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| Celebrating success: (Back row, from left) Neo Motshabela, Caleb Makhela and Thaphiso Mohale, Front: Roger McCleary, Busi Maile, Alleeshan Kisten and Eddy da Silva. |
WHILE new car sales are down year on year, Roger McCleary assures
it is not all doom and gloom.
Acting as master of ceremonies at an exclusive fundraising luncheon
that also announced the successes of the NF Apprentice programme, he said 2015
was to date the fifth best year South Africa has seen in terms of car sales; and
the fourth best year for bakkies.
Good car sales of course means more congestion on South Africa’s
roads, which McCleary said was even more good news for panelbeaters, who were
getting an increasing number of bumper bashings
to repair.
to repair.
The demand is growing so fast, he said, that panelbeaters and spray
painters could not keep up. This is where Ntuthuko Foundation (NF) has seen a
gap to meet both national and local business needs by sourcing apprentices for
the car repair sector.
Founder of the non-profit organisation, Busi Maile, said the NF
Apprentices is a social enterprise that assists body repair shops in
administering apprenticeship programmes to meet their own business needs and
South Africa’s aim to empower black youth through skills transfer.
“NF Apprentices provides apprentices with hands-on support through
their monitoring and evaluation programmes at the various NF partner auto-body
repair shops, ensuring that apprentices successfully complete the MerSETA CBMT
programme while assisting panelbeaters to train skilled staff for their
businesses,” Maile said.
NF Apprentices has to date placed 47 apprentices at 18
panelbeaters.
Alleeshan Kisten, CEO of the Collision Repairers Co-operative, said
there is a great need for such apprentice training in South Africa.
He said the country had 2 097 registered panelbeaters, but only
1 680 qualified auto-body repairers.
“We really need qualified artisans, and NF Apprentices helps to
bridge this gap,” he said.
Car repair shop owner Eddy da Silva said the apprentices really
responded to training on the shop floor to the point where they were world
class.
One such apprentice, Thaphiso Mohale, recently competed in Brazil
against apprentices from 50 countries to come 27th in the 2015 World Skills
competition.
“Seeing how other countries do things was fantastic, they train
three years. I trained a few months and our standard is almost there,” he
said.
NF co-ordinator and former apprentice himself, Neo Motshabela, said
the apprentices at NF will next repair an accident-damaged Honda Jazz donated by
Hollard insurance, and put up the car for auction at a gala dinner in March
2016.
Get more detail on the programme from nf.org.za
