For the last year and a half two creative Zimbabweans, Juma and Willard, have hustled their way from the robots on Roeland Street to a studio in Woodstock, Cape Town, crafting everything from bags made out of old t-shirts to recycled crate-chairs for corporate clients like Redbull. Not content to just be small tJuma, when did you leave Zimbabwe and move to South Africa?
Juma: In 2006 I moved to Khayelitsha, on the outskirts of Cape Town, and worked as a bricklayer until December 2007. I then returned to Zimbabwe to set up my own business. This proved to be impossible due to the countrys economic situation and so I went back to Khayelitsha in March 2008, to set up a craft venture.
Were you successful?
Juma: Before the business could start growing I lost everything in the xenophobic attacks of May 2008.
Willard, what was your story up until this point?
Willard: I was devastated by what had happened. This was not the first time in my life that I had lost everything I owned. I even contemplated suicide because I could not understand how so much misfortune could have befallen me.
How did you manage to get through the xenophobic attacks in South Africa?
Willard: Well, both Juma and I started to lead the group of people in Desmond Tutu Camp because it was the only way to cope with the stress. We needed something to do to take our minds off things. The best way to do this is to help others and so we started making a list of everyone in the camp and what their immediate needs were.
Juma: There were people from Tanzania, Malawi, Ghana, Angola, Cameroon, Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Zambia. For the next four months we helped deliver babies, women who miscarried, buried the dead and aided the sick. We also started connecting with NGOs and repatriating people.
Juma: We both moved back to Khayelitsha and were given R1352.18 from the fund to set up an arts and crafts business. JDI http://www.jdi.org a group of philanthropic professionals in Cape Town also donated tools to us. That was the beginning of the business we have today.
Why and when did you set up your art and craft workshops for the kids in Khayelitsha?
Juma: After we left the Desmond Tutu Hall camp and attended the Lucca leadership programme we realised that the only way to break down barriers was through interaction. Willard and I also realised that though we may have had our possessions taken away, we still had our dignity. We started having HIV prevention talks and discussions about the xenophobic attacks, with some of the kids that may have instigated these. We then founded a group called Ubuntu Youth and started teaching art and craft. There were seven children in the first week; the numbers rose to forty by the following week and now there are one hundred. What Willard and I had learnt to craft as children has become a means of breaking down barriers and building a business.
What do you want to do with your future?
Willard: We would like to employ more staff, build a good life for ourselves and hold more workshops to teach kids skills. We believe that the only way we can help people is to make them self-sufficient.
Do you ever miss Zimbabwe?
Juma: One day we may move back. We have not forgotten about our country. During the cholera epidemic in Zimbabwe we held a one-week hunger strike to raise awareness of the problem.
Post published in: Uncategorized