Zama shares her passion for kids through non-profit

Zama Mahlinza, a 31-year-old Afrika Tikkun alumna, is living her passion of working with children.

Growing up in Alexandra Township, Mahlinza cherishes the opportunity to nurture children, helping them to improve their lives, and supporting them to unleash their full potential.

“I love my children so much, I enjoy coming to work every morning”, she said. She added that working with children has taught her to grow and develop as individual and also learn to be patient.

She praises Afrika Tikkun for its exceptional work towards children and its efforts to upskill young people around the community of Alex. She said the organisation’s service have a huge impact on the lives of many young people like her who have once lost hope.

“Every young person deserves an opportunity to be empowered and have something that will help them to become economically active and therefore, the centre is doing exactly that, empowering the youth, and we are proud as the young people of Alex that the organization is really adding value to the locals”, Mahlinza added. 

She said many of the similar organizations are needed in communities like Alex that are experiencing a high rate of unemployment and substance abuse.

I believe that if we can have centres such as Afrika Tikkun within our communities to keep our young people busy that will also help in keeping them away from being involved in many wrong things that are happening in the area such as crime and substance abuse.

Mahlinza who also have always had a burning ambition of becoming a psychologist joined Afrika Tikkun, the organization that is funded by Gauteng Department of Social Development in 2016. she said the organization has revived all her dreams.

“From a young age, I always harboured a dream of becoming a psychologist, and now Afrika Tikkun is helping me towards realising that dream”, she said. When she joined the centre, Mahlinza said she did not have any further qualifications except her grade 12 certificate or any technical training however, she has now managed to acquire a computer training certificate and entrepreneurial certificate and she is also a qualified child and youth care worker who is permanently employed at Afrika Tikkun.

In 2019, she became one of the groups of young people to receive a department’s child and youth care worker leadership programme. The opportunity that she said opened doors for her to further her studies. She said she is currently enrolled to study Social Auxiliary work. She expressed her gratitude to the department and the organization for giving her the opportunity to turn her life around.

Mhlinza said she was referred to the centre via Alex FM and she took the opportunity with both hands. She urged other young people to utilizes opportunities presented by government funded NPOs in their areas while still awaiting for those bigger ones.