20 Jul 2016

 Orphans in Francistown, who underwent psychosocial therapy in Gerald Estates, have been applauded for their initiative to pick up litter in Block 1 and 2 as their way of giving back to the community.

In an interview recently, Department of Social and Community Development (S&CD) principal social welfare officer, Ms Daisy Ikaneng explained that during this therapy, children were taught technical and life skills.

Ms Ikaneng said the programme was held yearly in which a group of 275 children were divided into core-hordes in a 16-day psychotherapy programme.

 She added that volunteers called Bommabana helped the committee by taking care of the children in the duration of the programme by making referrals to the social workers.

Furthermore she said after the therapy there is a follow-up support programme which is aimed at ensuring that the skills acquired by the children are used.

She noted that this therapy is important as orphans who do not do well academically can use these skills to fend for themselves in future. She added  that litter picking campaign is an initiative the children came up with as a way of giving back to the community, and that the environmental health recommended Block 1 and Block 2 as a site to carry out the project depending on their assessments.

Ms Ikaneng said the main pioneers of this project are the Children Consultative Forum.

She also said in collaboration with the caregivers, the programme could prove to be effective adding that sometimes the children draw back because the caregivers do not give them support.

She said she encourages caregivers to encourage the children to participate in the programme as it can benefit them on different life issues.

“Children have proven to be determined as they sometimes report cases in which a peer is proven to have had a setback which shows they appreciate the programme and feel there is a need to attend to it,” Ms Ikaneng said.

She added that the programme does not only include counselling for the children but the caregivers are also offered counselling to be on the same level of understanding each other.

 She further explained that the division of home economics within the department are responsible for imparting the technical skills learnt during therapy.

Ms Ikaneng thanked stakeholders for the support they give to the children adding that the children’s academic results are so far showing the effectiveness of the therapy.

Kgosi Masego Masonya of Phase IV also applauded the children for their initiative saying the initiative has come at the right time as it is in conjunction with Botswana celebrating 50 years anniversary.

He said children have proven to be the true future leaders of tomorrow as their cleaning will help the city celebrations be on a clean slate, something which can be envied by many.

He further encouraged them to uphold the spirit of botho as it would help them to be better citizens in the future whom the nation can be proud of. ENDS