Every person views the world differently.
When Sarah Lindeire looks at a person from a rural setting, she sees a fully equipped individual who has great potential to create a full, joyful and satisfying life.
For that reason she founded a non-governmental organisation called Tingathe in 2016 to partner with vulnerable peri-urban communities in building wealth that sticks.
It is no wonder she won the 86th most influential woman in the world by Women Deliver in 2011.
Through Tingathe programmes and partnerships, they have engaged over 1 300 children, 638 youth, 260 women and 60 community leaders.
But she admits that villagers need special attention to recognise their innate capacity for great achievement.
Through her organisation, they are programmes focusing on providing a locally relevant and market-driven suite of urban enterprise options.
These programmers connect participants to basic services, develop savings and loans groups; and build deeper community ties where social capital is weakest away from family and friend networks.
According to Sarah, they also provide holistic support to participants as they climb the ladder of economic self-reliance into a sustainable future.
Tingathe partners with youth, women, children and community leaders in different programmes to ensure full participation of the communities towards the goal.
The founder said this is done primarily through their programmes such as Tingathe Training Programme where youth aged 18 to 30 undergo a non-formal holistic vocational training.
They also have, Azimayi Tingathe Geni—a women business school.
“This section equips women with micro businesses, business management and life skills. Our third programme is a children’s programme where we engage children from the age of 7-18 with life skills,” she adds.
Tingathe also holds chiefs engagements.
Sarah said her inspiration comes from her own experience and that of others.
“With potential, innovation and tools, people have access to resources that enable them make life and professional choices for success and wellbeing,” she said.
Sarah decided to work with the youth, women and children because she said they are disproportionately affected by acute poverty and are sidelined from taking up space as change agents.
She feels that this injustice in one of the reasons peri-urban communities are impoverished.
She observes that insurmountable poverty can be transformed by equipping these groups with practical knowledge in personal leadership, marketable skills training, financial literacy, holistic knowledge acquisition, access toned funding and mentorship.
Sarah said:”Community leaders are custodians of permanent change and their active support and participation in programme design and accountability is necessary if the impact we have is to be sustained.
“I feel energised and motivated to help them see themselves as they really are in spite of their current circumstances so they can live out their true potential.”
Sarah is is an educator, but growing up, she has been passionate about social justice with an interest in partnering with young people as change agents and advocates for themselves and their communities.
“To this end, I serve as one of the British Council Global Changemakers from the age of 16 and have developed community action projects in partnership with other youth from across the world. In 2011 at the age of 21, I was honoured by Women Deliver as the 86th most influential woman in the world.
She said her career trajectory with work in a number of organisations, including Theater for Change, Inter-Aide and UN Women and as a consultant in Gender mainstreaming has been deliberate.
When asked what she enjoys when working with people, Sarah said seeing individual fully embrace their innate gifts and using their acquired knowledge to continue learning and make choices to improve and enjoy their life on their own terms.
She added that Tingathe is supported by the SEGAL family foundation and Imago Dei as well as a number of private donors.
She said there are many people she looks up to, but mostly she looks up to all the people she meets every day.
“Community leaders who are committed to seeing their communities becoming wholesome and healthy, women who strive to do well socio economically for themselves, their families and communities,” she beamed.
For her to be where she is, she attributed to what she termed beautiful people that
surrounded her and have faith in humanity as well as the wellbeing of humanity, which is the mission they share.
‘’I try to balance my career with family by prioritising my personal wellbeing and that of my loved ones. I have learned the hard way that pouring from an empty cup doesn’t serve anyone. I try to be disciplined with time towards work and family everyday so that neither suffers. I have made tough choices to try and achieve balance as a wife, mother of three, daughter, sister, aunt and friend. Neither my career nor my family should be neglected and given the much needed attention to both adequately,” she said.
Sarah admitted that along the way she has made mistakes, unreasonable demands on hersel f and took on the unreasonable expectation that she was solely responsible for the success of others.
She forgot sometimes to take care of her mental, physical wellbeing and she collapsed under the weight and learned when to let go of things and when to pursue.
However, some of the hard decisions she made was to dedicate her entire life to being deliberate about who she is and marking the world and others as she goes through this life.
Sarah was born on the January 20 1990 to Mary and Frayer Nkhoma, the last born of six children.
She did her Primary school at the British School of Paris and went to Bishop Mackenzie Secondary School and Mount Sinai International Secondary School.
She later graduated with her bachelor’s degree in education from Mzuzu University in 2010.
Her advice to young girls is to do better and make a difference.
“They should learn to love themse l v e s completely and do good. This way, it’s guaranteed that every day they can change someone for the better, starting with themselves and then with everyone else,” she said.
In her free time, she loves to read, paint, watch bizarre documentaries, laugh with friends and family, listen to interesting music, write, cook, garden, Live and love
Some beneficiaries of Tingathe programmes
