Established in October 2018 by Namibia youth and piloted in the Tobias Hainyeko constituency, Do It For The Kids Namibia aims to amass community-based solutions to public challenges, specifically issues relating to underprivileged children’s academic development via volunteerism as a solution to the challenges.

The primary founder Robert Haihambo (30) said the very important mission of the movement is to harness the power of volunteerism to impact positively on the development of less privileged children, especially the school going with things such as tutoring, life skills, basic sport development and other activities.

Haihambo stated: “The Tobias Hainyeko constituency, situated on the northern outskirts of Katutura was the beneficiary of the pilot phase of ‘Do It For The Kids Namibia’ concept implementation earmarked to last for one year. We also know that this is one of the most populous constituencies in the Khomas region, 82% of children between ages zero and four were not under any Early Childhood Development (ECD) programme in the Tobias Hainyeko constituency.”
“Since taking on this journey, we have assisted about 500 children with tutoring, life skills, basic sport development and other activities through these targeted interventions. We have also helped in providing clothing items, schools stationaries including reading and colouring books,” he explained.

He said: “We needed to come up with tangible immediate and direct solutions that will help these kids. We want them to have a better understanding of the education sphere when they return to their usual classes after the weekend tutorials. Rather than playing left right and centre over the weekends, they now have this time to go through some work which they find difficulties in understanding,” pressed Haihambo.
The work is light, fun yet productive enough to entice the kids to go back. “I shared the vision with the volunteers and this is also something they had in mind so it was not difficult to execute,” recalled Haihambo.

He added the movement caters to none and school-going children and sometimes parents. Do It For The Kids Namibia has about 70 young volunteers with about 50 who are actively involved in frequent activities. “These volunteers include working individuals, unemployed and university students, learners and other thoughtful young leaders in Namibia,” boasted Haihambo.
He also pointed out that the need in the Tobias Hainyeko constituency is by no means isolated, there is thus a need to implement the Do It For The Kids Namibia concept of targeted volunteer intervention not only at constituency but regional, and national level in the short, medium and long-term, respectively,” said Haihambo.

With visions such as to be a leading volunteer – centric youth initiative that promotes the consciousness of volunteerism as a tool for social cohesion, empowerment and development of the less privileged kids in the community, the movement is also empowering and inspiring people to dream of and build a caring, giving, and helpful Namibia.  “The plan is to broaden the spectrum and spread out to other towns on a larger scale and make a bigger impact by meeting with councillors and discussing ways on how children can be uplifted. 
The movement has two community projects including clothing donations, mostly from Round Table coming up towards the end of the year,” concluded Haihambo.
-psiririka@nepc.com.na