By Sabina Elago
Queen Mwahangelai Mwadinomho Namundjebo is a young woman with bigger dreams.
Born in the village of Efolafo in the Oshana region, Nmudjebo was raised by her aunt who is also her namesake Mee Queen Namundjebo in Ongwediva. She has more than 30 siblings, “I am talking under correction as I believe we are more than that,” adds she. She is currently pursuing a doctoral degree (PhD) in English at the University of Namibia and has recently been appointed as a Lecturer there. She attended the Kandjengedi Primary School in Oshakati and when she moved back to her parental house at the village of Efolafo in the Oshana region from her aunt in Ongwendiva, her mother enrolled her at the Eloolo Primary School. “I moved back to Ongwediva after three years and my aunt enrolled me at Ongwediva Primary School,” Namudjebo recollects.
After Grade 9, she went to the Ongha Secondary School for her Grade 10 and and as Ongha only went up to Grade 10 she had to further advance to the Ponhofi Secondary School where she matriculated, after which she went on to Unam where she registered for an Education degree. Namudjebo had to learn to do house works and learn all the cultural norms and values at an early age as her aunt instilled discipline and biblical values in her at a tender age. The transition of moving from Ongwediva to her parents’ house was not an easy she says. “I had to all of a sudden learn how to cook, fetch water, collect firewood, pound mahangu and cultivate in the field during rainy seasons which was never the case when I was with my aunt,” says Namudjebo.
Her first job was teaching English at Uukule Secondary School for a year in 2008 and moved to Otjikoto Senior Secondary School in 2009. In 2010, she got a scholarship to do her Master degree at Unam. While pursuing her Master degree, she approached the Communication Department HOD to tutor English students as a volunteer, which saw her getting a full time job at the Polytechnic of Namibia. In 2011 she received a Fullbright scholarship to pursue a Master degree in Teaching English to speakers of other languages (TESOL) at Eastern Michigan University. “The Fulbright scholarship had me boarding a plane for the first time to the United States of America and I successfully completed my course with a Magma Cumlaude,”says she proudly.
It is Namudjebo’s everyday prayer that Namibians stop living as individuals, where no one cares about the next person but uphold the Ubuntu Wabantu as Africans. “I have a soft spot for street kids, orphans and disabled kids and it breaks my heart to see them hungry or people mistreating them. I have paid school fees for orphans when I was a teacher and I am now funding seven learners towards realising their dreams from the Okanghudi Primary School.”
Sharing a corrugated iron room with her mother and help her sell fat cakes to make a living reminded her every day how difficult life could be. “As a victim of teenage pregnancy, no one ever thought I would make it to a doctoral level or even be a lecturer at the highest institution in Namibia. I had to survive the judgmental society that attaches negative connotations to teenage mothers,” she says.
A prayer, her son, family and friends keep her going. “As a mother and a father to my boy, nothing tears my heart apart than seeing young mothers struggling with their kids as their fathers are nowhere to be found,” she says. To the young mothers who are thinking or will ever think of dumping their babies, “the world doesn’t end when you fall pregnant, no matter what circumstances you find yourself in. There are many kids who have made it in life without fathers and you might just kill a potential president of this country. Keep your pregnancy, give birth to your baby and take the baby to the nearest clinic, hospital or even to people like me who love kids,” pleads Namudjebo.
Her priority is to complete her studies before embarking upon on the realisation of the dream of owning a private school if not a college for training English teachers and the founder of Queen’s Orphanage by God’s grace. “I am also aspiring to be in Parliament one day heading the Ministry of Education.”