Khondleka then became one of the youngest presenters on the daytime line-up at Melton FM, a community radio station which serves the greater area of Melton in Victoria.
The radio and entertainment bug had bitten, and when he returned to South Africa, Mio worked as a musician, voice-over artist and club rugby player.
In 2003, while studying at what is now the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, he joined the campus radio station CBFM as a presenter. He was part of the team which took the station off campus, to become the Bay FM community station, where Khondleka was programmes manager. He then moved to Kaya FM in Gauteng as music manager.
The station recorded significant audience growth after Khondleka was tasked to re-packaged the music mix. Khondleka and Queenie Grootboom (his wife and on-air soul mate) also hosted mid-mornings at Kaya FM, and built up a large listenership before accepting an offer to join M-Power FM as the breakfast team.
A decision by the power radio couple to return to their home town coincided with the restructuring of Algoa FM. This created an opening for a programme manager - and incumbent Alfie Jay is more than happy to hand over the reins to Khondleka.
"I first met Mio at a record company function in Port Elizabeth and have been watching his career progress since then.
"While consulting to M-Power FM, I recruited Mio and Queenie to present the breakfast show and worked with them in Mpumalanga. Mio has comfortably kept the pace in senior positions both on and off air in the high pressure environment of commercial radio. We are delighted that he applied for the position and has accepted an offer to work with us" says Jay, who has been appointed into the position of operations director at Algoa FM.
Khondleka is up to the challenge of taking Algoa FM into the future as it consolidates its position as the station serving the Eastern Cape and Garden Route. "My motto: 'Bringing fun to radio' has always served me well, and I'll be working hard at Algoa FM to bring that theme across," says Khondleka. "Mio's approach is systematic and he has a dynamic skillset" adds Jay.
"Radio is always evolving, and I'm looking forward to learning and discovering new things with the dynamic Algoa FM team. "Algoa FM has consistently been performing at a high level for a number of years, and my goal is to continue to uphold that consistency. I'm looking forward to the challenges ahead in being part of a radio brand that has proven itself as the leader in the region," says Khondleka.
