IN KENYA
John Ngunjiri
Technical Manager
John is Mr Mwezi light. He leads on assembling the solar lights, servicing them and fixing broken ones. He has been with us since the beginning, in 2014. John provides a weekly stock report and liaises with the directors regarding component orders.
When he’s not in his workshop, John loves watching football and supporting his favourite team, Chelsea.
Julia Akinyi
Schools Manager
Julia has been with us since 2019. She looks after a portfolio of 120 schools (and counting!). As schools manager she is responsible for bringing new schools into the Mwezi solar light programme, and looking after the schools which already have lights. In term-time she usually travels twice a week to 5-6 schools each day, spending the rest of the time communicating with teachers and keeping her reports and photos up to date. Julia visits each school at least twice a year.
Julia loves athletics and also likes singing in her local Christian community. She is Mum to a teenage son, who loves football and plays in defence.
Antony Kiarie
Schools Manager
Antony joined us in 2022. He also has a portfolio of 120 schools. He has a background in field research and produces the most wonderful reports which analyse the difference lights make in students’ homes. He also produces a number of other reports each week which help the directors plan component ordering and monitor the Mwezi light programme in each school remotely.
Antony describes himself as a family person, and likes to spend his free time with his wife and twins. He loves watching football and used to play on an amateur basis.
David Oluoch
Technical Assistant
David joined us in January 2024 to help with the increasing volume of Mwezi lights being manufactured and fixed to be redonated. He has a degree in electrical and electronic engineering from the University of Mombasa and has spent several years working as an electrical technician. His skill in communicating digitally led to a very rapid extension to his role, as our social media manager, which he does when there are enough lights for the schools visits.
Along with John, he is a Chelsea fan – possibly a reason they get on so well!
Our Teachers
The teachers in the schools that we support are the real leaders of the Mwezi solar lights project. They manage the distribution of lights amongst their students – deciding who has a light – and ensure that the lights are returned to be lent to other students. They complete regular audits, where they collect in all the lights and photograph them, to show the Mwezi schools managers how many they still have, and follow up on any that are lost. They also report on how many lights are faulty and need replacing. They communicate with the schools managers by WhatsApp and email, liaising over visits. They have a direct link to the UK directors through WhatsApp. This all takes them time and require use of their mobile data, and we are grateful for their dedication.
IN THE UK
Mike Hamblin
Purchasing Director
Mike is the original director of the Mwezi Foundation, having been involved since its incorporation in 2014. He is responsible for sourcing components from all around the world, including Kenya, to ensure that John can keep manufacturing lights. This is not as easy as it sounds!
His career was first as a barrister and then as a solicitor, starting his own legal practice, which he ran for 20 years before his retirement in 2013.
For many years Mike has been involved in fundraising for charities with the Round Table and as trustee of several other charities, including his local Citizens Advice Bureau and Handybus scheme.
Mike spent his early years in Aden and East Africa and has always travelled extensively, globally and in Africa. He has a keen interest in using green technologies to address energy needs, poverty, and environmental and educational issues.
Claire Paye
Management Director
Claire joined the Mwezi Foundation in 2015. Her role is the day-to-day management of the team in Mombasa and overview of the schools within the Mwezi lights programme. She also works hard to provide feedback to donors, including photos of the lights they have funded and the children receiving those lights.
Claire’s day job is marketing director for a small M&A consultancy. She has considerable experience of travel in Africa, having grown up in South Africa and The Gambia, as part of a diplomatic family, and then having led UK trade missions across Africa. She is familiar with the ‘challenges’ of operating in Africa and so helps ensure the Mwezi Foundation works at a grassroots level, in direct contact with the beneficiary schools, which she finds to be the most efficient and effective way of helping the next generation.
Sue Dawson-Coltman (Doods)
Trustee | Human Resources Director
Through family connections, Doods was aware of the work that the Mwezi Foundation does for many years before she joined the team in 2021.
Doods recently retired from a career in human resources within the pharmaceutical industry, and she has spent many years supporting businesses by helping them to maximise the potential of their employees. Doods has brought her considerable HR experience to her role in the Mwezi Foundation, where she is responsible for the HR function.
Gary Dawson-Coltman
Trustee | Finance Director
After a career in telecoms (latterly as a business development director), Gary has turned his considerable skills and experience to helping the Mwezi Foundation develop and reach more schools and distribute solar lights to more schoolchildren. He has taken on the important role of worrying about our finances and balancing the books.
Will Durigan
Trustee | Design Engineer
Will was brought into Mwezi in 2021 in order to provide technical assistance with the development of a new Mwezi solar light.
He redesigned the injection-moulded casing to provide further protection for the electronic components, a much simplified assembly, continued compatibility with the same tried and tested components and easy access for maintenance.
He has worked as a product designer for a variety of lighting companies and remains on hand for any technical assistance Mwezi requires.
Will currently lives in Vietnam where he eats noodle soup and looks after his two young children.
Juliet Chalk
Development Manager
Juliet ensures that the Mwezi Foundation can afford to keep growing and donating lights by finding funds that will support us and filling in a multitude of applications. She is always on the lookout for new sources of income, whether from trusts and foundations, corporate donors or individual giving. She also seeks to network with other charities working in similar fields, to harness and promote best practice and to keep learning.
OUR PATRONS
George Nash MBE
George is Mwezi’s resident Olympian. He won a Gold medal in the men’s four at the Rio 2016 Olympics and a bronze medal in the men’s pair at the London 2012 Games.
George is the managing director of an engineering firm in Surrey and is passionate about simple, robust product design.
“The Mwezi Foundation light is a brilliant example of how an innovative, simple design can transform people’s lives not only through the primary use of the device in schools and homes but also through the service and redistribution of the product. I believe wholeheartedly in the Mwezi Foundation mission and am very excited to be a part of the team.”
Alan Pover CMG
“In my career in the Diplomatic Service I spent a good deal of my overseas service in developing countries – we used to call them “third world”. I travelled widely in Africa as a Foreign Office inspector, and was finally High Commissioner in The Gambia where a main function was support for a wide-ranging overseas aid programme. I have always been in favour of the leaky bucket approach to official government aid although, like many, have had some reservations about its direction and application.
As a proud patron of the grassroots Mwezi lights programme I have no reservations. This is not a feel-good activity. Providing lights to allow students to work after nightfall in homes without electricity (truly “disadvantaged” pupils in our vernacular) is quite clearly a benefit in itself and, importantly, its effects can be measured in the successes and progress of students in moving through the Kenyan educational system.
It is important also that the work on the ground is being done by local people who know the conditions and capabilities of the schools. Inevitably there are frustrations and problems in guiding the operation from afar but my overriding impression is that the admirable Mwezi programme is successful and deserves to continue to thrive.”
Andrew Bourne
“I’m a specialist recruiter/head-hunter who focuses on Africa 100% of the time. All the effort and focus is for me to find jobs for people across the whole of the African continent: I find locals, diasporas and expats for senior-level positions across a multitude of sectors. How did I get into this niche? Well, like most things it happened by chance, when a client in Liverpool asked me find a CFO for a job in Lagos – at the time I wasn’t sure if he meant in Portugal or Nigeria. I did the job and later on met the Chairman and Chief Executive of the company; this tuned me in to Africa and set the lightbulb flashing. Twenty years on, I’ve developed a busy business that covers the whole of the continent and, not only that, I’ve developed friends and contacts all over Africa.
When I was asked to be a patron and support Mwezi, for me it was a no-brainer. Over the years I’ve run many marathons for my charity of choice, Oxfam, but with Mwezi I could see exactly where the money was going to and I could see the benefits. It resonated instantly with me that it supports job creation and also helps school children in Africa so they can see at night-time – something that in Europe it’s difficult to understand with our reliable resources and utilities. What could be a better charity to support than the Mwezi Foundation? Therefore when I was asked to be a patron I was absolutely delighted to be associated with something so good as this.”
Martin Brown
Martin has worked in mental health services in England as a clinician, teacher and manager. In 1992, he joined the Department of Health to become head of mental health policy. He established the Northern Centre for Mental Health, a multi-professional development agency, in 2002. In 2005 he became a technical consultant for WHO Europe, working in the Balkans, other east European countries and Turkey, providing strategic advice at government level on reforming mental health policy and services. From 2008-2011, he was director of high-secure services at Ashworth Hospital, Merseyside. He is an honorary Professor in the School of Life Sciences at York University.
“I am delighted to be supporting the Foundation in its mission to bring solar lights to schools in Kenya. I came across the Foundation by accident but was inspired by its commitment to using local knowledge and expertise to provide real practical help where it’s needed, in a way that helps people work towards achieving their ambitions. I look forward to helping the organisation grow and develop.“
