Personal testimonies and case histories

Country: ZIMBABWE
Name: Grasian Mkodzongi
Date of birth: Nov 1973
Address:1821 Egypty, Highfields, Harare, Zimbabwe.
Tel. 00263 408670

EMail: graccag@yahoo.co.uk

I was born in the summer of November 1973' the third son in a family of seven children.The place that I was born is a little village in a remote western part of Zimbabwe called Gokwe. I grew up and went to a local rural school where I did my primary and secondary education. I was born to a poor family, growing crops only for subsistence. It was financially difficult for my parents to look after seven children including paying schools fees for us. This made life very difficult for me as a young man. Growing up in the village was very exciting, the only thing that I hated most was going to school, because of a various reasons. My family was so poor that they could not afford to buy me a pair of shoes. I walked seven miles to the nearest school often without having had any breakfast and sometimes very thirsty to the point of fainting. These conditions eroded my confidence and interest in schooling to the extent that I used to play truant most of the time until my father caught me. In rural Zimbabwe, teachers are hostile and coming late to school attracts beating. The teachers use big whips and these often leave children with injuries and sometimes children die after being severely injured. All these horrific conditions forced me to hate going to school.

This was not all. I lost my mother in 1982 due to a cancerous tumour which tormented her for almost two years before she died. this was a final blow for me because my mother was my only hope.This contributed to my growing up as a very miserable young boy, because I lacked maternal love during my childhood. My domestic environment affected my academic performance a lot, though I was one of the best students in class, lack of proper clothing and shoes eroded my confidence as a young teenager due to social exclusion at school. I enjoyed village life as it gave me hope and inspiration. I often heard distant voices telling me things that I did not understand. I could not tell anybody , because I did not know what the voices were saying and why.

I moved to Harare the capital city of Zimbabwe, where I shared a room with a married cousin. Life became so difficult for me In Harare (I had a bad experience at a takeaway shop where I worked). I was paid enough to eat and for accommodation only.
In 1993 I went to South Africa as an illegal immigrant trying to raise money to further my education. Things were hard for me in South Africa. I suffered racial and xenophobic attacks which left a big scar in my psyche. I have bitter memories about South Africa, but it is where I first realised and answered my calling. I met a group of community activists in Johannesburg. I got involved in community regeneration programmes and activities. I managed to get a place at a university in South Africa to study social anthropology.

My involvement in community development work inspired me to go back to start a development project in Zimbabwe in 2002. I had little experience but I was extremely ambitious. I met Richard Douthwaite, an Irish economist in 2001, when he came to South Africa teaching about sustainable development. I explained to him about my ambitions and he gave me Mike Thomas from the Future in Our Hands network's contact details. After Richard left, I wrote to Mike Thomas explaining my ideas and he sent me £150 to start the Future In Our hands Network in Zimbabwe. When I received the money I became overwhelmed because I felt I was realising my dream. Things were not easy in Zimbabwe because the government was waging a war against NGOs with links in the United Kingdom. This made registration of the project in Zimbabwe impossible for me. Nevertheless we started a training programme with women in Highfields Township, Harare with the donation of 20 computers from Computer Aid, a charity in the UK and sewing machines and equipment from Tools for Self-reliance, another UK charity.
The political environment in Zimbabwe has been a major stumbling block for our work in Zimbabwe, but we are managing to continue our work.

After visiting Zimbabwe to attend my father's funeral, I managed to help a group of twenty women with a donation of $40 (mostly single women whose husbands had died) for them to start a micro- finance scheme. The group's name is called Kupfuma Ishungu ( which means 'progress is achieved by determination and perseverance' in the local language). The are working hard to raise some money through selling vegetables in the street and a micro-finance programme to provide food security for their respective families, though conditions in Zimbabwe are so difficult because of political violence and inflation which is almost 200%. The group recently elected a committee that oversees its work and they also managed to open a bank account. I am still busy trying to raise an amount of £200 to increase their financial reserves to expand the micro- finance project. Future in Our Hands Zimbabwe is going to be merged with the Future in Our Hands Southern Africa ( FIOHSA) which is the new regional board that will undertake all Future in Our Hands work in Southern Africa. Arrangements are at an advanced stage with the South African Department of Social Development to register and open an office. All the Future in Our Hands work in the region will be co-ordinated from this office.
Our new priority areas in the region are:

- HIV Aids education
- women empowerment programmes through training and opening a centre for women's resources in Johannesburg
- social policy reform and advocacy in South Africa and the region
- social policy research, dissermination of Social policy research and micr-economic trends across the region -developing a computer training programme for girls in township schools in South Africa
- helping community groups to set up their own community based small-scale projects for self-reliance
- education for social entreprenuership.

We believe that our efforts need to be complimented by supportive social policy frame works. We will partner with other social reform lobby organisations in the region like the Zimbabwe Coalition on Debt and Development, Africa Forum on Debt and Development, Soweto Crisis Committee, Anti-privatisation Forum, Men's Forum on Gender and Kathorus Concerned Residents Association. We are still fundraising to make it possible for millions of children and women in Southern Africa to get out of the cycle of poverty by helping them to start small-scale projects for self-reliance.

You can contact Future in our Hands Southern Africa ( (FIOHSA) at PO Box 3077, Braamfontein 2017, Johannesburg South Africa. Tel. 0027116438370 email: graccag@yahoo.co.uk

In Zimbabwe you can contact Future in Our Hands at: 1821 Egypty. Highfields, Harare, Zimbabwe.

Website.http//www.fiohnetwork.org

email:graccag@yahoo.co.uk

Tel. 00263 408 670

Grasian Mkodzongi - Human ecologist