot even plough vegetable gardens.
• Most women and the youth are unemployed and they depend on men for their live hood as such making them vulnerable and prone to abuse by these men.
• Some women resort to alcohol because of their state of poverty and frustration

Issues:

• Poverty
• Abuse
• HIV/AIDS

Self help group meeting

On another note we have a Production House that is called Christian Media Centre where we are producing Christian programs for the Local Radio station here in Swaziland. All of the Christian programmes in the country are produced by us. We also have a program for the youth and teenagers that is called “Be the Best you can Be” attached below is the summary of the program:

PROJECT SUMMARY

The club aims at encouraging young people to be the best they can be in life instead of engaging themselves in dangerous activities like sex before marriage. The club promotes abstinence among young people and would like to assist those affected with HIV/AIDS spiritually and materially.

[ MBABANE CHURCH YOUTH CENTRE ]

Structure:

Mbabane Church Youth Centre is headed by the manager, Ms. Delisile Valencia Dlamini. I am impressed by her commitment to learn despite that she was only employed as an admin secretary.

From the restructuring exercise at CMC, we have learnt that MCYC does not need to have many departments that cannot be coordinated effectively. We have reduced the departments from eight to two. We have the Production department, focusing on the core business of the centre and the Administration/accounts. Under production are two sections i.e. catering section, under which the kitchen staff work and lodging section. Under administration department are tenants, maintenance, sports and security. The manager is in charge of the two department heads. However, if funds do not allow us, we will only employ the production head and let the manager shoulder the administration department as well for now

Workforce:

The centre employs about twelve (12) people, of which seven are casual employees.

• PRODUCTION:
• The core business of the centre is to offer conference, lodging and catering facilities. Under the lodging section are the conference hall and accommodation. The centre accommodates fifty-eight people (58) at E40.00 per night. The cleaners are under this section. There is a need for self-contained rooms in view of the competition around. Ways to improve this section can be evidenced by the repainting, floor tiles and bedding. After advertising the laundry service we will get someone to specifically work in this section.
• The catering section has all along been suffering from the malfunctioning of the cold room; it has since been fixed some two weeks ago. The kitchen walls and ceiling were repainted.
• ADMINISTRATION:
• Tenants for the seven flats are serviced by VJR Estate agents. Maintenance of the centre is manned by two people owing to the old facilities that require high expenditure and repair. The electricity supply of two SEB meters that were disconnected in year 2000 has been reconnected and arrears paid.
• The sport facilities e.g. gymnasium, 3 football pitches and one basketball court are under this department.
• The office needs a photocopier, a fax machine and many clients require internet services. The main hall needs to be renovated and we hope that next year we will house this meeting in that facility. Such a facility can generate a lot of money for the centre. We are presently renting the grass-cutting equipment; we have noted that it is expensive so we need to buy ours. To tighten security, we need to put barbed wire over the fence. The centre needs to have a vehicle, a kombi is suitable in that it will ferry pre-school kids at a fee, do daily errands and transport cus tomers at a charge.
• The former workshop, which has been used as a storeroom has been subdivided into 2 flats to let. The pre-school has been leased to Groom- Bridge pre-school at a rental of E850.00 per month. Now the centre works towards meeting monthly targets and a small contribution goes towards SCC Administration support. The CEO frequently visits the centre at least once a week. We are now working towards paving the car park and change the carpet in the hostels. The improvements that have already taken place have started to bear fruits, despite the stiff competition

[ SPREADING OF THE GOSPEL THROUGH RADIO ]

AIM

The aim of this vision plan is to lay a strong foundation on which to build the future of proclaiming the gospel of Jesus Christ through multi-media. It is also an opportunity to put our thoughts and ideas on paper so we share the same ideas and are working from the same perspective. It also helps us set priorities; and make guide- lines for the production of programs for broadcasts and cassettes for radio.

The question is: “why do we want to spread the Gospel through the modern ways of communication?”

The answer is:

• a. To reach the unreached people
• b. To teach the basics of the Christian faith to (new) Christians so that they can get a better understanding of the Bible and God

The unreached and new Christians are two different groups; therefore our approach has to be very different. The programs vary according to the specific needs of each group.

In order to work effectively, we use broadcasts mainly for reaching the unreached and the cassette-ministry for (new) Christians. The exception will be to make programs for broadcast to reach new Christians who are in communities that do not have other possibilities to receive good teachings:

PROGRAMS ARE PRODUCED ACCORDING TO THE FOLLOWING GUIDELINES:

• a. The aim of the programs is to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ in the biblical way. The statement of faith of SCC is the basis of all programs to be produced. No influences of syncretistic teaching will be included in the programs.

PRIORITIES TO REALIZE THE ABOVE MENTIONED OBJECTIVES ARE:

• 1. To ensure that high quality programs are produced both technically and in content.
• 2. To do our utmost to maintain the airtime available at the National Radio Station
• 3. In order to serve the Christian community in Swaziland we will be develop video teaching materials. This can be helpful in teaching pastors. We will also investigate if Bible Colleges and Universities need such materials as well.
• 4. For CMC to be vibrant and affluent to clients, production will be made with adherence to the statement of faith of SCC.

WAYS TO ACHIEVE THE ABOVE MENTIONED OBJECTIVES ARE:

• The studio including equipment available at the 175 Ngwane Street in Manzini will be used to produce programs of good quality.
• Adequately qualified personnel will be employed and continuous training will be provided as per the need.
• If there is need for more air-time we will discuss this with the relevant broadcasters. A healthy relationship with the broadcasters will be maintained.
• For effectiveness, it is necessary that programs are appealing to the targeted audience. Therefore, it is necessary that we use a holistic approach. Programs should identify CMC with SCC.
• 5. The airing of programs is like sowing seed. That is why we have to take responsibility for the growing of the seed and the ripening of the harvest as well. Reactions as a result of the programs by mail and by telephone have to be handled very carefully. A network of local pastors will be set up, so the follow-up possibilities will be as nearby as possible. A guideline for the follow-up work will be worked out.