11 Jan 2016

Sundry dream chasers can draw a lot of inspiration from Ms Tebelo Mhutsiwa’s story.

Her rise to the top is demonstration of how far determination can take one in life.

Ms Mhutsiwa  is the sole proprietor and managing director of Letsela Fashion World, a fashion and design enterprise whose product line include school uniforms, corporate clothing, wedding gowns, African attire, protective clothing, and track suits.

Operating from the heart of Kanye mall, Letsela Fashion World has a staff compliment of 11 and can increase to 23 employees depending on the availability of market.

Ms Mhutsiwa admitted that her success was blood, sweat and tears.

Growing up in Kanye, the 71-year-old always aspired to make it in life to the extent she toyed with the idea of quitting school to secure employment to kick into motion her dream.

Dress making, a skill she learnt from her mother, was another career option she conjured up.

“Back then education was only but a platform to learn how to read and write and nothing much,” she said of her idea to quit school.

She started the ball rolling by quitting school at Seepapitso Senior Secondary School while doing Form Two in 1963 to chase her dream.

At the time, winds of Botswana attaining independence were increasingly gaining momentum and prospects of gainful employment in the new administration were becoming a reality.

Hungry for a better life Mmaago Boy as affectionately referred to by staff did not waste time and immediately enrolled for a secretarial course in Zimbabwe.

“Unfortunately we realised later that the school was bogus and had to come back home to Botswana where I applied for a Primary Lower Certificate in 1968,’ she said.

After a successful completion of her certificate, Ms Mhutsiwa was posted to Mapalamo; now Mokgadi Primary School in 1970 where she taught for two years before subsequent transfers to other schools in Kanye and surrounding areas.

Having explored all avenues, Mmaago Boy quit teaching in 1984 to take up sewing, perhaps a vindication of her all time quest to make money and lead a comfortable life.

True to the old time truth; ‘Despise not small beginnings’ Letsela Fashion World grew considerably from a not so promising business with a start-up capital of a little over P2 700 courtesy of the then Financial Assistance Policy (FAP) to an annual turnover of over P600 000.

The drive to further succeed in life has seen Ms Mhutsiwa procure other businesses to avoid having all her eggs in one basket.

That withstanding, scarcity of parts needed to repair sewing machines locally coupled with unavailability of quality fabric remains a stumbling block to the fashion industry in Botswana as importing such has proven to be an expensive undertaking.

“The fact that we have to contend with an influx of cheap and fake material that find its way into this country means we lose potential customers to these scheming traders,” she says sighting the setting up of local fabric production mills can be one of the solutions to the problem.

The tendency to work in isolation by Batswana Ms Mhutsiwa posits is one of the fashion industry main undoing because designers efforts are not consolidated.

“We have tried in the past to combine efforts as designers through the establishment of a Union but such efforts did not bear fruit as some people misappropriated the funds.”

Ms Mhutsiwa says though all is not lost and is pinning her hopes on government interventions such as the Stimulus Package Programme whose intent is to resuscitate the ailing economy.

The snow-balling effect of such noble initiatives she says has the potential to create employment for many Batswana. Ends