04 Mar 2019

She is one of the 22 Poverty Eradication Programme beneficiaries who graduated from the programme in the Chobe District last year.

Ms Gladys Simon enrolled with the programme in 2012 for a tree nursery project and she already has a registered company: Simon Jordan’s Valley. 

The thirst and passion to see herself and those around her living a better life drove her to not only focus on the tree nursery, but to spread her wings into landscaping of all the three malls in Kasane, as well venturing into cleaning services. 

The 57-year-old outspoken Ms Simon, is proud to mention that the dry landscaping at Tlou Safari Mall popularly known as Shoprite Mall, Seboba Recreational Park and the Water Front Mall also known as FNB Mall, are the work of her hands.

She explains that dry landscaping is good for the Chobe area because of the weather and wild animals that can be a nuisance to the vegetation.

Ms Simon also makes wedding and funeral flowers as well as corsages and she explains that she can make P7 000 per day.

She also possesses an agent licence, which enables her to supply both council and central government departments. 

She narrates that when she has a tender, she engages up to seven people and pays them as stipulated by law. 

Ms Simon has herself and another employee on permanent basis and she boasts of a personal account and a business account.

Her story is not just of an ordinary beneficiary, who fended for her family, but of an entrepreneur who is able to give back to the community through donations to the VDC, schools and even the Red Cross Society.

She also planted trees at the Kasane Clinic, Kasane and Kazungula dikgotla, her way of giving back to the community.

Through the programme, she graduated from begging for accommodation from other people to a home owner as she was able to build herself a two and half house. 

As if it was not enough, she extended the two and half house and managed to build bachelor pads for three of her five children. 

Ms Simon also has small stock purchased from the programme project proceeds and her dream is to turn the extended two and half into a bag packer’s lodge as well as buy a cart for her anticipated tourism project and to extend her services outside the Chobe district. 

While she dreams big, her predicament is the lack of land as she wants to have a recreational park and says her daily prayer is for the land board to allocate her a plot that will not only serve as a recreational park, but will also serve as a place where she can mentor other beneficiaries who enrolled for the same project.

Narrating how the programme took her from zero to heroine, Ms Simon keeps on emphasing dedication, commitment and vision as her winning formula.

Her journey with the programme started when she heard about the programme during a kgotla meeting.

She then approached the social and community officer, who assessed her and at the completion of assessment she was trained in tree nursery and at later given gardening equipment to the value of slightly over P3 000.

She tells of how the monetary value of the equipment did not deter her from accomplishing the big mission ahead of her, as she started grooming trees. 

She says while the grooming of trees was ongoing, the Poverty Eradication office sent her for training in landscaping and later for flower arrangement courses.

As if it was not enough for the Poverty Eradication office to have stirred the desire in her to pursue the project, Gender Links-Botswana came into the picture by featuring her in the book “My I stories” that reassured participants that a woman can still reach greater heights without a man’s input.

Ms Simon tells of how this instilled confidence in her that she can still do it and she approached Gender Links about her dream and they assisted her to draw a business plan.

In 2015, Ms Simon participated in the Gender Links-Botswana national exhibition and scooped first position in Emerging Entrepreneur category. 

In the same year, she participated in the SADC Gender Protocol and still scooped the first position in the nine countries that participated in the Existing Businesses category. 

A technical officer at the Department of Forestry and Range Resources, Mr Matthews Sonny said Ms Simon was funded to the tune of P15 000 inclusive of equipment and training.

He says while she has graduated to a fully functional entrepreneur, who is capable to compete in the open market, the office still gives her technical advice and support in order for her project to continue thriving. ENDS