Mkhululi Nzima helps kids take right path through soccer training

Scenery Park local hero Mkhululi Nzima dedicates his afternoons to coaching youngsters in his community in soccer in a bid to keep them away from alcohol and drug abuse.

In 2013, Nzima, 42, started a community soccer club with about 30 young boys who displayed a passion for the game and now, more than a decade later, the initiative continues to shape the lives of Scenery Park youngsters.

The club has close to 100 male and female players across different age groups.

Nzima, who is unemployed, was nominated by Asanda Fani for this year’s Local Heroes awards.

Fani said Nzima was dedicated to bettering his community and even had potentially saved some lives through sport.

“He is very dedicated in doing what he does.

“I remember when the Enyobeni tragedy happened in 2022, not one of the kids in his team were involved.

“That’s because he’d instructed them to go home early and rest because they had a game to play the next day.”

Fani said Nzima was admired by parents, who appreciated his community work.

Nzima was unemployed in 2013 when he started the club.

The following year, he found a job, but did not allow this to deter him from his passion.

For the next six years, he worked as a material handler, alternating between morning and late shifts, until he was retrenched due to Covid-19 problems faced by his employer.

When he worked morning shifts, he would meet his team on the field in the afternoons for practice and matches against other teams at weekends.

Nzima’s club, Lion Strikers FC, initially consisted of boys aged 13 to 15 but he later incorporated girls’ soccer training.

Today, the boys’ team has eight divisions from under-11s to seniors aged over 17, while the girls’ team comprises two divisions — junior girls and senior girls.

“I used to be a soccer player for a local team,” Nzima said. 

“We had a discussion in the team about these young kids in the community who were roaming around with no-one to coach them. I was picked to be the coach.

“I had to leave Scenery Park for work in 1999 and when I came back in 2012, I noticed the same problem of young kids getting involved in negative activities on the streets.

“So, in 2013, I started the team. Soccer was among various activities I thought of getting them involved in, including music and events.”

The team joined the Gompo Local Football Association in 2014 when it was still the Amalinda Football Association.

Nzima coaches youngsters in soccer after school on weekdays.

“We start with the younger ones in the afternoon until around 5pm and then start with the seniors until late.”

Though he is driven by his passion for soccer and youngsters, Nzima’s journey with Lion Strikers has not been without challenges and there have been times he considered quitting.

“What drives me is the passion I have for this.

“Once I felt it was all too much because I didn’t have time for my family or myself and it was costing me money.

“Sometimes when we play [an away] game, we struggle to get team transport.

“Sometimes, when the team has multiple games in one day they get hungry and I have to take money out of my own pocket to feed them.”

Nzima said he was encouraged by stories that some players shared with him about the club’s positive impact.

“I was very touched when I learnt that one of the boys in the team could have been an Enyobeni victim but was saved by the fact that he had a match the next day.

“He told me he’d been invited by his friend to go to the tavern that night but declined because they had been ordered to go home and rest for the next day’s game.”

Nzima said if he won the Local Heroes prize, he would organise transport and catering contracts for the team and buy new soccer balls as they now only had two.

• Nominations for 2024 may be submitted by emailing a 500-word motivation to localheroes@dispatch.co.za. Nominations must include the nominee’s name, cellphone number and email address.

DispatchLIVE