CWP transforming lives

A government intervention to fight unemployment and create sustainable jobs is making a difference in the lives of people who reside in marginalised areas where there are few opportunities.

The Community Work Programme (CWP) is making a difference to the lives of many people, especially the youth.

The programme is providing beneficiaries with skills and opening doors to employment by entering into partnerships with other organisations.

Paarl resident Noxolo Mapolisa is one of the CWP’s beneficiaries. When she started participating in the programme, all she had was a matric qualification. Today she is a site supervisor.

The programme gave her access to the West Coast College, where she obtained her N6 qualification in Human Resource Management.

“Through the CWP I was able to study and put food on the table for my family at the same time. During the day I’d be at work and go to school at night,” she said.

Mapolisa encouraged young people not to focus only on money but also on personal and professional growth.

"I am so proud of what I have achieved through the programme.  It has really changed my life.

“I am grateful to CWP and I would like other young people not to wait for opportunities to come to them but get out there and find them,” she said.

She is doing her internship in human resource management at the City of Cape Town’s Department of Human Settlements.

Another beneficiary, Nadia Louis Hektor, started as a regular participant in the Swellendam Municipality, where her job was to clean the roads.

The programme helped her grow from being a participant to a site supervisor and from there to being an administrator in the Swellendam Thusong Centre.

Hektor is now employed by the Dhladhla Foundation, the CWP’s implementing agent, as a site administrator in the same municipality.

“I am still new in the job but I am so proud of what I have achieved through the programme. It has really changed my life,” she said.

Nosicelo Khali also found permanent employment by working for the CWP in Khayelitsha on the Cape Flats.

“Part of our job description as participants is to clean school yards and plant vegetables. I used to work as a cleaner at Yesu Nathi Educare, also in Khayelitsha, and I was trained as an Educare teacher. After I finished my training, they permanently employed me,” she said.