Army Saints founder makes top 200 list

Toti Army Saints founder, Shaun Callaghan has been nominated and made the list for the Mail and Guardian’s 200 Young South Africans.

Every year, the newspaper scours the country to find noteworthy and newsworthy young South Africans to profile.

Shaun was interviewed two weeks ago for the role he has played in forming Army Saints, a platform for groups wanting to do civic duty and make a difference in Toti.

The Saints grew in popularity when the Sun reported on their clean-up of Toti River and lagoon last year. Members of the organisation and volunteers cut and pulled water hyacinth out of the river and lagoon.

For their next project they cleaned up the Amanzimtoti Bird Sanctuary and since then have tackled numerous projects in the greater Durban area.

“Army Saints is an organisation of soldiers, sergeants, supporters and successors who are focused on making a difference in this world,” said Shaun, who first tabled the idea five years ago under the banner of the Saints Network.

The first project was cutting down the bush at Toti SPCA. “I approached the SPCA to find out how I could assist them. They asked me to fundraise, but as our core principles are no money, no religion and no politics, I offered to save them money by cutting down the bush. I expected to take two months to complete the task, but 36 people rocked up on the first day to help and it only took us two hours.

Since then, he has revamped the website and renamed it Army Saints and his idea of forming an army of volunteers and companies that help out charities and organisations that are in need of some aid has grown.

“We are not a non-profit organisation (NPO) nor a non-governmental organisation (NGO),” he explained.

“Soldiers help and attend events. We have seen some 6,000 soldiers attend our events. Sergeants are leaders and they upload events. Supporters are businesses that assist us and we in turn support those businesses who support us.

Successors are organisations we help, such as the SPCA, Centre for Rehabilitation of Wildlife (CROW) or Cancer Association of South Africa (Cansa).

We are completely unbiased – we assist whomever needs help and work alongside soldiers, regardless of their religion or political views.

We have bigger plans than just ourselves. I’m not Army Saints, I’m just the captain of the South Coast chapter.

We want to see Army Saints in other towns. Once it starts in other towns, then I know it’s working. It is working well here in Toti and we are learning as we go along. It is not my organisation, but a platform for bigger social goodness.”

Shaun is now focused on a project called ‘Watch Me’, a network of linked cameras to curb crime in Toti and surrounds, and a soup kitchen in Durban.

His right-hand ‘man’, girlfriend Chanel Geldenhuys wants to focus on vegetable farming in rural areas and schools, which is her forte as she has a Masters in botany. Make contact with her if you are interested in starting a veggie garden in a rural area.

Shaun also wants to plant 100 trees on his birthday on 5 August, like he did last year.

Make contact by visiting the website www.armysaints.com.