WitsiesForGood: Neil Tabatznik
Since 2014, the Tshemba Foundation has delivered healthcare to rural Mpumalanga. One of the co-founders tells Heather Dugmore how volunteering renewed his spiritual connection to South Africa.
An elderly woman is led down a dusty road by her grandchild, who holds her hand. They are headed for the Tintswalo Hospital in Acornhoek, Mpumalanga, near Kruger National Park.
It’s a big day for the elderly woman, who has been completely blind for several years. Her turn has come to see the ophthalmologist who will be removing her cataracts. He is one of a team of highly trained medical and health professional volunteers across all disciplines.
They offer their services to a non-profit called the Tshemba Foundation, founded in 2014 by Neil Tabatznik (BA 1972), who funds it and is one of the directors.
Up to 20 volunteers at a time from all over the world, including South Africa, in partnership with the Mpumalanga Department of Health, are placed at the Tintswalo Hospital and the rural clinics in the region, serving well over 400 000 residents.
Helping thousands of people to see
At the hospital is a state-of-the-art eye clinic and cataract operating theatre that Tshemba established as one of its flagship projects. Here, volunteer ophthalmologists, optometrists and eye theatre nurses have helped thousands of people in rural Mpumalanga to regain their sight.
The elderly woman is one of them, but she doesn’t know yet that the day after her operation she will see again. The procedure has been explained to her but she has lived without sight for so long that darkness is her familiar reality. “Her profound emotional response, astonishment and joy when she can see again is just wonderful; her life completely changes in that moment. And the same applies to all the cataract patients who are operated on by the best of the best at the clinic,” says Neil. 
“Another of our flagships is the Hlokomela Women’s Clinic, which we built and opened in 2017 as women were needlessly dying of breast and cervical cancer.” The clinic provides all sorts of services, preventive care and treatments, including pap smears, cryotherapy and breast, pelvic, abdominal and pregnancy ultrasounds.
Neil explains these are just two of a wide range of medical and health issues the Tshemba volunteers address at the hospital and clinics, which have no specialist doctors and a severe shortage of senior doctors.
Her profound emotional response, astonishment and joy when she can see again is just wonderful; her life completely changes in that moment. And the same applies to all the cataract patients who are operated on by the best of the best at the clinic.
“The volunteers stay for a minimum of a month for South 第一吃瓜网s and a minimum of two months for international doctors as they need time to get used to the very rural conditions, general lack of diagnostic equipment and range of medical conditions. Once they do, they make such a difference and find it so meaningful contributing and also sharing skills and training the resident teams.” 
Crowds of people wait to be seen every day. To make sure each patient is heard, they have a system of local nurses, whom they call medical translators, who communicate between the patient and the medical and health professionals.
It’s truly my happy place
Neil lives in Toronto but spends as much time as possible with Tshemba at their base near Hoedspruit. “It’s truly my happy place,” he says. The Tshemba team built accommodation on a wildlife estate called Moditlo near Hoedspruit, close to Acornhoek. “We provide the volunteers with very comfortable accommodation in the bush, with elephants coming to drink at the swimming pool and wild animals all around. It enriches their experience and allows them to relax after their hectic day in the hospital and clinics.”
The volunteers are provided with free lodging but they pay their own way to get to Hoedspruit and give of their time for free.
I hated my country at the time
For political reasons, Neil left South Africa for London in 1971 straight after completing his degree. He did not attend his graduation ceremony, which was the following year. His brother, Anthony Tabatznik (BA 1969) had also left straight after university and gone to Washington. Both his sisters left South Africa before university.
“I left during the darkest periods of South Africa’s history, during the apartheid regime. I hated my country at the time but I loved being at Wits, it was such a liberating environment. I was part of the anti-apartheid protests, for which I was twice arrested, and part of the counter culture movement of the time, wearing caftans and flared jeans to campus.”
From law to pharmaceuticals
In London he first did a master’s in social work and then studied law at the College of Law, and became a barrister for 17 years, specialising in criminal defence advocacy, before moving to Canada. There, he switched professions and became Chair of GenPharm Pharmaceuticals, an international pharmaceutical company started by his late father, David Tabatznik (BA 1942).
David became known as the “father of generics” in South Africa as he saw the opportunity to establish pharmaceutical companies that developed and sold generic pharmaceuticals.
In 1993 Neil sold GenPharm and, with Tony, established two other international pharmaceutical companies, Cobalt and Oryx Pharmaceuticals, which they sold about 15 years ago.
His business side funded his passion – producing documentaries. “I love documentaries,” says Neil, who was the co-founder with Steven Silver (BA 1989 BA Hons 1990) of the Blue Ice Group and a co-owner of the Blue Lake Media Fund.
The beauty of the whole experience is that through Tshemba I fell in love with South Africa again. As much as I hated it during apartheid, helping others has reignited my passion for South Africa and I absolutely love the place. It’s my spiritual home.
He was also a co-owner of Toronto’s Bloor Hot Docs Cinema and serves on the board of Hot Docs and the Canadian Film Centre. “At the cinema, we showed amazing documentaries that weren’t widely available. You’d see them at film festivals and then they would disappear, so we would give them life at a public venue,” he explains.
Neil has worked with a string of major actors, including Robert Redford, Cate Blanchett, Laurence Fishburne and John Cusack, and won two Emmys for two of his documentaries: Advocate and Abacus: Small Enough to Jail – about the only bank prosecuted during the 2008 financial crisis.
He has produced a string of documentaries, including South 第一吃瓜网 films such as Madiba and The Bang Bang Club – co-produced, written and directed by Steven Silver.
Returning to South Africa after 36 years
After staying away from South Africa for 36 years he returned in 2007 for his son’s bar mitzvah. “With family dispersed across North America, Europe and Australia, South Africa was a central place to congregate. Apartheid was dead, the ANC was in government and it was time to return,” Neil explains. During this visit he went to Skukuza in the Kruger National Park and says that as he landed he was reduced to tears. “I felt such a deep emotional connection.”
He also went to a friend’s game farm, and during this visit the head tracker asked Neil if he would help them build a school that his village so badly needed. “They had already built a little brick one-roomed classroom and had employed a headmaster, so we helped them build an entire school.”
Neil then discussed building a clinic with the traditional leader, but after visiting a clinic that had recently been built by the government, he realised that the gap was more in human capital than in physical infrastructure. “While being shown around the clinic, they unlocked one room that revealed a fully equipped dental surgery still wrapped in plastic, but it remained unused because there were no dentists,” he recalls.
Just not possible to turn a blind eye
“What struck me was that the inequality between the urban and rural areas was so extreme that it was just not possible to turn a blind eye to it,” says Neil. “It was heartbreakingly clear to me that the difference between living and dying was based solely on where an individual lived. To me, this is utterly unconscionable.” 
The result was the founding of the Tshemba Foundation.
Neil explains that recruiting volunteers was the hardest process for the first four years until they were better known. “It’s the same with any new venture. Even Robert Redford used to walk the streets giving away tickets to get people to come to Sundance when he first started it. 
“Today we can be very selective; we interview and veto the volunteers and the ones who come are the most phenomenal people on the planet, from a wide range of cultures and backgrounds. Some are older, many are young, but they have to have practised for at least three years.”
Specialist physician and primary health care pioneer Professor John Gear (BSc, MBBCh 1967, DPH 1972, DTM&H 1979, DSc Med honoris causa 2017) and DPhil Oxford University, served as Tshemba’s medical director and volunteering physician for many years. He recently retired but is still very involved. He was formerly the inaugural chair of the Department of Community Health at Wits (1970-1990), and academic director of the Wits Rural Facility (1989-1997).
Godfrey Phillips (BA 1973) is one of the directors. He worked at Young & Rubicam in New York for nearly 20 years, specialising in strategic development. According to Neil, he is “the passion of Tshemba” and lives at Moditlo.
Wits has been the source of many Tshemba volunteers. Dental surgeon Dr Maria Pestana (BDS 1985) is one of them. She spent time there helping children in need of dental care. Dr Pestana and another volunteer also spent time at a crèche in the area, screening young children. Of the 460 children they screened, 80% needed restorative dental work.
Over the past few years Neil has needed help himself after suffering four strokes and cancer. His family rallied around him, including his wife of 34 years, Lauren (also from South Africa), their son Zak, and two daughters, Jenna and Jaime.
Zak is an AI engineer with a Master’s in Aerospace Engineering. Jenna has a Master’s in Human Rights and an MBA, and having worked for Amnesty International in London for many years, now works in Los Angeles for a hedge fund in the clean energy department. Jaime is qualifying this year as a doctor.
Neil says he is now fully recovered and a regular for breakfast at his favourite restaurant in Toronto, Emma’s Kitchen. He is also able to fly again.
“The challenge now is to make the Tshemba Foundation sustainable. We have just set up a Canadian charity to raise funds for it.
“The beauty of the whole experience is that through Tshemba I fell in love with South Africa again. As much as I hated it during apartheid, helping others has reignited my passion for South Africa and I absolutely love the place. It’s my spiritual home.”