Peace4Wentworth concert brings hope for peace and unity in community
The Peace4 organisation is also doing school outreach programmes and is involved with churches.
HOPING to bring about peace and unity in Wentworth, the non-profit company, Peace4, held its Peace4Wentworth concert at the Ogle Road grounds in Wentworth on November 4.
Ash-Leigh Lex LaFoy, a rap artist and founding director of Peace4, said the idea to have a concert was due to the many social ills that result in violence, that communities, such as Sydenham, Newlands and Wentworth, among others in the province, were faced with.
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“It was in December 2021 that my cousin, who lives in Sydenham, told me about the gang violence in the community and how it was impacting lives. I had been living in Johannesburg for more than six years and had returned to Durban just before the country went into lockdown in 2020.
“Having been away for such a long time, I didn’t realise how things had escalated, how gangsterism we heard about in the 1980s and which had died down over the years, had now resurged. After the conversation with my cousin, I sat with this information, and it stirred something in my heart. As an artist, an event organiser and a person with years of involvement in national community development projects, I realised I could and wanted to do something about it,” she said.
LaFoy said the first Peace4 event was held in Sydenham last year.
“We were very blessed as we had community support and the Hollywood Foundation who came on board and supported us. The greatest reward was when a mother told me she never let her child go outside to play but felt so at ease at the concert.
“In December last year, a cousin of mine was shot and killed in Wentworth. I told my production manager that we need to do Wentworth next. There were extensive engagements held to find out where the community was at and what their vision was for this event. The engagement also led us to do school outreach programmes, and we included a conflict resolution team and strategy that has been ongoing with the churches in the area,” she said.
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