About Us

Bottomline is a student-journalism team that specialises in Developmental Journalism. Our aim is to portray the fundamental factors of social developmental issues. Bottomline aspires to tell inspiring stories from a grass root level. We go for the smaller stories because we believe that “the small stories are the ones that make and have the biggest impact.'' We strive to use our communication and journalistic skills to depict how people from disadvantaged communities manage to come up with self-determinate ways to uplift and empower themselves from the harsh realities and conditions they face in their communities.

People who live in underprivileged areas face various issues and problems and to help counteract these issues, Bottomline has identified that media coverage and exposure can make a difference. As Albert Einstein said: “Those who have the privilege to know have the duty to act.” That is where we as Bottomline come in. Journalism is not all about the bad stuff. We focus on the good. We strive to publish and highlight the problems that people in such areas face, and how they overcome them by independently bringing about practical solutions to their social ills.
We are here to maximise your truth. We focus on the good - that's the Bottom Line.

Motivation

The topic for this multimedia project is: Social Development through arts in Ikageng, led by the NPO, Youth Invasion.

Bottomline specialises in developmental journalism, thus the topic was chosen to give the NPO media coverage and exposure we feel they deserve.

We strive to tell and uplift society about inspirational stories of how people from impoverished conditions, with little or no governmental support, work hard to come up with ways to tackle the issues in their communities and ultimately making huge strides in empowering and elevating themselves out of the conditions they were in.

Furthermore, the motivation behind this multimedia project is to use different and a variety of elements such as text, photographs, videos and audio to illustrate and tell an inspiring story in many ways. The topic and story we are telling is about a township-based NPO that uses its skills and resources at their disposal to address community issues in a variety of ways.

They use their music, film and clothing skills, amongst many other skills to tackle the social ills in their township. This gives Bottom Line the opportunity to tell their story using various multimedia elements to tell their story from different angles, that might seem small but makes a great impact to the community of Ikageng.

Lindi Goba

Feature writer

Lindi Goba is an aspiring Multimedia Journalist and Academic Researcher. She is currently a postgraduate student at the North-West University. Prior to enrolling for an Honours degree in Journalism and Media Studies, Lindi completed a BA degree in Communication which she obtained with distinction in 2018.

She has been awarded with the prestigious Burke Scholarship and the National Research Foundation’s Postgraduate Scholarship. In addition, she received an award for superior academic performance from the School of Communication in 2019.

Having worked as a research assistant and intern journalist in the past, Lindi joined Bottom Line in 2019 as a Feature Writer. Her position involves providing quality local and international content for our print and online platforms.

Anmané Eckard

Community journalist

Anmané Eckard is an aspiring radio journalist and a busy bee. She recently finished her undergraduate degree in BA Communication that led to her doing honours in Journalism and Medistudies.

Anmané is a Wapad journalist and worked as a KSR: SnapIt photographer. She also interned and shadowed at RSG, eNCA, GrootFm and Impact radio.

Anmané is a spontaneous person that cares about the small stuff, because big things happen when you start small. She loves to know why a person is sitting in front of her and what she can learn from them. She loves the environment and will try her best to protect it.

Something that is close to Anmané’s heart is people helping others. Like in the case of Youth Invasion. “We are not here for ourselves but as vessels to help and lift each other up.”

Her words may be few but enough to make an impact. Anmané is a journalist giving your story a voice. “We fulfil many roles in the group but her main role was website builder, videographer and video editor.

Mpho Koka

Columnist

Mpho Koka is currently a postgraduate student of the North-West University (NWU), studying a BA Honours Communication degree, specialising in Journalism and Media studies. Previously, he completed a BA Language and Literature studies degree with the same university in 2017.

He has worked at the Wapad (student newspaper of the NWU’s Potchefstroom campus) as a journalist and columnist, from July 2015 - January 2016.

In addition to this, he has had two of his opinion pieces published in the Daily Sun newspaper in December 2013 and February 2017. Apart from academics and writing, he is a member of the NWU Convocation - a statutory body of the NWU consisting of former students (alumni) and represented on the University Council.
As a Columnist of Bottom Line, Mpho’s role entails writing opinion pieces for Bottomline and sharing information of public interest

Zakumi Mtsweni

Journalist

Zakumi Mtsweni an aspirant TV Journalists and a presenter. She is a multi-skilled individual and has been awarded the Legend in Engineering award for completing the Sasol Solar Challenge in 2016. Zakumi also has experience in websites, publications and running several social media platforms since serving on the North-West University Executive Committees since 2016. Also she has been the Registration and Orientation - and Reception presenter of the NWU Potchefstroom Campus since 2017 to present. Whilst doing all this, she obtained her BA degree in Communication in 2018.

Zakumi is currently a postgraduate student completing her Honours degree in Journalism and Media Studies. She also serves on the Student Campus Council; as Media and Communication chairperson and forms a part of the Student Representative Council of the NWU.

Having worked as a production assistant and broadcast intern in the past, Zakumi joined Bottom Line in 2019 as a News Writer and formed part of the Photographic Department. Her position is to provide news stories; local and international that maximize the truth also photographic content that help support all content at Bottom Line.