Cyril Ramaphosa Foundation held a youth empowerment workshop on Saturday, 16 November with 300 youth in Mamelodi, east of of Tshwane. The youth empowerment workshop is one of the Foundation’s activities to commemorate its 15th anniversary this year.
Mamelodi, like many of the country’s townships, is plagued by a high number of unemployed youth, leaving many of them despondent about solutions to their daily challenges. The workshops aimed at capacitating the young adults with entrepreneurial skills.
“The workshops expose our youth to different ways of looking at their problems and to seek solutions to them. The participants were given very useful tools to use in their entrepreneurial journeys and everyday lives,” says Mmabatho Maboya, CEO, Cyril Ramaphosa Foundation.
The delegates attended both theory and practical sessions that stimulated self-reflection, purpose-driven thinking, problem-solving and pitching. The sessions were facilitated by Startup Academy. The keynote address was delivered by as Sizwe Mahlangu, Marketing Executive at Halfway Toyota Group.
“I enjoyed Sizwe Mahlangu’s talk a lot,” Dudu Makhoza, a workshop participant, said.
“He shared practical methods that we could use in our everyday lives to address our daily challenges. Most importantly, he reminded us not be too hard on ourselves if we fail, saying that resilience and getting back on track is what counts”.
“Empowerment workshops like these are no longer a luxury,” Maboya added.
“They are an important tool to keep our youth focused on finding solutions that will uplift them and their communities. Whilst we understand that not everyone is going to start a business after this workshop, we are pleased that they will be equipped with solution-based thinking and have a renewed way of tackling challenges,” she said.
Listen to Cyril Ramaphosa Foundation’s Communications Officer, Keneiloe Kotlolo’s interview with Tshwane FM here.