Bringing the thugs back into the fold

Emeline Afeaki is working to turn Mangere teens away from gangs and violence. Picture / Martin Sykes

Police say about 245 youngsters belong to 53 gangs in Otahuhu, Mangere and Papatoetoe, with similar numbers in Otara/Flat Bush.

Most gangs are informal groups based in individual streets or schools, but some are affiliated to wider gangs such as Black Power, King Cobras and Tribesmen.

Once or twice a week when Emeline Afeaki needs space to think, she looks for an isolated spot on Mangere Mountain.

The 30-year-old youth worker has had a lot of thinking to do since landing the job of turning Mangere's youth gangs towards a constructive future.

Her six-month contract as "Mangere youth collaborator", supported by another youth worker, Ronji Tanielu, is funded by the Government in response to growing gang problems in Mangere, Otara and Flat Bush, where a man was killed last October.

The funding also provides for six detached youth workers who are organising sports and games in Otara parks over summer.

Ms Afeaki and Mr Tanielu were born in Mangere and still live within the shadow of Mangere Mountain. Mr Tanielu is so committed to the suburb that he has had its telephone code, 275, tattooed on his arm.

They offer role models in their own lives to other youngsters. Mr Tanielu, of Samoan descent, has a law degree and works for the Auckland University of Technology, which has seconded him to the Mangere project. Ms Afeaki, whose parents are Tongan, has a masters in social policy and employs 14 people in her own company, Affirming Works.

"I was a youth worker from the time I was 19 - voluntary and communal to start with, and then for the Manukau Youth Centre for three years," she says.

She started Affirming Works (then called Affirming Women) when she was 25 and saw a need to help teenage prostitutes on Manukau streets.

"Many of these prostitutes were in the schools, it was an evening and weekend job," she says.

"Lots of our young people were choosing prostitution as a way of earning income, not just for themselves but for their families. I was talking to them about having higher education and better jobs."

Her company has grown to provide mentoring to many young people, male and female. Ms Afeaki says 95 per cent of them now go on to further education or jobs.

Mangere East Family Service Centre director Peter Sykes, who came up with the idea of a "youth collaborator" for Mangere, says Ms Afeaki's job until June will be to connect the youth services that exist in the area and identify the gaps.

"Everyone is still quite ethnic-specific," Ms Afeaki says. "I understand that, being first-generation. But our kids have become quite region-based - it's Mangere or Otara, or just Massey Rd or Wakefield Rd.

"So what I say is, let's be more inclusive, let's use that village concept so we develop the village of Mangere as one whole community with people of different races and cultures."

She grew up in St Therese's Catholic Church in Mangere East, now worships at a Mangere youth church, and plans to talk with all the local churches about getting their young people more involved.

"The gang members are quite subtle. They are church members and attend school, and come out in the evenings and weekends when there is really nothing to do," she says.

"We are trying to develop a youth development approach where we work with all youth and the ones in the gangs get pulled into it a little bit more."

Meanwhile, Otara's Crosspower Ministries is knocking on doors to invite young people to games evenings in local parks. Manager Sully Paea says whole families are turning up.

"Last week in one area we had 110 people, and it was everybody. It wasn't just the youth, it was the mums and dads and kids and youth," he says.

Ministry of Social Development regional commissioner Isabel Evans says the two projects are funded by her ministry and Child, Youth and Family Services - about $70,000 for Mangere and $135,000 at Otara.

"We will continue to work through what else is needed. We want to look at what has been done and the lessons to go forward."