TackleAfrica-trained coach educator Becca spent a month in Kenya alongside Yianny and Ndunda delivering coach training programmes and tournaments with our local partners.    59 coaches were trained over 3 courses with MYSA, Bravilian Queens and the Oasis orphanage project, and these coaches will be supported to deliver HIV education through football coaching to over 2,000 young people.

Watch here: 

One game saves lives

Forget Fernando Torres; TackleAfrica believe our January recruit Ndunda Mukonyo is the man to make a real difference.   Ndunda will work with TackleAfrica’s Kenyan partner Alive & Kicking to build and support our network of coaches delivering HIV education to tens of thousands of young people.    Ndunda is a retired professional footballer who grew up in and around one of Africa’s biggest urban slums, now a key target area for TackleAfrica’s HIV programmes in East Africa.  Coaching Development Manager Yianny Ioannou caught up with him in Nairobi to find out how Ndunda’s first month has gone.  

What did you know about TackleAfrica’s work in Kenya when you applied for the job?

Because I live in Mathare North I knew that MYSA (Mathare Youth Sports Association) were using football to educate on HIV. The first coach I saw from MYSA using football drills with HIV messages was wearing a TackleAfrica t-shirt so I knew there was another organisation training their coaches.

What attracted you to working with TackleAfrica?

After a volunteer training session I was sitting by the field when a village elder came over to me and said to me that there is an advertisement for a position in today’s newspaper which is for you, “please don’t fail to apply.” He was very optimistic for me, it was a mystical thing! What TackleAfrica were looking for is what I had been doing in my community already. I saw it as a learning opportunity to grow my horizons and a way to do more good work.

What are you most looking forward to?

I’m looking forward to helping TA succeed more in what they are doing, reaching more young people and improving skills and information in the slums in Nairobi. I came from these places that people call slums and that I call home.

How have you found the job so far?

I’ve been in the job for about 25 days now and already travelled to Uganda for a training course. I have been welcomed warmly by everyone at TackleAfrica and was given a very positive start. I’ve met so many people already and I see that the work is reaching very wide across Nairobi and to other areas of Kenya.

What impact do you think TackleAfrica’s work can have with young people in Kenya?

Great impact! TackleAfrica are targeting the right group of young people to work with and supporting the organisations which are working on the ground both established and growing.

What message do you have for TackleAfrica supporters?

Keep supporting TackleAfrica.  TackleAfrica’s popularity has led to people depending on the information and skills training and football has the power to bring people together for peace and progress. TackleAfrica can help to build a bridge between people across social conflicts.

Ndunda’s story so far:

Growing up

Born in Kiambu hospital Nairobi, minutes away from Mathare slum, one of Ndunda’s early ambitions was to become an architect and he inherited his grandfather’s talent at wood carving in the Kamba tradition.   A new passion began to emerge as Ndunda began playing football at an early age with footballs made from plastic bags, and joined MYSA’s programme aged 12.    His burgeoning footballing talents saw him compete in Scandinavia and Northern Europe for the MYSA Allstars aged 15, and his leadership skills and passion for helping others led to him being the first youth leader in the MYSA executive council a year later.

Professional football career

Ndunda signed for the Mathare United senior team, set up in Division 2 of the Kenyan league at age 19, before a switch to Premier League side Tusker FC in 1999.   Ndunda went on to win the Premier League twice with Tusker, coming off the bench to score the winning goal to clinch the Championship in the final game of his first season.   Ndunda went on to play for Thika United and ended his professional footballing career in Ethiopia with St George.   He has also represented Kenya at U20 and U23 level.

Football for development career

Realising the difference that football had made to his own life and its potential for helping others, Ndunda began coaching football as a volunteer in his local neighbourhood, before getting a job coaching school teams with German School Nairobi.   He studied Sports Science at Leipzig University and got his coaching badges before joining TackleAfrica in January 2011.

Keep an eye on our website for updates on Ndunda’s work in Kenya, and some very exciting upcoming partnership announcements

All of TackleAfrica’s work is delivered through African partners, who provide relevant expertise, experience and access to large numbers of young people affected by or at risk of HIV.  In turn we empower our partners to combine HIV education into football coaching via training, support and resources.  Together we reached about 22,000 young people last year – and it’s our relationships with our partners that allows an organisation of TackleAfrica’s size to have such a huge impact.  

 Our partnership with Alive & Kicking Kenya is one of the most fruitful and we have high hopes for our work together in 2011.  A&K are a social enterprise who train local stitchers to make high quality durable footballs for use in Africa and for commercial sale around the world.  They provide employment, footballs and health messages to people in Kenya and Zambia and the synergy with TackleAfrica’s work is obvious. 

In December we recruited a staff member who will sit in A&K’s Nairobi office but is funded and supported by TackleAfrica.  The post will add TackleAfrica’s resources and expertise to A&K’s existing health-promotion through football roadshow, and help us develop a stronger and larger in-country network of coaches with other partners. 

As an organisation with only 2.5 FTE in the UK, this also represents not just a significant capacity increase, but a major step in us handing over and developing our expertise to and with Africans; ultimately the people who know best about what’s needed and how it can best be delivered. 

Claire Le Feuvre, Managing Director, January 2011

For a full list of our current partners, click here

Keep an eye on our website for more information on our work in East Africa and an introduction to our new staff member in Nairobi.

We arrived safely and with no problems from the UK (if you don’t count the broken back from 9 hours in economy class seats) and were met at the airport by Joseph from MYSA and George the driver.

The roads through Nairobi were a touch bumpier than your average rollercoaster but we made good time and were at our guest house in just over an hour. I was sad to hear that the ‘Matatu’ or shared taxis will be no longer as of June 2011. You have to look out for them as you would a sugar crazed 10 year old in a bumper car but to me they are a piece of Africa and are being discontinued because they create too much traffic in the city centre. In their place people are gathering together to buy 25+ seater vehicles which is now the minimum size although I’m not entirely sure this will solve Nairobi’s chronic traffic problem as they are double the width and triple the length of the old mini buses. 

The Kenya School of Accountancy will be our base for the next few weeks and Ben, Clive and I recovered from our flight in the dining room over coffee, cake and sausages (a traditional welcome offering or all that was left from breakfast). Clive was doing his best Clint Eastwood impression with beard and toothpick while I checked out Ben’s lovely pink watch.

The evening brought with it the obligatory Premier League feast which we enjoyed in a nearby hotel and our first contact with David from MYSA. We lost the feed of the match at one point while a monsoon downpour hit which cleared the air ready for our first day on the course.  Commiserations to Chelsea fans on being humbled by Sunderland at home and here’s to many more twists in this year’s race to the title.

As I finish this blog we have wrapped up the first day and a wonderful one it was too. Hopefully if Ben’s photography skills are better than his goalscoring (competitive goal no.1 at MYSA: Ben 17 mins o.g) we will have some great pics to share with you all so check out our Flickr galleries.

One game saves lives

Yianny 15/11/2010

This TackleAfrica project was delivered in partnership with FRACODEP (St Francis Community Development Programme), delivering HIV education and awareness to young people in Kisumu and Siaya.

Kisumu is a large town on the edge of Lake Victoria with a number of large outlying communities with poor resources.

Siaya is smaller town in a more rural area, but is an administrative centre with outlying villages in the countryside.

The coaches on this project were Neil Peters, Paul Peters, Chris Clapham and Adrian Moorhead from the UK and TackleAfrica trained coach Nelson Wanyama from another partner organisation SAIPEH (Support Activities in Poverty Eradication and Health).

This was the third successive year that TackleAfrica have partnered with FRACODEP.  The project followed up work that TackleAfrica undertook in 2009 when they trained a number of coaches and teaches to deliver HIV education and awareness through football using TackleAfrica coaching manual.

The 2010 follow up project looked to build on the success of the 2009 project, to see how the local coaches were delivering the drills from the manual to their teams, and to demonstrate new drills from the new 2010 World Cup addition of the TackleAfrica coaching manual.

The project was split into two week segments, with the first week working with teams in Siaya, and the second in Kisumu.

Each week followed a similar pattern which involved coaching teams and youth groups during the week, and talking to teachers and coaches about the new TackleAfrica manual.

At the end of each work there was a football tournament which FRACODEP used as a method of community engagement and for raising awareness of HIV issues.  Voluntary HIV testing and counselling staff were available at the tournament in Siaya and players were encouraged to find out their HIV status through these services.  TackleAfrica coaches were also on hand to provide advice on football and to give information on HIV issues.

The project was a useful way of delivering HIV education and awareness to young people by engaging them outside of the class room through football.  The football coaching drills in the TackleAfrica manual are good for coaching football in their own right, but they also contain a useful HIV message within them.

Football is extremely popular in Kenya and the TackleAfrica model is a great way of engaging communities to deliver these valuable and life saving messages to the people that we work with.

The TackleAfrica team on this project were also able to meet new contacts in Kenya, with the possibility of partnering with them on future projects.  These included KYFA (Kisumu Youth Football Association) that operates a large football league in Kisumu and has access to around 80 teams and coaches.

EMIMA (a Swahili acronym for Education, Sport and Physical Activity) is a non-governmental organization based in Dar Es Salaam that aims to empower youth through sport. EMIMA’s  primary aim is to use sport as a tool for development and youth engagement by conducting sport based activity programs that raise awareness of HIV/AIDS, gender equality, sexual health and other similar issues.

EMIMA’s vision is one of a Tanzanian society in which all youths have the opportunity to enjoy taking part in sport and use that experience to enhance their life skills.

EMIMA currently has a total of 8 centres in some of the poorest communities around Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania. These centres provide the venues and equipment for football training and matches, as well as peer education and peer education training for local youth aged 20 and under.

Founded in 2001 with only one centre, EMIMA has now developed and expanded to 8 centres each reaching a range of 150 to 300  girl and boy participants. Since forming EMIMA has had great success in giving youth the opportunity to engage in competitive sport.

Each one of EMIMA’s centres is located in connection with schools allowing for students and residents of the community neighbourhood to become involved with EMIMA centres. Children become involved at the centres by simply showing interest in sport and joining the team. Centre co-ordinators also recruit local children from the neighbourhoods as they notice children who are keen on sport or who may be in need of direction. Any child, male or female, may join any team at the centres.

www.emima.org

The province in which CCFMC operates has the highest rate of HIV prevalence in Kenya – at 29%. The impact of HIV in this area is most serious amongst adolescents and young adults – 3 in every 5 new infections are aged between 15 and 24. There is also a high rate of teenage pregnancy – estimated at 10% per year for girls aged 13-14 years and young people exhibit significance ignorance about HIV/AIDS and its modes of transmission.

This project aims to equip the youth and community with accurate and appropriate knowledge and skills for curbing the spread of HIV/AIDS and facilitate, establish and support activities among the youth that will enhance their active participation in efforts to curb the spread of HIV/AIDS. CCFMC are also using the project to address the socio-cultural issues that relate to HIV/AIDS and reduce the rate of teenage pregnancy amongst the adolescents.

The project is based on a tournament model, with build up taking place in two areas – Siaya and Chiga, with a series of 9 build up events at a sub-parish level followed by final matches between the winning teams. During these events, HIV/AIDS messages are passed on through printed T-shirts and caps, through posters and banners, and also through guest speakers from local government and HIV awareness programmes.

CCFMC are also using these events to raise HIV awareness through a number of core activities:

• Peer education activities in groups
• Facilitate youth group and interschool competitions
• Coordination with local health facilities to monitor treatment seeking behaviour among the youth
• Promotion of information through football, songs and poems among the youth
• Distribution of IEC materials
• Promotion of Voluntary Counselling and Testing for HIV

50 members of the Kabaa Young Cobras Football Club & Tulila United Football Club, aged 15-24 years, are being trained as peer educators who will be able to inform young people about HIV/AIDS at football events. Their activities are expected to reach an additional 10,000 young people aged 5-30 years old.

Many young people in the Machkaos area drop out of school and become involved in child labour. Many are involved in ‘sand-harvesting’ which involves digging up sand from dry rivers beds and selling it in sacks at the roadside to trucks which take it to Nairobi for in construction. This is illegal, poorly paid and bad for the environment, but it provides the young people with disposable income, which is sometimes spent on drugs. There is also pressure from some families to contribute to household income. PfP is working with the schools and local leaders to discourage this activity

A PfP survey carried out last year identified negative peer pressure, unemployment, HIV/AIDS, drug abuse and poverty in the family as the key impediments to the development of young people and to their communities. The objective of the project is to promote positive behaviour change among young people. This will be achieved by providing them with information about HIV/AIDS, reproductive health and related issues so that they can make informed decisions and take control of their lives. Young people out of school cannot readily access information about HIV/AIDS and they are particularly vulnerable to infection. This project will specifically address this urgent need to help save young people’s lives

The project involves 8 one-day training seminars for all club members to equip them with accurate and relevant information about HIV/AIDS. The seminars will also be used to plan the events and help the members design the messages, and methods of delivery, they will use during the sporting activities.

The project also provides for ongoing support to club members from PfP staff and the Provision of sporting equipment, kit, balls, nets etc.