By: S’nennhlanhla Mnqayi

Good hearted, crazy, morally inclined person, great personality are the best qualities to describe 29-year-old Siyabonga Vilakazi.

In 2004 Vilakazi was involved in a tragic car accident, and stayed in hospital for a couple of months.

Unfortunately two years later after the accident, he lost his sight.

Vilakazi stated that it was really hard to accept that he won’t be able to see again.

He knew that God had planned what he planned and that he knows why this had happened to him.

“Even if I don’t see the structure of a beautiful house, a car driving pass, but the desire to live gets me up in the morning,” he said.

Vilakazi said that although he can’t see, his personality has not changed that much; he is still the same person he was.

“I am a very busy person. I don’t just sit at home and do nothing regardless of my state.

I wash, cook and clean for myself. Being blind has taught me not to depend on others because people are not going to be around every time I need them,” he said.

He is also a supervisor of a programme called Khari Kude by the Department of Education, where volunteering teachers teach blind people how to read and write.

Vilakazi said that morals are important to him. He enjoys taking care of people and he loves kids.

His role model is any person who is ambitious.

“I have many dreams but one of my biggest dreams is to see scholars getting an education that will prepare them for tertiary.

It is very sad to see scholars going to tertiary and they can’t even spell, they can’t even put perfect grammar,” he explained.

Vilakazi is now working on a proposal for one of the community radio stations.

This initiative aims at empowering kids to feed themselves. He added that a lot of kids nowadays just want to finish matric; they don’t really care what they are passionate about.

“I think it’s very important to choose something that you are passionate about.

If you choose your passion, it’s not going to be work for you, but it’s going to be passion,” he said.

He also desires to do media communication because he is very passionate about the media, but mostly radio. He has applied to universities for this degree.