21 Sep 2016

A young Motswana woman, Ms Dorcus Rasedie, who views business as the only solution to the alarming rates of unemployment in the country, has started a business to empower Batswana on financial management.  

She understands that there are many roads that lead to prosperity as the old truism says. The 36-year-old resident of Maun believes that as long as she is alive, poverty will never catch up with her.

Ms Rasedie, who owns Smart Wallet Proprietary Limited, established her business in 2014 after securing funding from the Ministry of Youth, Sport and Culture to the tune of P70 000.

She said in an interview that the company offers financial management services such as mentoring and monitoring. The funds were used to set up a desktop, purchase office equipment and marketing the company.

Even though the company is still at an infant stage, Ms Rasedie said the company’s objective to shift the poor from income-consumption mindset to savings investment-asset building mindset.

She intends to equip Batswana with financial skills required in running businesses by hosting workshops. She added that they have taken the workshops to schools to coach students on financial management as a life skill.

Ms Rasedie said the Gender Affairs Department has engaged her to empower government scheme beneficiaries on the stages of business and how to explore the market and maximise profits.

She said the youth failed to understand that it was their responsibility to create jobs and that of government to provide jobs to the youth.  Ms Rasedie encouraged the youth to always have a ‘plan B’ when jobs were scarce to enhance their skills and work harder. She said most of the time people would say ‘if I had money’ not seeking to know how to make money.

She said she had realised that Batswana were taking time to reshape as they still lacked understanding on matters of finance.

“Batswana should understand that every thebe counts and it should assist them on drawing their balance sheet,” she added.

Quizzed on the golden jubilee, Ms Rasedie said she was grateful of the time given by the government to study, adding that she had built the initiative on the knowledge she acquired during her studies.

Ms Rasedie said one error that entrepreneurs made was getting a salary when the business was still at the infancy stage.

She studied for a bachelor’s degree in accounting at the University of Botswana. She also has a master’s degree in business administration specialising in finance with the University of New Brunswick in Canada. Ends