A CONGOLESE car guard who is a qualified maths teacher, has been given an assistant teacher’s post at the Sunward Park High School in Boksburg.

Fernando Ogadi (35) left the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 2004 to escape political upheaval and came to South Africa.

The French speaking Ogadi has a B.Sc. degree in mathematics and physics from the University Marien Ngouabi.

“I just want to teach, but back in the Congo, classes would always get disrupted by political turmoil. Then the children wouldn’t come back to school for weeks.”

When he followed his brother to South Africa, his dream of teaching was shattered. His rudimentary English made it impossible to find any other employment than as a car guard.

He worked in the parking lot of Zomerlust Spar in Paarl from 2005 and put up a small blackboard where he would enthusiastically explain mathematical equations to any shoppers who cared to listen.

“We became quite friendly,” says store owner Tim Maree, who helped Ogadi to improve his English.

He also picked up a smattering of Afrikaans and Xhosa during his seven years in Paarl

Three week ago, Ogadi was featured on the kykNET programme Kwêla, in which he was shown doing equations on his blackboard and expressing his great desire to teach in South Africa.

The programme was seen by Sunward Park headmistress Ansi Peens.

“If somebody is so passionate about something that he’s prepared to leave his country for it, he deserves to be helped,” she said, according to a report in the Johannesburg newspaper Beeld.

“Not everybody has the ability to explain maths - his method is quite unique.”

Now Ogadi’s dream has come true.

He started working at the school a week later, and has been given accommodation in the hostel, where he offers extra classes and tuition in the afternoons.

He will also teach French and will enroll in an English class to improve his communication skills, so that his dream to teach Mathemathics can come true.