Mohalenyane Phakela

Standard Lesotho Bank’s Back2School celebration held at the bank’s Tower Branch on Friday morning was a grand spectacle which brought that part of the city to a standstill.

The bank’s employees from different branches around Maseru (Station, Maseru Mall, City and Tower branches) who were dressed in school uniform danced and sang along as popular deejay, DJ Daverts, belted out some riveting tunes. The event drew a huge crowd, and was made even jollier by Mazenod’s dance trio, Heartbreakers. The group had the crowd asking for more as they performed different dances, with Sbujwa the favourite of the gathering.

Standard Lesotho Bank employees, who were being referred to as students, had brought along different goods to be donated to the needy once the beneficiaries are identified. The goods included schoolbags, school shoes, canned food and toiletries among others.

According to Standard Lesotho Bank’s Head of Marketing, ‘Makeabetsoe Mabaleha, the financial institution has been celebrating Back2School for many years and this was the second year they had collected goods from their employees for donation to less privileged members of society.

“We have been celebrating Back2School from way back but last year, we thought of using these celebrations to give back to the community that has been supporting us.

“January is the period during which we have many clients, among them parents who come to deposit school fees or apply for loans, so as to pay the fees.

“Apart from that, there are so many destitute children around the country whose parents or guardians struggle to get them basic necessities for school. So we thought we could try and meet them halfway by giving them these goods,” Mabaleha said.

According to Ms Mabaleha, last year’s initiative was well-received by the public hence the bank now sees it as a long-term project.

“We have such celebrations throughout the country as we have branches in all the 10 districts so what is happening here today is also taking place in other districts.

“We work closely with the Ministry of Social Welfare in order to identify the needy children since they deal with them on a daily basis. However, we do not donate to the same people every year; we rotate around children’s homes or schools that have the neediest children.”

According to Ms Mabaleha, the bank matches what would have been collected from its employees and they were hoping to give the presents out this coming Friday once they have finalised the beneficiaries with Social Welfare.