It's time to wake up, the time is now.

A young man ready and willing to get his hands dirty - meet Sylvester Hlongwane, known to many as 'Mr. Campus Crush'. He was born and bred in Mamelodi (Pretoria), a vocal arts graduate from Tshwane University of Technology and is currently enrolled for an Advanced Diploma in project management.

Many would refer to Sylvester as an all rounder - Jack of all trades - simply because of his involvement in the arts fraternity as a whole. He's a singer who has found himself heavily involved in the film and television industry as a producer, editor, director and cinematography. To add, he's an event organizer for both student entertainment and corporate, which all links to his current course of project management, when asked what does he do, his response was: "I do everything that will helps me fit into the economy.”

Hlongwane is the founder of one of the shows that took YouTube by storm - Campus Crush. A show we can refer to as the 'necessary push' needed by students who have fallen inlove with their campus mates but cannot propose to them because of fear which in this instance is referred to as 'Gwababa.’ He was asked to share more about Campus Crush and the vision that he had about the show, he replied to say, "honestly speaking, I did not have a clear vision at all, i just wanted to entertain, to bring something fresh onto people's screens. I always say that when brands want to introduce something new into the market, their first target are students, so I wanted to tap into that as well."

"With multiple episodes out, I had time to think of an actual vision for the show. Brand expansion is the way to go, I want the show to hit international market, with YouTube that can be achieved, but I want an even bigger scale even for those without internet access and that can be done by having it on national television, proper branding - I want when people hear the word 'Gwababa' to think of Campus Crush first. Grow it to a point of 'Office/Colleague Crush", I mean students cannot be the only people who struggle with proposing right? But first, we need to come onto the people's screens, we've stopped for a while, but best believe we are coming back."

Running and sustaining a show as a student was difficult, Sylvester shares some of the lessons that took him by surprise that he had to quickly adjust himself to continue with running the show. He says, “firstly, Financial sustainability, my partner - Bino and I had to cough out a lot of money to finance the show, and I must acknowledge that our sponsors were so helpful, however, It was difficult and we weren't prepared for that. Secondly, I learnt the importance of documenting things, all the agreements that one enters into must be documented and should contain all the necessary information for both parties to understand their contributions and benefits. Lastly, I've learnt to never mix work and friendship - it's quite an art to be able to separate the two" he said.

Sylvester said that of all the challenges he's experienced with the show mostly they were finance related because the show took a turn to greater heights which he was never prepared for. The challenge started to show when Campus Crush expanded outside of TUT where now it was difficult to even get transport to get to the people who needed Campus Crush.

Hlongwane has successfully hosted one of the biggest student gatherings at TUT, when asked to give his advice to anyone who wants to host a gathering what should they firstly have in place, he replied to say: “well, firstly it has to be the will to do. If one has no will they won't do it, it's important for people to know and learn to work with that they have before wanting to rush and chase after sponsors. Another thing is, know and understand your target market and their needs and work towards fulfilling them. Lastly and most importantly, putting together an extremely exceptional team, if your foundation is weak then your entire structure will collapse."

The pandemic has hit the entire country, however the unemployed graduates remain frustrated more than many. When asked what he has learnt in the entire period he said, "You have to read, we should be in the business of obsessively empowering ourselves, the line 'knowledge is power' may seem to be cliché, but it is exactly that. Recently, we've seen unemployed graduates marching as a cry for help, but honestly we need to start somewhere, it's not easy but must use what even have. Most of us have so much pride and are ashamed to get our hands dirty even with our graduation belts around our chests.”

Hlongwane was asked of what happens in his mind when he sees or hears headlines about cases of Gender Based Violence (GBV) in our country, he replied to say, "this is how I feel, I think we have more than enough social media activists, we need more foot soldiers - we can march and hashtag names of the fallen victims, but what is next? It's about time we actually hold people accountable for their actions, men in particular, but also not forgetting women - I believe women are the key role players in reducing the cases of GBV."

"Women have these days glamorized GBV, they find it easy to come out as victims on social media but not reporting people to the relevant places where they can find help. Women must know that with the first sign of any abuse they notice then that should be their cue to walk away."

In closing, his message to the youth is - “it’s time to wake up, the time is now.”

Writer:Pogiso P Mokwena

Editor: Nomvula Kgoale