After three months in New Zealand, singer Deen Louw, better known as D’Low, is back in his home town – Lentegeur – to tour Mitchell’s Plain high schools.
He has already visited Beacon Hill High School, in Beacon Valley and is due to visit each of the 17 schools in the area as part of an anti-gangsterism and drug campaign.
“I have especially come back to focus on this project, as we stand to lose an entire generation of young women and men – through this evil in our communities.
“Family lives do not matter for our youth anymore as their only urge is where to get the next hit, regardless of how they going to get it. But get it they must and this destroys the very fabric of our society,” he said.
During his three months away, he also visited prisons, where he did missionary work with young offenders.
“I realised why am I doing this in New Zealand? I work in Mitchell’s Plain all these years and I need to plough back,” he said.
He also does missionary work at Pollsmoor Prison where he sings his brand of hip hop, jazz and R&B to his audiences.
“My lyrics speak about day-to-day issues, gangsterism and drugs, woman and child abuse,” he said.
He said music played an active role in his life as a philanthropist, human rights and community activist. D’Low will be addressing pupils at school assemblies, totalling more than 1 000 pupils at a time, but he believes if he can change one person, he can change the community and a nation.
“They must know we as role models are there for them to look up to as leaders,” he said.
“I am where I am today because my life mattered back then,” he said.
D’Low, now 50 years old, said he will continue to work in his community until God calls him.
“I am very capable of doing what a 15-year-old can do because I have never smoked or been a drunkard,” he said.
D’Low said he came from a household where substances were abused. “People like DJ Ready D and Shaheen from Prophets of Da City resonated with me,” he said.
“I want to give young people genuine hope and show them that there are people in the community doing positive things,” he said.
D’Louw said being the father of four children, aged between five and 25, encouraged him to work harder and to be a role model.
He encourages them to have professional lives, careers, which they can fall back on and to know that they can make a difference.