About

The Associação Comunitária Ambiente da Mafalala – ACAM is a non profit Community Based Organization. It is youth led with their main target groups being children, local youth and woman.

The main purpose of ACAM is to have a community with basic sanitation and an adequate quality of life for the people living there. ACAM wants to contribute improving the life conditions of the less privileged groups in the community as well as increasing the fulfilment of basic needs and the protection of the environment of the neighborhood.

Their main activities are:

• social action;
• education;
• health;
• environment;
• sports (football coaching);
• environment (main awareness campaigns in rubbish management, cleaning activities in the local excavates of drainage and etc);
• culture and vocational trainings for youth (in carpentry, batik, tapestry and sewing).

Location

Mafalala is a neighborhood in the Mozambican capital city Maputo and known as the cradle of Mozambican culture, sports and politics. Most of the famous artist, musicians, writers, politicians and athletes were born or lived in Mafalala. This was the neighborhood in which Eusebio da Silva Ferreira was born and grew up. The first Mozambican president, Samora Moises Machel lived here before taking the long journey for the Mozambican Liberation Front. This is also where Jose Craveirinha, the most popular Mozambican writer, was born.

Mafalala offers easy access to diverse kind of facilities like banks, including ATM, internet access, hospitals/health care centres, local transport from one place to another (especially between home and work placements), shops and entertainment.

Accommodation

Mozambican Host Family

Volunteer Tasks

ACAM has several areas of activities. Volunteers will be assigned to one of them:

Football Coaching
Two volunteers are needed as football coaching assistant, working with 50 children divided into 2 groups of 25 kids in two periods of the day. 25 children in the morning, from 0730h to 10h and from 1400h to 1600h on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Saturdays are reserved for competitions in which the volunteer should take part. The other days of the week are mainly reserved for meetings in the office and activity planning but also to visit other local clubs to exchange experiences. In November a tournament is organised in collaboration with other neighbourhoods of Maputo in which the support of the volunteers is key.

Social Workers Assistant
In this field, the volunteer will be mainly working with vulnerable
children of Mafalala, training the children e.g. in different topics, offering tools on how to live better with themselves and with others as well shareing positive values and seeing the future with different eyes. The volunteers might also assist in teaching languages and monitoring the school proficiency of the children. They will assist other local social workers in different social fields.

Other Activities
Non regular activities can include:

• Construction and/or substitution of latrines and drains;
• Cleaning together with the local community;
• HIV/AIDS and other disease awareness campaigns;
• Advocacy campaigns.

Volunteer Requirements

• Able to communicate in English;
• Woman or men;
• Age preferably between 18 to 35 years old;
• Passion for community work;
• Openness to learn and ability to share personal experience;
• Active, creative;
• Interested in social media;
• Web development skills;
• Marketing and publicity.