18 Aug 2015

Members of the Mbanderu Youth Association of Botswana (MYAB) will throng Sehithwa on August 29 to commemorate their annual cultural festival, where the community gets to showcase their dynamic and unique culture.

The youth association is a culturally-oriented advocacy group from the OvaMbanderu community living in Botswana. It is a community whose historic ties with Namibia is well-known and documented.

This year, the festival would be held under the theme: Culture and creativity - The key to communities’ economic transformation.

In an interview, the chairperson of MYAB, Henda Matundu-Uananisa said this year’s festival would be different from the previous ones as it would be spiced up with traditional music, food, clothing and traditional tools.

“We intend to expand and showcase community trade mark attires, dance, food and traditional tools,” he said. He explained that the previous events were more of reporting back forums hence featuring less cultural activities.

Matundu-Uananisa revealed that this year, they were broadening the focus of the event, noting that various stakeholders who were key to the prospects of the youth in business such as Citizen Entrepreneurship Development Agency (CEDA), Local Enterprise Authority (LEA), Botswana Meat Commission (BMC) and

Ministry of Agriculture had been invited. Senior officials, the district leadership and some high commissioners to Botswana are also expected to grace the occasion.

However, the chairperson said they view the event as an opportunity to instil a sense of pride on the youth about who they were as a people as well as to provide economic opportunities towards prospective entrepreneurship activities through some educational and informational exhibitions by various stakeholders and departments.

In addition, Matundu-Uananisa noted that the festival also acts as an opportunity to impart, revive and exchange culture, first, with the community’s youth, and also share with other ethnic groups of mutual interests around the country the beauty of diverse cultures.

MYAB is made up of many aspiring young people from the community, and was established and formally registered in 1999 with the key aspiration amongst many being to promote the OvaMbanderu culture and seek to preserve and instil its norms and customs on younger generations to ensure sustainability of the unique and exciting culture.

The association seeks to call on members and the OvaMbanderu community at large to take such initiatives seriously as it stands as a wonderful opportunity for the community to make a meaningful difference to people’s lives.

Matundu-Uananisa revealed that the association was successfully allocated a commercial piece of land in Sehithwa where they intend to establish a cultural heritage centre that would not only serve as the headquarters of its operations, but also as the nerve-centre for the entire community in its desire to bring real hope and prospects of diversity to realise economic transformation.

“As an organisation we are totally convinced that economic transformation is possible and can be realised in our generation through this opportunity,” he said. ENDS