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MAN OF GOD-MAN OF THE PEOPLE

by Tribute to our heroes

On 20 June 2026 we laid to rest Spopoto Headman Mbatyazwa at Phelandaba Village, Sterkspruit. He was a known social activist and respected influencer especially when it came to agriculture and self sustainability, very articulate despite his limited formal education.

Relevant here is that he established Aah Madlangala, a Non Profit Company and Non Proft Organization and also Msamariya NPC focusing on agriculture and the supply of water respectively. These are areas of concern for the Government and the churches but he engaged “unemployed ” and “uncalled”
Some churches are registered as NPC’ or NPO’s or both. The unregistered ones are classified as Voluntary associations. That registration Certificate is a potent weapon to go hunting for money and food and clothing both here and abroad from the rich Charities and other organizations.

Matthew 25: 35-36 “for i was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink..I needed clothes and you clothed me”

For a moment let us picture a situation where each church can register a Tuck Shop. Picture the Gogo who comes back to church quite free of the burden of tithe.

“Feed my lambs…take care of my sheep ” John 21: 15-17

THERE ARE MINDS IN STERKSPRUIT

by Uncategorised
In April 2024 I wrote under the title “Together we are Sterk”,
This article may confuse one because it was written in the heat of the 2024 general elections, but it is still relevant that it talked about Advocacy groups (interest groups, lobby groups etc.)
In July 2024 I wrote under the title “Let us be proud of our own”.
These articles are both relevant to Senqu Economic Development Forum as expresses in their WhatsApp group.
Yesterday I wrote to the initiator of this group (which brings together small businesspeople of different persuasions) and enquired as to whether there are forms in other Municipalities that have similar objectives. I was tying to explore how I could expand my marketing range for 2026.
She replied that “this was my brain idea and my aim was to have it in Walter Sisulu and Elundini that we do Joe Gqabi Economic Development Forum”.
It is refreshing that there are people in our community who still wake up and clean around themselves and even go as far as cleaning their neighbour’s environs just by thinking and reaching out.
Unfortunately, this spirit is immediately suffocated by our silence and indifference.
This is why I shout out to the world that Sterkspruit exists.
Big up Ntombazana: Support the people’s future with vision.

MY SAD EXPERIENCE OF MASAKHANE

by Uncategorised
Some time ago I was a whatsapp group member of Masakhane Organization which operates in some of the Suburbs in Bloemfontein. In that time the “to be” organization was at the stage of drafting a constitution and we were expected to contribute towards that important step.
I suggested that the easy way would be to look into the constitutions of bodies of similar intent and take out what would suit us. This was my demise.
The next thing that happened was a voice note from a prominent lady in the group. I cannot say now what she said but I know that she was spewing vitriol, asking who I thought I was. I replied that I would reply and this was because I had to take some time to organize myself and not reply out of emotion. Immediately after that I was blocked.
In writing as I do I need to caution such organizations ate made in order to bring people who share certain values and experiences together and should not be a platform to settle scores and (I dare say) gossip.
I am a proud citizen of Herschel District (as it used to be. If one looks at the posts that I have contributed to this platform one would attest to this and I will not be deterred. MASAKHANE please

POWER TO THE PEOPLE

by Uncategorised

There is wind that our Municipality will soon have a platform for Company Registration. This is a noble intervention that will save money for aspirant Small Business and promote more and more participation and business activity. But is it really noble?
A worrying factor is that the Municipality has it’s own mandate which is to promote and encourage small business and in so doing curb unemployment and create employment. This translates to nurturing existing businesses.
If true, this is ill advised, and the entity will be shooting its own mandate in the foot by stifling small business.
Has the mother of small business considered:
1. Supporting the small business support entities even financially by subsidizing small business registrations?
2. Trying to negotiate with existing small business support entities in order to mitigate prices and ant other conditions?
3. Trying to bring existing entities in the field of small business support entities in par with their counterparts that appear unapologetically on the internet,
I don’t think so.
Stifling small business smacks of the apartheid era and is counterproductive to our government objectives Nyhani.
White Companies have been there on the ground and on the internet for ages. Look at Govchain, Company Partners, Swiftreg, ANM Accounting, Shelf Company and many others. In fact, we have inherited our pricing regime from them, but vitriol is not directed at them but to the small fish. Our taxes support the endeavors of the Municipality but now the same taxes are used to subjugate their very subjects. It doesn’t add up.
There is also wind that some big muscle business is intending to do the same services for a certain sector or certain sectors. Maybe ndishiywe ngumgosi.
Are they bringing in anything better than we locals offer? Have they attempted any dialogue with us. Whose empowerment is this. Have they, among other things looked at means of mitigating prices and other factors. You don’t kill one of your children so that the other one can breast feed more.
What are they saying about ancillary services related to company registration. Registration is only an admission at the gates of the stadium. The playing field is inside.
Lastly I must thank the Senqu Economic Development WhatsApp group for accepting me and my Company and I want to say to them our company is versatile. Nothing is cast in stone when it comes to group situations. We are open to discussions and negotiations. We are your Partner.
Before I leave I am duty bound to make an honest disclosure about myself.
At some point I was a member of Senqu SMME’s WhatsApp group. There happened to be a contentious issue against which I objected. The problem seemed to have been resolved but later, guess what: “You can’t send messages to this group because you are no longer a member” And that’s how my business was promoted. Nkosi yam

Shepherd carrying a shepherd's staff walking on a narrow footpath between tall trees near a canal between Damme and Bruges in Belgium. The herder is leading the flock of sheep and many small lambs who are all following him while grazing the grass. It's almost a biblical scene, which could be used for many religious, christianity, or spirituality concepts.

Disaster of Climate Change. Or what is it?

by with No Comment Lifestyle and Wellbeing

I’m reminded by the Mtata disaster that when the Jozana dam was constructed I was one of the Officials
who were liaison between McAlpine Construction and the Government.

I was privy to discussions, the maps etc and I remember that they indicated the pathway of water in the
case of damage to the dam. New Rest did not exist by then but I know that parts of it are on that pathway.
I’m not trying to cause panic but just sounding an alert in the hope that someone will be preemptive
especially regarding maintenance.

That’s what Citizens do if they care!

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Congratulation to Azola Masiza.

by with No Comment Tribute to our heroes

CONGRATULATIONS to Azola Masiza on being elected Chairperson of Ward 10. Sithi MAYIBUYE!!!.

Let me share my experience relating to when I went to request Proof of residence at the Bhunga Hall office a few years ago.
I was asked whether I know my Councillor to which I said NO. So I had a problem getting this document, but before giving
up I pointed out that it is the Shepherd who must know his sheep and not vice versa.

By the grace of God I was issued with the document. Just saying.

sterkspruit

Let us be proud of our own.

by with 3 Comments Tribute to our heroes

Let us be proud of our own.

AP MDA is our own

We are the last generation that had some kind of contact with AP MDA or some kind of “affinity” with him and we owe it to Africa, South Africa and Herschel (What is now mistakenly called Sterkspruit) District,to pass on what we know or have heard about him, a son of Herschel District, Teacher, Lawyer, Political Activist and Leader of Mandela, Sisulu, Tambo, and many other ANC Youth Activists, but he has been literally forgotten when other leaders are remembered and commemorated.

I have had wind of someone or some people who are entertaining the idea of re-naming St.Teresa School after him. This is massive and noble and this is what has re-awakened my concern regarding the attitude we have towards our heroes.

I must be quick to say that I am not writing this as a Politician but as a proud “Herschelite”.

By: DNP Tindleni

The books below are available on takealot.

P. MDA
Today Ashby Peter Mda is principally remembered in South African intellectual and cultural history as having been Anton Lembede’s closest and best interlocutor. Nelson Mandela in his autobiography Long Walk To Freedom (1995) recalls this intellectual relationship in the following manner: “Lembede’s friend and partner was Peter Mda, better known as A. P. While Lembede tended to imprecision and was inclined to be verbose, Mda was controlled and exact. Lembede could be vague and mystical; Mda was specific and scientific. Mda’s practicality was a perfect foil for Lembede’s idealism.” This high praise indeed. Walter Sisulu in a Foreword to Freedom In Our Lifetime: The Collected Writings of Anton Muziwakhe Lembede (1996) written three years after the death of Mda, made the following observation of this relationship: “It was Lembede, together with A. P. Mda and Nelson Mandela who sat up late at night drafting the political philosophy for an as-yet unborn Youth League, before presenting the document to colleagues as such as Willie Nkomo, Lionel Majombozi, Oliver Tambo and myself, to consider and to critique. But of course Lembede, as a typical leader of the Youth League, fought the struggle not only politically, but with all the impressive skills at his disposal.” Jordan Ngubane in the context of praising the intellect of Mda, recalling the moment Anton Lembede introduced him to A. P. Mda, postulates that Catholicism, asceticism and anti-Communism were the underpinning principles of their intellectual friendship: “Ashby was, like Anton, a Roman Catholic. He was unlike both of us in that he had been exposed to the clash of mind on mind along the Reef [Johannesburg] for a much longer period. As a result he had more clearly-defined views on every aspect of the race problem. The expression on his face had been chiselled by concentrated study and disciplined bthinking in a way which made me feel, shortly after I’d met him, that I was in the presence of one of the greatest minds I then had the privilege to know and befriend. His knowledge of African political affairs staggered me. Both he and Anton possessed colossal moral courage; neither knew fear of any sort. The three of us met as often as we could. Anton  had been exposed to the influences which had moulded my own attitudes at Adams. He, too, was worried by the question: why are things as they are and not otherwise? The three of us felt very strongly the need for a new ideology with a meaning which would be valid in the day-to-day lives of the African peoples. We rejected Communism. Mda, always the wisest among us, came in between us and suggested that we should work for a re-grouping inside the ANC which would be inspired by a militant determination to be free. We were still working on a unifying ideology when Lembede came along with AFRICANISM as a new philosophy of struggle which we could project before our people as a new road to freedom” (“Lembede and Africanism”, undated document that would seem to be part of Ngubane’s one version of his autobiography: When Apartheid Falls; in the Carter-Karis Papers). In effect, Ngubane argues here that the ideas and philosophies that have always been attributed to Anton Lembede had in actual fact originated with A. P. Mda. If this is true, the history of the ANC Youth League or of the New African intellectualism needs to be re-appraised. The existant writings of A. P. Mda on Anton Lembede and on their historical relationship does not seem to support such a view. Perhaps what Jordan Ngubane seeks to indicate is the inseparable intellectual affinities between the two of them. Mda’s posthumously published Foreword (written at least three years before its actual publication) to Lembede’s Freedom In Our Lifetime indicates how this intellectual affinity emerged: “When I reflect on my memories of Lembede, two things stick out in my mind—his scholarliness and his innovative analysis of the freedom struggle. His dedication to his education brought him spectacular results. . . While he was studying and preparing for his thesis for his M. A. degree, we were staying together in Orlando East. We had extensive discussions because he was studying the philosophers from Descartes to the present day. Now that was very fortunate for me because he used to invite me to take part in discussing some of the issues raised by the philosophers. Very often we took opposite positions. I had to defend a certain position while he attacked it. He wanted to gain some clearer understanding of the subject matter he was studying. He used me as a tool to achieve that goal. And, in this way, he also improved my knowledge. I was argumentative, too. I was a debater. I liked conflict, and he knew I was very stubborn. He was like that, too. He often challenged me. And after explaining to me so and so stood for this and that, he would make a reference to some book. He read to me, and I would read myself. Then we would discuss issues that he wanted to go deeper into. He invited me to take a certain line, an opposite line, so he could give me a chance to go deeper. He learned a lot from contoversies because sometimes I attacked his posditions just to give him an exercise in refuting my arguments.” In this recollection written 50 years after the fact, A. P. Mda portrays himself as a student to the mentoring of Anton Lembede. A viewpoint that takes a perspective that is similar to that of Jordan Ngubane about this great intellectual friendship is that of Nelson Mandela in his autobiography Long Walk To Freedom, also written half a century after the fact: “Lembede’s friend and partner was Peter Mda, better known as A. P. While Lembede tended to imprecision and was inclined to be verbose, Mda was controlled and exact. Lembede could be vague and mystical; Mda was specific and scientific. Mda’s practicality was a perfect foil for Lembede’s idealism.” In a way, both the views of Jordan Ngubane and Nelson Mandela bespeak to the complex nature of this great intellectual friendship. When the writings of A. P. Mda are eventually assembled together, in all probability they will enrich our understanding of its true dimensions concerning its principal modernistic project of constructing and consolidating African Nationalism in South Africa.
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Together we are Sterk Group (T.O.W.A.S).

by with 3 Comments Food Scheme ProjectsLifestyle and Wellbeing
Images courtesy of Red Chilli @Kopanong

Research has found that the time around an election increases the levels of stress across the nation, regardless of who will be getting our vote.
Constant media coverage and debates in the home, workforce, or on social platforms, along with concerns about how the results of the election will affect our lives and society, or have the potential to have a negative impact on our well-being.


But now we are not talking about our own lives as natural beings, but but our businesses as legal persons. I choose the catering business for this blog. We need to create a safe haven for when we are “connected” and also when we are not connected. Advocacy groups, also known as lobby groups, interest groups, special interest groups, pressure groups, or public associations, use various forms of advocacy or lobbying.

Images courtesy of Red Chilli @Kopanong
Images courtesy of Red Chilli @Kopanong
Images courtesy of Red Chilli @Kopanong


A pressure group is formed when people or companies of similar interests come together and discuss strategies aimed at overcoming stumbling blocks.
Somewhere on this website, under NPO SMALL BUSINESS FORUM the following are some of the questions posed:
*Have you ever serviced an order (or tender/bid) and not been paid?
*Do you need legal backing regarding your small business problems?


These are only two examples that could be of common interest. This calls for discussion