/ 5 June 2009

Still crazy about soccer

Friends Dumisani Banya (25) and Vincent Bezana (25) live in the Wonderkop village, close to the Lonmin Western mine, north of Mooinooi.


Vincent Bezana Banya, originally from the Eastern Cape, moved to Wonderkop in 2005 to live with his brother and father, who worked on the mine. But earlier this year Banya’s brother and father died.

Banya had hoped to get a job with Lonmin because it had a policy that when the breadwinner in a family died, a relative could replace him or her. But a bad year for Lonmin means a bad year for potential employees, and Banya remains unemployed. The youth soccer academy he founded in 2005 though continues, but only just.

“I came here looking for a job, but in life things are not always on your side,” he says. “So I decided to do something for the community and the kids with the soccer academy.” The academy, which has four teams for players aged between 12 and 19, also boasts a women’s team.

“The young kids — if they have nothing to do in the community, they get caught up in crime. I have 120 kids to look after and it is difficult, but they are crazy about soccer and so they inspire me.

“I want to see them grow up and play at the World Cup, not the one in 2010, but one day,” he says.

Co-volunteer at the soccer academy, Bezana, is employed by a Lonmin contractor, RAK. He earns about R2 000 a month and sends half that amount home to his grandparents, father and three sisters in the Eastern Cape. He is the family’s sole breadwinner.

“You know Teko Modise? We have our own Teko Modise,” he says, pointing at Paseka Duma (17), who is putting on his boots. “He is excellent,” says Bezana, adding, “he used to be a bad kid, but he is good now.”

Banya and Bezana speak of the good old days — last year — when Lonmin sponsored the soccer academy’s teams. The sponsorship has since been withdrawn. “Lonmin gave us money for soccer balls, tracksuits and kit. They used to hire a bus for us when we needed to go to matches, but because of the economic crisis they were forced to withdraw their sponsorship.”


Dumisani Banya(left) use any extra money to nurture future ‘Teko Modises,’ such as Paseka Duma (putting on the socks) in their soccer academy For now, Banya and Bezana use the little cash they have to get the teams to matches and are looking for a new sponsor.

Money is not the only problem for the academy. Banya says a lot of the players have left the team, because their parents — who were migrant workers from the Eastern Cape — have had to go home after being retrenched. “We have lost a lot of players; they were very sad. They loved the academy,” says Banya.

Bezana chips in: “Everyone is suffering here. Women will start to sell their bodies and there will be an increase in pregnancy. Crime is increasing because people don’t have work. Lots of people here have started drinking since they lost their jobs. Some of them were paid a lot of money when they were retrenched and used the money to buy cars —”

Banya completes the story: “They were happy to have a lot of money, so while some were buying beers others were buying cars. But now they can’t afford to keep the cars. They didn’t know what to do with all the money.”