Farewell family

As individuals within the Gwijo Squad community, we have all individually experienced loss of friends and family, but as a collective with a purpose, COVID-19 had dealt us a few telling blows.
The loss of two giants of South African rugby, Kaunda Ntunja and Monde Tabata, has made the country’s game, the black rugby community, and indeed the Gwijo Squad immeasurably poorer.

In their own unique way these men used their platforms to advance the development and inclusivity of South African rugby, they advanced the rise to prominence of black rugby, and played direct roles in opening doors for and amplifying the Gwijo Squad as they believed in the importance of the movement to bring igwijo into the mainstream of the South African game.
Many within the squad had personal relationships with these gentlemen and our hearts will bear the scars of 2020’s wounds forever.

What we got up to in 2020

Our year got off as planned with a football match with the Barmy Army, who were in South Africa to support the English cricket team who were playing the Proteas.
The football match churned some attention from the media and we had quite a few of our members either take to the field or cheer on the team from the stands at Pirates Club. The visitors were a bit better than the Squad and the victory was celebrated with a few cold ones at the pub after the official floating trophy was handed over.
Our presence was felt at the Wanderers Stadium, in support of the Proteas, during the Test match and of course, the One Day International (the ever-popular Pink Day) against England.
We worked with Standard Bank on the ODI and assisted with one of their initiatives with youngsters and the development of cricket.
Alas, this was to be our final in-person gathering as the Squad in the year of 2020.

It has been an (almost) entire year of not being able to gather to do what it is that we, as a group, love to do.
A special word of gratitude must go to Nondwe Maqubela, whose online quiz nights have carried us through the darkest times of our lockdown.
We managed to host three live-streamed quizzes with special guests such as Temba Bavuma, Dumisani Chauke, Joel Stransky, Karla Pretorius, Babalwa Latsha, Monde Zondeki, and Gcobani Bobo – just to name a few.
The trivia ranged from general knowledge, picture rounds, a special round of boys and girls schools trivia as well as a jam-packed music round.
You never know, we may host a few more in 2021 for all our members and friends.

It has been a year of virtual interaction and igwijo has been no different with us being involved in a number of exciting initiatives over the year that we contributed virtually to.

At the beginning stages of lockdown, we did a special collaboration with Engen together with Hlubi The Twin. The message we drove was for everyone to wash their hands and adhere to the social distancing instructions from our government.

Partnering with a long-time friend of the Gwijo Squad, Mandisi Dyantyis, in an effort to keep the conversation of gender-based violence going, and highlighted the struggles that women go through in South Africa. The reception of the project from the public and the mainstream media was absolutely amazing which signalled that the initiative had served its intended purpose.

One of the most entertaining virtual collaboration that we did, was with Klipdrift and is available on YouTube, titled “Unklipped: Gwijo Squad”, which I recommend, and the follow-up titled “Lockdown Chillas – The Gwijo Squad”, with about 400,000 combined views and counting.

Later in the year, in an effort to contribute to keeping the conversation around gender-based violence going, we decided to continue on the same vein and facilitate a conversation amongst some of our members to discuss some thorny issues and questions to advance the sophistication and understanding around the GBV conversation.
We had two teams which consisted of members and also friends of the Gwijo Squad, to unpack the conversations. You can watch both ‘In discussion with’ on our ever-growing YouTube channel.
Check it out and let us know what you think.

Chasing the Sun

The Chasing The Sun documentary was a welcome reminder of our journey with the Springboks under Siya Kolisi’s tenure and a year since one of our finest hours in the gathering for the Rugby World Cup Final at the Sandton Convention Centre.
It highlighted the reality that, amongst all that we are doing, what we all really want to do is to be able to sing together.
Just prior to the release of the documentary, we had taken the opportunity to embark on a special project that we have intended on doing for some time, and that was to get into a recording studio and make some of our favourite gwijo available to digital music platforms.
We are pleased to say that that process is also in its final stages and further details on the availability of the recordings will follow very shortly.

Upcoming events in 2021 and beyond

But what of the physical presence of Gwijo Squad at upcoming events?
Well, asilelanga.
After lengthy deliberation and attempts to get Gwijo Squad into the stadium for the 2021 British and Irish Lions tour, we were put in a position where we had a very difficult decision to make.
Essentially, we were pushing to be able to block buy tickets but there was no guarantee that the tickets that we booked would be together in a block to allow us to be together as Gwijo Squad. It was decided that our being able to sing together was more important than being inside the stadium and it was thus more worthwhile for us to organise ourselves a viewing venue and create a similar experience as we did for some of the 2019 Rugby World Cup matches including the final.
We will keep the Gwijo Squad community abreast of developments especially as the B&I Lions Tour approaches.

A little further in the horizon, there are two major events that we have identified as Gwijo Squad targets – namely the  2023 Netball World Cup in Cape Town and 2023 Rugby World Cup in France.
The committee has been hard at work putting the costings and logistics together for these 2 events to allow for us to break the costs up into monthly payments as we have done for all of our previous stadium trips.
We will be looking to launch these two initiatives in March 2021 for our members to start saving towards a really big year in 2023.

From the Gwijo Squad committee, 2021 has dragged us all over the tumult of a pandemic that has not only taken lives but thrown livelihoods into disarray.
In spite of all this, and however difficult our own circumstances currently are, we can be grateful for still being here and having a future that promises better days.
The final verse of hymn 126 of in the Xhosa Methodist hymnal starts: “Vuyani! Vuyani! Vuyani! Mabandla asesemhlabeni. Bongani! Bongani! Bongani! Nje ngabasebungcwaliseni.”
The lyrics, that remind those of us who are still on earth to be grateful for the blessing of life, has never been more apt and poignant.
We look forward to singing and celebrating together again in the future until then, wear your masks, wash your hands, keep your distance, and stay safe.

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2020 and beyond

The All Blacks will be visiting the cradle of humankind and experiencing load shedding for the first time since they stole the game from us in Pretoria, and Gwijo Squad will be sure to remind them that we’re World Champions (venues and dates not released yet, but that’s never stopped us from planning and preparing), additionally Scotland and Georgia could provide us with a nice vocal warm-up (assuming that at least one of the 3 tests will be in Joburg or Pretoria).

More immediately, there is the small matter of a horde of warm beer-drinking vitamin D deficient delinquents traipsing around our country making a noise in our stadiums like this is their mother’s house. We can’t stand for such disrespect in our backyard. Everyone and I mean everyone, needs to stand up and defend our country’s honour by unleashing our full arsenal of amagwijo when we hold the fort at the Wanderers for the Test match and Pink Day.
For those who’ve not seen what’s been happening at the other stadiums, the English have come through in their masses and if we drag our feet in buying tickets we could find ourselves in the unthinkable position of being outnumbered in the Gwijo stronghold of the Bullring.
We can’t allow such a travesty. I, for one, cannot wait. The Wanderers is going to be a jump and I’m looking forward to showing the visitors what we’re made of.

A quick update on Gwijo Squad matters

2019 was certainly a watershed year for us, assisted in no small part by the fact that it was a World Cup year and Gwijo Squad had come to represent the changing face of South African rugby.
From the onset, the Gwijo Squad committee had resolved that we would use the platform that we’ve been given to impact the sporting environment on and off the field. To this end, we have set ambitious CSI goals that we are confident will be transformative for communities and individual young athletes in our target sports who need a leg-up to reach for their dreams. Over the year we had numerous activations in partnership with brands which has been instrumental in building our reserves.

As you all know, at present there is nobody on the committee who draws a salary or derives financial benefit in any way, and I would like to highlight and applaud this extraordinary selflessness from very busy people whose time and skills fetch a hefty price in the market. So to Nkosana Matyeshana, Naledi Mdyesha, Afika Selemani, Malibuye Cossie, Vuyisanani Mangisa, Qhayiya Linda, Chumaninande Mjajubana, Nondwe Maqubela, Mhlangenkululeko Siwisa, Mzwandile Riba, and Nqabomzi Matyeshana, on behalf of the greater Gwijo Squad community and indeed the sporting fraternity at large we thank you. Nangamso.
A special thanks to other Gwijists who have contributed massively as former committee members as well, Sijadu “CJ” Mzozoyana, Sipeto “Volo” Ganca, Phila Bitterhout, and Lusindiso “Loza” Dabula. Your contribution to laying the foundation on which Gwijo Squad is being built has been invaluable.
So, where to from here?
We’ve agonised about what the best structure would be for what we’re trying to achieve for Gwijo Squad (in a nutshell, maximising membership numbers while delivering maximum value to gwijists). We have made a lot of progress in this regard and have gotten valuable advice from other organisations on how best to model the Gwijo Squad going forward (shout out to the Barmy Army who have given us great insight in how they run their organising as well). We’re yet to bed these down as the committee has not met yet this year, but we’ll do so shortly and details of the way forward.

Setting goals

There are a few major goals that we want to achieve over the next 4 years, culminating in 2000 Gwijists going to France for the World Cup in 2023. This is a giant undertaking and, frankly, is the kind of massively ambitious goal that needs a dedicated project manager because the elements are so complicated and time-intensive. We’re already in the process of developing a detailed campaign around it with the assistance of financial consultants, Lifecheq. Please keep this in the back of your mind because, if we are to pull this off, were going to need a massive group effort from the entire Gwijo Squad.

On the subject of looking forward to 2023, South Africa were awarded the hosting of the next Netball World Cup in Cape Town. An exciting development indeed. Over the last 4 years, the Spar Proteas have rebuilt to being amongst the highest echelons of the sport and the journey to 2023 promises to be quite a ride, and we’re here for it.

Finances

As things stand, the Gwijo Squad reserves stand at R329,342 thanks to your effort in getting brands to back us and in then showing up to do what we do best. A special shout out to Klipdrift, MTN, Showmax, & DSTV. The key ingredient in maintaining momentum and steady growth is consistency and quality administration. At present, between the committee members, we’ve managed to divvy up responsibility but, as the squad grows in both number and ambition, it’ll become too large and involved for a bunch of part-timer volunteers to handle and we’ll need to employ people to run the squad on a day-to-day basis (I assure you, this will not be me ). I expect that we’ll only get there in 2021 but it’s an important development to start thinking about and planning for.

How about that final at the Sandton Convention Centre?

WOOOOOOOW! You guys are actually amazing. I’m not embarrassed to admit that I shed a tear or 15 in my wife’s arms after Makazole’s try because it was clear at that moment that the game was over and Siya was going to lift the trophy.
But it wasn’t simply the winning the brought me to tears, it was that it was happening with 1,200 South Africans in Sandton singing igwijo. We even had capped Springboks watching with us!!! People brought their parents, even. It was other-worldly what we pulled off and you can all be extremely proud of yourselves.
What an inspiring experience. It’s a high I’ll likely chase for the rest of my life.

There are probably things that I’ve overlooked and I’ll have to cover in a later update but this was mostly to say thank you for an unforgettable 2019, and I’ll see you all at the Wanderers.

The post 2020 vision and beyond | Newsletter #1 appeared first on Gwijo Squad.

It is imperative for us as the Gwijo Squad to continue holding ourselves to the highest standards in terms of ensuring that our group continues to be a place of sanctuary for all, especially the vulnerable such as women and children.
Security is a delicate condition-based largely on confidence in one’s environment to protect them. It is thus incumbent on us to have a high sensitivity to anything that could make the women and children of the Gwijo Squad feel uneasy.

As the Council, we have taken a decision to ask members with a dark cloud of accusations for gender-based violence in our midst to exit the Gwijo Squad until they can get a resolution of said accusations as the peace of mind of our Gwijists is paramount.

We appreciate everyone’s understanding and assistance in ensuring that Gwijo Squad remains a safe space for all.

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