Resilience, hope bring change
The Grahamstown Forum for Asset-based Community-led Development (ABCD) recently held their first gathering for the year at Noluthando Hall in Joza. Participants were from the Assumption Development Centre, Oasis, community groups, small community initiatives and individuals. It was co-hosted by Ikhala Trust and Raphael Centre. This gathering’s theme was 'Celebrating and Sharing our Stories'. Stories refer to people’s journeys of resilience, hope and change.
Ntombekhaya Adam (a Forum member) said, “These stories are so very powerful! And they make my heart jump. This is how happy I feel when I hear them!”
We believe that to have a healthy city, we need a community composed of self-reliant and responsive citizens who work together. Listening to the people’s life-changing stories at Noluthando Hall we realised that change first and foremost needs to start within yourself: with a mind and a spirit which are aligned, independent and ambitious.
ABCD delivers a consciousness-building framework that aims at appreciating one’s own and other people’s resourcefulness. Our ABCD training aims at unlocking and unblocking people's skills, talents, knowledge and material and social assets so that they can drive their own processes of change.
All Forum members have been trained in ABCD by Raphael Centre and Ikhala Trust. The Forum was established in 2015 with the purpose of bringing like-minded people together to ignite a movement of citizen-driven growth in Grahamstown - especially for structurally disadvantaged population groups by structurally disadvantaged and advantaged population groups.
Bernie Dolley from Ikhala Trust said, “Raphael Centre has always taken responsibility for calling these gatherings and felt it was time that autonomy is handed to the group if they wish to continue to meet and share experiences and lessons.”
Furthermore, for all of us it was time to listen to each other’s little successes and celebrate them at the beginning of this year in Joza’s community hall.
Bernie reported later, “The hall was beautifully decorated with balloons and flowers and the mood felt festive as everyone was chatting to each other and was genuinely happy to connect again…”. The Ikhala Trust had provided the refreshments and Bernie took the lead in facilitating the day.
In small groups, people shared personal narratives of change and hope, which they considered profound for their recent well-being and motivation.
For example, here is the story of Nomaxabiso Fani, 34:
In 2013, I established a Centre for children who were living in the streets of Xolani here in Grahamstown.
I wanted them to have a safer place where they can get meals and learn life skills. Many of these kids have incredible talents, such as art.
I used to work as a social worker. But when I thought about this project idea I decided to resign and start this Centre.
To get started I just used what I had available, such as my grandparents' house and my own savings. Later, I saw that it was a good thing to also create an aftercare programme for school kids. So, now we have a home work club, study groups and we still producing art which partly generates income to sustain the Centre.
Despite some rough times, the Centre overcame. What always inspired me to carry on was the resourcefulness of the children.
Inspired by individual stories we concluded the day with specific ideas about how to move forward in our role as catalysts for local change.
Starting with happiness at our own houses and surroundings, there were ideas to form small neighbourhood groups to address and work on specific local needs, such as administering progress in improving infrastructure as well as through closer collaboration with SAPS.
People also felt that the Forum needs to meet more regularly, if not once per month, to share ideas and expand thinking, to exchange assets (instead of having to purchase them) and to access each other’s different and diverse skills for the purpose of driving their own projects and wider community activities.
“It was clear from the stories that people enjoyed listening to each other and hearing about each other’s experiences and that they felt encouraged to continue!” Bernie said.
• Anne Loeffler is the operations manager at
Raphael Centre.
Raphael Centre has always taken responsibility for calling these gatherings and felt it was time that autonomy is handed to the group if they wish to continue to meet and share experiences and lessons.