FDH Financial Holdings has launched a mentorship programme targeting secondary students in the country as part of the commemoration of the Day of African Child.
The launch took place at Chichiri Secondary School in Blantyre, where FDH CEO, William Mpinganjira gave a career guidance talk to the students.
Mpinganjira encouraged the students to be focused by making sound decisions which include trading off some flawed behaviours with education.
“We planned to have this initiative which coincides with the commemoration of the Day of African Child which is perfect for us to launch the program. So, this program is about mentoring kids, mentoring these youngsters as they grow so that they can aspire to be successful and that FDH can be part of that growth. So, we want our staff to be involved in the initiative where they will be mentoring the students.
“It is important for all of us as private entities and as FDH to get involved in our communities more than the way we have been doing. So as FDH we have decided that instead of just doing what we normally do, which do donations and then go away, we want our staff now to be involved with the communities that they live in, we believe that as we do then we will live in a sustainable manner and we will understand the needs of our communities and we can serve our customers and our stakeholders even better,” he said.
In his interaction with the students, Mpinganjira encouraged them to aim high, citing an example of his father, who went through the same career path and managed to build his business, including the bank to where it is now.
“We are the third largest bank in Malawi despite being established in 2002 when we had no single ATM, but now we are a financial institution with more ATMs. Dr Mpinganjira, just like you was a student at Box 2 in Zomba,” he added.
To prove it is possible to make it, the CEO shared his story about being a student at Chichiri Primary School from Standard one to eight and aspiring to do his secondary at the institution.
Chichiri Secondary School Headmaster, Allen Mjima commended FDH for choosing to launch the program at their school.
The school’s headboy, Alex Gondwe also praised the bank for the talk and donation of desks and chairs saying it compliments the fight against COVID-19 pandemic.
“We have had a problem of missing classes because students are running up and down looking for chairs to sit on. Sometimes we have students sharing desks which is against rules in fighting the COVID-19 pandemic since social distancing is not adhered to,” he said.
The Day of the African Child has been celebrated on June 16 every year since 1991, when it was first initiated by the OAU Organisation of African Unity. It honors those who participated in the Soweto Uprising in 1976 on that day and continues to highlight the plight of the African child today.
