NGO STAFF BEAR THE BRUNT OF RECESSION

By Lesego Tlhwale (BTM Intern)

SOUTH AFRICA – 24 August 2009: As the global recession takes its toll with soaring levels of economic instability and speculations on who will be the hardest hit, the future of South African non governmental organisations working in the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex (LGBTI) sector remains uncertain as they seem to rely on the same overseas funders.

With no help from government because many are operating as NPO’s, these organisations, on top of cost cutting, might be forced to close down should some of the key core funders pull out from funding them.

“NGOs’ have to come up with ideas of self sustainability as funders are pulling out or have a particular life span”, Gugu Bayne of Atlantic Philanthropies advised.

She added “they should collaborate with other NGOs’ doing similar work and not compete against each other for the same funding.”

Atlantic Philanthropies revealed that many NGOs’ have closed their doors because of the lack of funding.

“With the current global financial situation, we feel the general sense of everyone tightening their belts, and the way we are mostly affected is by means of our staff, We just do not have funds to fill another post and we so much need to. We also have not had funds to adjust our staff salaries for the past two years”, Liesl Theron, Director of Gender DynamiX, said.

Meanwhile Jon Campbell of Hivos, one of the largest LGBTI NGO funders confirmed that LGBTI organisations “are visibly knocking on the same doors.”

“Hivos alone gives direct support to five key LGBTI organizations in South Africa and with all these NGOs’ depending on the same funders, this might in future cause constrains of limited grants available”, Campbell said.

Dawie Nel Director of OUT-Wellbeing pointed out that if one of the core funders pulls out or decides to close down, all of these organisations will suffer the same effects and “this is not good for the LGBTI sector.”

While the Nonprofit Organisations Act of 1997 states that, an NGO or any other organisation needs to register as an NPO under the act in order to be eligible to receive funding opportunities from the different government departments, the South African government seems to have turned a blind eye when it comes to funding the LGBTI sector.

Zanele Mngadi Spokesperson of the National Department of Social Development confirmed “we currently have no LGBTI organisation registered with neither the government nor the departments.”

And, on the contrary, some NGOs state that they have tried consulting with different government departments without luck. 

“We previously tried at local government and department of social developments and [there was] no positive feedback”, said Theron.

Only a selected few organisations such as OUT-Wellbeing count themselves as the lucky few that have managed to get government funding which they admit took a lot of trust building and “a working relationship of over four years before we could get funding from the department of Health”, said Dawie Nel, Director of OUT.