Thandeka Ngobese
Women in Business and Industry
Nominee's Province:
Kwazulu-natal
Project Name/Description:
Inanda 88.4 FM, Uniq Magazine
What do you do when one door closes? You open another one, says award-winning Inanda 88.4 FM station manager Thandeka Sivusumuzi Ngobese, 45, of Chesterville, west of Durban in KwaZulu-Natal. Ngobese joined Durban Youth Radio (DYR) as an intern in 1998. She worked for the station until 2000 when DYR’s broadcasting licence expired. Bitten by the radio bug, in 2003 Ngobese founded Inanda FM, a community radio station based at Inanda township, north-west of Durban. The entity received its full broadcasting licence in 2009 and continues to this day to captivate its 250 000 listeners with thought-provoking programming and entertaining music. Inanda 88.4 FM broadcasts in isiZulu and English 24 hours a day. Its footprint stretches from the greater eThekwini municipality to Pietermaritzburg, Tongaat, KwaDukuza, Port Shepstone, Mtubatuba, Hluhluwe, Empangeni and Nkandla. The radio station scooped the Station Imaging Award at the 2021 SA Radio Awards on July 30 this year. Ngobese is the National Community Radio Awards Life Time Achiever 2018 and a proud recipient of the eThekwini municipality’s Wenze Kahle Award 2018, respectively. The station has launched the careers of more than 20 broadcasters now working at SABC’s Ukhozi FM, East Coast Radio and Gagasi FM, and many other radio stations. Ngobese, who also co-founded Uniq magazine, an online publication covering news of interest to the gay and lesbian community, is a former chairperson and board member of the National Community Radio Forum.
