Maputaland Development and Informaton Center

Since its inception Maputaland Development and Information Centre (MDIC) has been striving to establish a model for the reduction of poverty that undermines family and community life. The whole area of Maputaland is mainly rural and is dominated by poor and low-income communities. The major source of livelihood in these traditional areas is subsistence farming which consists of largely small gardens and fields close to the homesteads; with crops (such as cassava, mealies, ground nuts, and sweet potatoes) for domestic consumption and livestock (comprising cattle and goats).

Households that were previously self-sufficient in food production are now suffering due to erratic weather and inadequate rainfall that result in failed crops and food shortages. The high prevalence of HIV and AIDS in the area also adds more burden to the vulnerable households since it is mostly the economic active members that are infected. MDIC seeks and sources a funding to facilitate and manage sustainable social and economic community development initiatives. This is achieved through mobilizing communities into advocacy campaigns, active citizen participation in local government matters, co-ordination of resource mobilization strategies and efficient management of development projects.

What MDIC needs to do?
Most responses to this question show that MDIC always has a huge task of addressing community development issues. This includes:

• Leadership: leaders need to understand their communities very well, so that they can make good decisions regarding developmental programmes in their areas.
• Perceived community leaders should encourage each other to assume a leading role on specific portfolios so as to propel their communities or constituencies to find their niche areas of specialization.
• Community networks, structures and associations must hold meetings on regular basis so that there is a commonly shared understanding of issues and to avoid wasteful duplication of services, at best to maximize the use of resources.

What are gaps to be addressed?
Aside from what MDIC needs to do as the organization, there are conspicuous shortcomings that need to be dealt with:
• There is a low level of communication among community members, a factor which makes them speak with different voices when lobbying for support and resources;
• Leadership does not visit communities regularly. This has a serious bearing on many issues, which may need clarification while on the working environment;
• Inadequate information flow between the NGOs, other civil society service providers and government agencies;
• Low level of planning and strategy formulation skills when approaching different matters;
• Fear of unknown-circumstances. Some community leaders do not want to endeavour in programmes, which may seem to jeopardize the status quo. Here is the situation whereby politically aligned NGOs cannot pursue projects, which may seem adverse to their party’s political agenda.

Relationships
MDIC relationships with other stakeholders use to vary considerably depending on socio-political forces at play. The following sub-sections will provide an overview of types and levels of relationships MDIC has in the context of operations.

Relationship with Municipality
Previously, MDIC relationship with local authorities at municipal level was marred by political agendas of government officials, albeit MDIC leadership was not entirely immune from the problem. The following are some points to highlight about this predicament:

• There was too much bureaucracy to get NGOs listed in the Municipalities Database of Service Providers. Therefore, most NGOs remain unknown to various local government departments;
• Recognition of NGOs in Municipalities, banks heavily on how much a NGO leader is known by government official. Recognition of this nature usually goes together with expectation of returning favours, and by implication leading to ‘ bribery and corruption’ of sorts;
• Often less confident municipal officials (e.g. Ward Councillors) view NGOs as competitors and they are viewed as political threats when they advocate for local developmental projects and service delivery;

Relationship with Traditional Leaders
In rural areas where Traditional Leadership is prevalent, political affiliation has been a detrimental element to development. Conspicuous cases show that the democratic dispensation has divided generations across political ideologies, which have a negative bearing on developmental initiatives:

• Traditional Leaders can impose unnecessary bureaucratic hurdles if a developmental agency that wishes to carry out a project in their areas if it is not recommended by their political party of their preference;
• Adverse relationship between local governments and traditional leaders affects the initiative and progress of NGO projects. Traditional leaders are of the view that municipalities will strip them of their powers.

Relationship with Community Development Workers (CDWs)
There seemed to be a trivial misunderstanding and lack of cooperation between NGOs and CDWs. This is partly due to the fact that CDWs are government employed and deployed while NGOs and CBOs are community initiated. This lead to obvious shortcomings:

• In areas where both CDWs and CBOs co-exist they do not know about the roles of one another;
• By implication lack of information about one another leads to suspicion and mistrust which results to duplication of efforts and misuse of scarce resources that could otherwise been useful to pursue other programmes.

Relationship with Ward Committees
The politicization of Ward Committees has made it very cumbersome for NGOs to get a foothold in them. This is mainly due to information about the role and composition of Ward Committees. For these reasons:

• NGOs have been left in the periphery of Ward Committees such that they find it difficult to influence the process of decision-making regarding community issues;
• Lack of information has perpetuated this situation.

Relationship with Funders
While sponsors deserve special eulogy for their support of social upliftment programmes, they cannot shake off the holds of criticism:
• Often funders require that NGOs be rigidly structured in a corporate fashion. A donor may • requite a NGO to have a governance structure (e.g. executive committee) separated from those actually carrying out daily activities (e.g. volunteers) whereas NGOs often use the same leadership structure for both. There is also an expectation that NGOs should possess strong management skills, especially in finance, prior to receiving assistance. Items such as office infrastructure and office equipment inspire confidence in funders. This means that those who do not have these are seen as not reliable. All these factors makes it very difficult for new NGOs to comply with requirements even though they are doing good community development;
• Sometimes funders will support projects carried within certain geographic areas. This poses questions whether some sponsors are ideologically or politically immune at all.

Relationship with Government Departments

Some NGOs have good relationship with government at departmental level. For example, in some Municipalities, the Health and Social Welfare Departments have been helpful in assisting NGOs involved in Home Based Care (HBC) activities or orphan care. However prevalent shortcomings include:
• Political favouritisms are cause for concern, as they dent good relationship between government and NGOs, as much as hampering good developmental work.
• Red tape remains a thorny issue, which government departments must overcome. For example sometimes it takes more than three (3) months to process a wheelchair application. So in such long waits, disabled people and patients have to carry the brunt. This goes together with the payment of services rendered by service providers to the government departments.

Relationship with Faith Based Organizations (FBOs)
Like any membership-based organizations, churches tend to focus on the welfare of their members first.
• They are not opposed to cooperating with NGOs as such, although they tend to orientate themselves in terms of religious commitment;
• They usually support NGO programmes, and often they extend a helpful hand such as allowing NGOs using their premises for charity functions.

Most Serious Challenges
MDIC, like all non-profit organizations have to grapple with a competitive world, and its sustainability depends mainly on the extent to which it can withstand hostile environments or difficult times. Below are some of the challenges that threaten the sustainability of MDIC.

Exodus of Human Resources to “Greener Pastures”
Quality and highly skilled personnel who may be in the employ of MDIC are lured to join the corporate world or government jobs for better salaries. MDIC is unable to offer benefits.

Loss of Interest by Some Members
In the process, some members who were initially committed to the organization can lose interest. This phenomenon may be partly due to leadership’s loss of vision or redundancy if other social forces are at play. Hence, the importance of MDIC to network in its area of operation.

Power Struggle Through Positions
One trend that is particularly detrimental to NGOs is the scramble for recognition and power amongst NGOs. Success of one NGO can ignite envy and resentment of others, thus leading to subtle power struggle between NGO leaders and as consequence leading to loss of focus on community developmental work.

Lack of Resources and Capacity
Many NGOs have low capacities of human and material resources to help carry out envisioned activities. This predicament can lead to failure and overburdening of one person to accomplish what the organization has set for itself to do within specific time frames. Lack of basics such as stationery, office equipment leads to an organizational dependence whereby official tasks are financed from employees’ personal moneys. Unfortunately this state of affairs is prevalent in NGOs and it seems to have ensured their survival during difficult times when financial sources have dried out.

What is MDIC Is Doing About the Situation?
MDIC has tried to overcome this situation by taking the following deliberate process:

• Encouraging multi-skilled leadership and community workers (personnel) within non-profit sector. In other words, MDIC leadership and workers need to be endowed with variety of expertise in order to minimize gaps of skill shortages in carrying out their duties;
• MDIC is encouraging team building amongst NGOs and CBOs working within the same geographical domains;
• Development of Code of Conduct within each niche area of specialization so that communities know what is expected of MDIC that is purported to serve them;
• Organizational development of MDIC and skills upgrading of people demonstrating commitment within the organization;
• Ensuring that the people share common vision and responsibility within individual departments. This is important as it ensures that organizational focus on its initial intent when starting programmes and projects prevails.

What Skills do MDIC Requires
In their various categories, NGOs in general have low basic functional skills. Examples are:-

Communication Skills
Most NGOs need basic communicational skills. These skills are vital for organizational purposes as they are critical in shaping the organization’s image. For example writing application letters need good expression to make the NGOs attractive to prospective funders. This is definitely an organizational need.

Computer Literacy
It has been identified that in the current electronic information age, computer literacy in any organizational environment is critical. Non-profit organizations, which lack basic computer skills, are likely to be technologically left behind. Processing of information across the world relies on Information Technology (IT).

How Government Works
Many NGOs possess low information and knowledge of their citizen’s rights and how government works. That has limited their expertise in challenging government departments or constitutional structures, which fail to fulfill their duties in terms of service delivery to the communities. Ignorance of existing policies on specific issues seems to be a contributory factor to poor public administration in areas where NGOs operate.

Management Skills
It is apparent that NGOs come about as a result of individual efforts, commitment and talent. However, lack of management skills sees organizations die a natural death. There is general agreement that most NGO leaders need to be empowered in the following:

• Team and group management skills;
• Time management skills;
• Writing skills;
• Delegation and people management skills;
• Project management skills; and
• Formal and casual communication skills.
Put differently, NGO leaders need to develop emotional intelligence and inter-personal skills so as to be able to deal with different group dynamics that prevail at particular community contexts.

The above summary shows that MDIC is and needs to be a community asset. While it may operate as an independently organized legal entity, its "owners" must ultimately be the community in which it resides and delivers service. If the local communities do not engage with and feel a sense of ownership of the organization, it is destined to mediocrity at best, and failure at worst.

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