09 Dec 2014

Francistown YOHO project coordinator, Mr Mosalagae Moteu, has said they have been financed by the Ministry of Health through the Alcohol Levy Fund to educate Batswana about the dangers associated with alcohol abuse.

Speaking in an interview recently, he said they were spearheading a project called Seboza; life is so bright, which ran from May 2014 and will end on April 2015. Mr Moteu stated that the three targeted locations of Monarch, Phase IV and Gerald Estates had many cases associated with alcohol abuse.

He said their mobile outreach intended to educate people about alcohol abuse in order to prevent new cases of alcohol abuse and rehabilitate and refer those who had been affected by it.

Mr Moteu said their targeted age group is the youth aged between 18 and 35, stressing that they are the ones who are prone to the abuse and as future leaders, they need to be empowered and assisted to curb bad behaviours.

He also stressed that besides community outreach, they also have a Facebook page called Soberness is good where they interact with affected individuals and unanimously and confidentially assist them.

Furthermore, Mr Moteu said they collaborate with Social and Community Development (S&CD) officials to identify families that are affected by the abuse and as a result do families visits to offer their guidance and counseling.  He said they also consulted and taught youth groups about the abuse.

He added that their main objective was to assist those who are affected to assist themselves, stressing that they do economic empowerment for unemployed youth and high school drop outs by assisting them with business plans to be able to benefit from government initiatives such as Youth Development Fund (YDF) and LIMID so that they could be self-employed and employ others. ENDS