"I am a citizen and an equal"

“As I got more involved in my academic studies it made me realise that I am a citizen who is equal to any official.”

“The change I experienced in 2011 was of self empowerment around different themes that have to do with public policies, public policy decision making and also raising my self esteem.

As community leaders we are sometimes seen as people with no decision making powers on public policies. But really self esteem is always the main thing on our minds.

I have thought about who I am, I am a citizen, equal to others just as I am. I therefore realised that I need to do advocacy work on public policies, especially with those authorities who have decision making powers and whose duty it is to lookout for their citizens.

Once I was made to believe that I did not possess this ability. But as I got more involved in my academic studies it made me realise that I am a citizen who is equal to any official. Maybe not on an academic level, but as a natural leader I realise that I have to lobby these authorities.

This doesn’t put up barriers, or rather, this doesn’t prevent me from continuing to negotiate with whatever authority or represent my community to any organization, insitituion or those same municipal authorities.”