10 Jan 2017

An old American philosopher Elbert Hubbard once said, down in their hearts, wise men know the truth that the only way to help yourself is to help others.

The saying perfectly fits Mr Boemo Lesego of Xhosa 1 in Mahalapye, who at 23 years of age is already one of the wise men.

The young man has dedicated most of his time to doing productive and useful things to give back to his community.

Lesego who is also a VDC chairperson in his ward, is the mastermind behind the Xhosa 1 Youth Empowerment and Charity Cup which was formed last year with the help of locals, Jimmy Bareetseng and Godfrey Makgarapa.

He told BOPA in an interview recently that the initiative is aimed  at encouraging the youth to take charge of their lives and to get started in building their legacies using different empowerment schemes provided by the government and giving back to the less privileged while they are at it.

“Through this empowerment initiative we will host a football tournament  that will help us raise funds to be able to provide for some families in our community and help pay school fees and buy uniform for the children,” he stated.

Mr Lesego explained that they are not only going to give to the needy through earnings made in this tournament but will take advantage of the gatherings to empower the youth to change their lives.

He said that they intend to bring in trained professionals to come and help talk them into behavioural change and ways to improve their lives and stay away from activities that could ruin their future especially considering the fact that Xhosa is one of the wards where the youth are deep into crime and substance abuse.

Mr Lesego’s dedication to giving back to the community did not just start last year, at only 20 years, he founded a group of 40 young people in his ward that was also into empowering youth into starting their own businesses.

He stated that all members were initiated into business, did a course with the agriculture department  and all went to learn about skin tanning and processing in Lobatse.

“Of all the 40 members, six managed to get funding through the Youth Development Fund but unfortunately as the chairperson, I fell sick and got admitted in hospital for a while and the remaining members failed to keep things together which led to the collapse of the group, which will hopefully soon be up on its feet,”he added.

He went on to explain that he also introduced Academic  Excellence Awards for the schools in Xhosa ward as a way to encourage students to work hard in their studies adding that the first annual awards were held last year with support from the schools and Broadway Motors.

At last year’s Mail &Guardian  and GabzFm  Change Makers Awards that recognised 50 young Batswana who have made positive changes in their communities, Mr Lesego proved he is indeed a change maker and walked away with a leadership and business award.

He said the award inspired him to keep working hard.

Mr Lesego said he believes that in the near future their empowerment group will have grown and not only serving those in his ward but the whole nation.

Furthermore, he encouraged his fellow youth to never judge their destinies by their current situation and believe in themselves and that if they can dream of something, they can definitely make it.

He also appealed to members of the community to help them make their initiatives a success and extended his gratitude to those who have supported their projects since inception . ENDS