Judy Westwater Brings Good News

by Caroline Dobson - 12:16 on 22 September 2009

Judy Westwater returned to update us on the Street Children Project which she runs in South Africa. Pegasus has been looking after 4,000 street kids from babies to early adulthood in Johannesburg and Cape Town since the early 90s, providing food, clothes and education. In years of “knocking on doors” as an ambassador for street children, Judy has felt that one of the major obstacles to gaining support for such projects was that it was always ”someone else’s problem”; but since gaining the support of Mansoor Mohammed, Cape Town City Council’s Executive Director of Social Development, she feels things have started to move. Her charity is now running  a programme called Second Chance which trains the children in music, dance and circus skills. Not only does this improve confidence and develop skills in working together but it also gives a space in which they can just be children enjoying themselves for a short period. The groups are now involved in producing a junk orchestra using recycled materials. The use of recycled materials underlines the theme that everything can be reformed into functional new roles rather than thrown away. Judy emphasised that this is  a message about the street children as well as to them, like the materials used for the instruments  the children could have a vital role in the future development of South Africa if they are given a chance. The children performed last December at the World Cup final draw in Cape Town and at the handover of the Green Point stadium. On June 11, 2010 they will perform at the World Cup opening celebrations. They are also linking in with children from London who will be performing at the opening ceremony for Olympics.
Judy’s work and life was featured on This Morning in 2006 and you can watch the video on http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Tgh2SG4o_8
 

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