by Gqibelo Dandala, Country Director, One to One Africa
Necessity is the mother of all invention, or so the saying goes. Thomas A. Edison said “If there’s way to do it better – find it.” Either way, the message is clear – when current problems do not have current solutions, thinking beyond what has always been done must become the norm.
And so it was that I witnessed ‘organic’ innovation in rural Last Mile communities around Tshani village where One To One Africa runs its largest project, the Enable program. Last Mile communities are literally villages furthest from the main tar roads. Tar roads are a linkage to urbanization, and by default resources, development and all that that represents. Conversely, distance from tar roads correlates with impoverishment; the greater the distance between a community and a tar road, the more severe the impoverishment. Last Mile communities are just beyond which there is nothing! No resources, no services, no development, no employment, just about nothing. We serve such Last Mile communities.
The natural, untouched beauty of Tshani and surrounding villages belie the abject poverty therein. The abject poverty belies the strength and resilience of the women in these communities, ordinary women we have trained to become Mentor Mothers, which are effectively community health workers. The smiles on their faces don’t reflect the harsh realities of their daily work, walking many kilometres in harsh conditions to go door-to-door to each and every household in the village, bringing health education and advice to those households, their bright green shirts have become bright beacons of hope within the communities. The challenges they face in their work demand that innovation become par for the course. On my last visit I witnessed this first hand.
We visited a household with a pregnant woman suffering from high blood pressure. She lived a walking distance from a medical clinic, yet our Mentor Mother had to walk several kilometres to her house every two days to closely monitor the high blood pressure. Upon seeing my confused expression, it was explained to me that the clinic had no doctor, the maternal nurse visited once or so per month and the clinic was often out of stock of necessary medication for the mother-to-be.
So our Mentor Mother took it upon herself to visit and check on this client every two days instead. However worried that this would in the long run impede on visits to other clients, the Mentor Mother decided to give this mother-to-be a blood pressure monitor, taught her how to use it and then called the mother-to-be her daily to monitor the blood pressure. A simple solution to a potentially life threatening situation.
In a different household, we walked down almost an hour to visit another client. This hour long walk was from the closest place we could park our 4×4 vehicle. The vehicle was parked about ½ km from the side-road. The side-road is another approximate ½ km from the main road. The main road itself is gravel and over 20 km from the tar road. Public transport is only available on the main (gravel) road. Public transport is not a bus, mini-bus or train. The public transport is a van.
About ¾ of the way down we came across the communal tap, a single short tap designed to serve a community of households scattered on mountain. I mention short tap because people typically bring a 20litre bucket to a tap to collect water for their household. However the tap was too low for a 20litre bucket to fit, meaning less water per household. 20 litres sound like a lot? An ordinary bath holds 100 litres of water, a shower typically uses 20 litres of water per minute, a single flush of the toilet uses 6 litres of water.
But back to our downhill walk. When we finally reached the house at the bottom of the mountain, we found a mother with a 3 month old baby. My first thought after the long walk down was “Where did she give birth?!” I asked our Mentor Mother who then told me that she’d given birth at a hospital. My temporary relief was replaced with shock when she continued that this mother had had to walk up to the main road at the onset of her contractions. Aware of the dire conditions mothers in these communities come from, hospitals nearby (that being over 35km away) had built rondavels called OLindela (Prenatal rooms) to accommodate such women to ensure that they were near the facility when full labour began!
As rudimentary as the structures were, the innovation to have such ‘awaiting / early labour’ units has saved and continues to save many women and babies. However to be accepted into OLindela, one needed to be in early labour, meaning that our client had walked up the hill, past the side road and onto the main road to await public transport (a van being highly unsuitable for a full term pregnant woman) to travel to the hospital.
Secondly, the family was malnourished, they simply did not have enough food to eat. In response to their plight, our Mentor Mother provided nutritional advice on the vegetables they should eat, and thus plant in their small field. She provided them with seedlings and izithole taken from her own garden to plant in their field. As a result, our team asked that we have a community garden from which to feed the poor and share the seedlings with households to grow their own food.
I’m in absolute awe of the responsiveness of our Mentor Mothers who go beyond the call of duty and their job descriptions to ensure the health of our clients. For them, it’s merely par for the course. They provide pro-active solutions and promptly share those successes with the rest of the team at the monthly meetings, thereby ensuring constant improvement in our work which translates to improved health outcomes for our communities! I am proud and humbled to be a part of this team, One To One Africa.
Justice Froneman obtained a B.A. degree from the University of Stellenbosch in 1974 and a LL.B degree from the University of South Africa in 1977.
After completing his pupillage at the Pretoria Bar he commenced practice as an advocate at the Eastern Cape Bar in Grahamstown in 1980. He obtained Senior Counsel status in 1990 and was appointed as a judge to the Eastern Cape High Court in 1994. In 1996 he was appointed as Deputy Judge President of the newly established Labour and Labour Appeal Courts, a post he held until 1999. In 2002 he acted for two terms in the Supreme Court of Appeal. In October 2009 Justice Froneman was appointed to the Constitutional Court.
Froneman was an extraordinary professor in public law at the University of Stellenbosch from 2003 to 2008 during which he participated in the specialised LL.M course in Human Rights by way of annual seminars. During periods of judicial leave he attended Harvard University (1999) and the Centre for Socio-Legal Studies, Oxford University (2008) in a visiting capacity. He has been involved in judicial training for new judges over a number of years and has also participated in practical training courses for magistrates, attorneys and advocates.
Rishda oversees the finance function of One to One Africa. She is a qualified Chartered Accountant and completed her articles at Ernst & Young Cape Town. She has a range of skills and experience in audit, financial management and corporate finance and across a range of industries, including Financial Services, Energy and Retail. She also has experience working with multi-national clients both in the UK and in South Africa.
Rishda has served on various professional, school and religious boards and committees over the years. After taking a break from her career to raise her children, she decided to utilise her skill set in the NGO sector. She joined the team of One to One Africa as a consultant in July 2019. She also currently serves as a director for the largest animal welfare organisation in the Western Cape.
Madeleine has a Masters in International Development from the University of Birmingham, alongside nine years’ experience working in the International Development sector. She began her career working for a $20 million health organisation to become Senior Business Development Manager and has since utilised this experience to consult for a range of organisations, specialising in strategy development, process and system design, and proposal development. This experience has culminated in her role as Business Development Manager at One to One Africa Children’s Fund.
Rochelle Carelse is an experienced Operational Manager with over 20 years of experience working in the NGO field. She joined One to One Children’s fund Africa, in May 2021 bringing a wealth of experience along in the fields of Finance, Procurement, HR, marketing and HIV operations/research. Before that, Rochelle worked at The Trauma Centre, Workers World, NACOSA , Desmond Tutu HIV Foundation and MES (Mould Empower and Serve).
Rochelle is a member of the South African Institute of Health Care Managers. Her qualifications include Management Certificate through the institute Damellin a further Higher Management Certificate through FPD where she boast cum laude pass mark and various studies of Grant and Cooperative Agreement course. She also has obtained certificates in Grants Policy and Management Training, Budgeting and costing for NPO’s, Fundraising Proposals and Financial aspects. She served on the Board/council of the Church of the Province of South Africa.
Rene Diane is the Impact Manager at One to One Africa. Rene is responsible for all monitoring and evaluation (M&E)-related activities currently focusing on the Enable programme’s transition to digitization.
Rene has over 16 years’ experience in social development and clinical health, working for organisations such Kheth’Impilo, NACOSA, Health & Development Africa and Hope Worldwide South Africa. She has led programme and M&E teams, and provided technical support and research oversight. Capacity development, Health System Strengthening and innovation is at the core of what Rene is passionate about.
Rene has a clinical health background and has worked as a nurse mainly in Botswana and South Africa before starting her career in M&E, capacity building and Health System strengthening. She is a qualified M&E Specialist, Assessor and experienced in digital health for monitoring and research purposes. Rene enjoys getting involved in projects which make a difference in communities and contributes towards social upliftment and social capital.
Dr Lillian Cingo is a South-African British professional nurse, counselling psychologist and honorary doctor.
For the last 8 years, she has been mentoring and fundraising for various HIV charities and NGO’s in South Africa. Prior to this, Dr Lillian was the Manager of the Transet Phelophepha Health-Care Train – a train that takes primary health-care and counselling services to rural South African communities – for over a decade.
Dr Lillian holds Honorary Doctorates from the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University (South Africa), the Tavistock Centre (United Kingdom), the University of East London (United Kingdom), the University of Willemett (USA) and Rhodes University (South Africa). Dr Lilian also holds a Public Service Award from Liberal Caucus Queens Park (Canada) and a Doctorate of Social Science from the University of Cape Town (South Africa).
Over her career, Dr Lillian Cingo has won over 30 professional awards, including The Golden Key from the International Honour Society and being presented to the Queen as Best Neurological Nurse Specialist in 1975. Most recently, Dr Lillian was chosen as one of South Africa’s 21 icons alongside Nelson Mandela and Bishop Desmond Tutu.
Patience is a qualified Chartered Accountant with a passion of changing people’s livelihoods through implementation of various projects across the globe.
Over the past 15 years, Patience has been working in local and international organisations implementing education, agriculture, health and business linkages projects where she was responsible for building, leading and developing finance teams, implementing financial systems to optimize the financial performance of companies, risk management, grants management, compliance, pricing proposals and developing budgetary control models.
Patience worked in Zimbabwe for various profit and non-profit organisations. After moving to South Africa, she continued working in senior finance positions in local and global development organisations including DAI where she was responsible for financial management of projects across Africa.
A former Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) South Africa, Network Panel member, Patience holds a BSc Honours from Oxford Brookes University and Masters in Business Leadership (MBL) from University of South Africa. She is a Chartered Accountant of England and Wales (ACA) and a Fellow Chartered Certified Accountant (FCCA).
Emma joined One to One Africa in August 2018 as our Head of Programmes. Emma has been working in the HIV/AIDS field for over 10 years; she has worked at the University of KwaZulu-Natal and at the School of Public Health at the University of the Western Cape where she also completed her doctoral studies in Public Health in 2017. Previously, Emma was Head of Operations at the Right2Know Campaign overseeing the Finance, Human Resources and fundraising departments as well as the day to day operations of the Campaign.
A former investment banker whose current work is a reflection of her personal passions, Gqibelo lives by the ethos that a life of service is a life well-lived, which is reflected in her work.
A graduate of the University of Cape Town and the Gordon Institute of Business Science (GIBS), she founded and ran a non-profit organisation for 15 years prior to joining One To One Africa in August 2021. As such, she is a seasoned leader and executive in the social development space, her previous organisation, Future of the African Daughter (FOTAD) having been publicly acknowledged by Mrs Michelle Obama.
Her work is characterized by her passionate but practical approach to her life and her work, informed by the unusual balance of her professional training in finance and economics, her passion and heart for the development and an almost quixotic enthusiasm and conviction in a better tomorrow for all. She is also a former member of the UN Women Civil Society Advisory Group (CSAG) Committee (RSA Multi-country office).
Jonathan Penkin is CEO of Goldman Sachs South Africa as well as the Head of Growth Markets ECM at Goldman Sachs International. Prior to this role, Jonathan was the Co-Head of the Financing Group in Asia Pacific (ex Japan) at Goldman Sachs Asia LLC.
Jonathan gained a BA in Political Science at the University of Cape Town before completing his MA in Political Science (Cum Laude) at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. He also holds a BA in Jurisprudence from University College, Oxford.
Jonathan is a member of the Board of Governors of Tel Aviv University and a member of the International Council of the New Israel Fund.
Jenny Altschuler is a consultant clinical psychologist and family psychotherapist who has spent much of her professional life working in the public sector, most recently at the Tavistock Clinic, London.
Her work focused on families affected by life limiting illness, trauma and the training of health care professionals.
Jenny now works as an independent psychotherapist as well as supervisor and consultant to medical and mental health professionals working in a wide range of health care settings. She has also written extensively on ways of addressing the challenges that illness and trauma present.
Jenny has been instrumental in setting up our counselling centres in Kosovo, and the training and supervision of the counsellors who work in these centres is a matter of great importance to her.
Jenny also oversaw the clinical aspects of our Israeli-Palestinian trauma healing and Child Resilience projects. Her expertise is particularly relevant in advising on our HIV/AIDS initiatives, including our Expert Patient Programme and the work of PATA (Paediatric AIDS Treatment for Africa).
Executive Chairman
David is the co-founder of One to One Children’s Fund and the Chair of the Board of Trustees.
David qualified as a Chartered Account in South Africa, before transferring to the UK in 1977 to become Treasurer of Marks & Spencer plc.
Alongside his venture finance interests, David embarked on a career as a social entrepreneur some 25 years ago. He was Chairman of the Refusenik organisation and then co-founded the One to One Project with Rita Eker MBE, which led to the formation of One to One Children’s Fund in 2001, with a mission to relieve the suffering of vulnerable children, wherever there is no government or other support.
This led to the development of our HIV/AIDS support and treatment programmes in South Africa, trauma counselling programmes and day care centres in Kosovo and Israeli/Palestinian resilience building initiatives in the Middle East.
David is also the co-founder and Chairman of Paediatric AIDS Treatment for Africa (PATA), a network organisation of more than 400 HIV clinics across Africa, sharing best practice and treating more than 100,000 children born with HIV.
David received the Prime Minister’s Points of Light award in 2017 in recognition for his outstanding volunteer work benefitting thousands of vulnerable woman and children. He has also received the WIZO Commitment Award for Entrepreneurship in 2013 for his endeavours in the non-profit sector.