BY MBONGENI NDLELA
MBABANE – Minister of Sports, Culture & Youth Affairs Harries Bulunga has today launched a partnership between the Youth Enterprise Revolving Fund (YERF) and Limkokwing University. The partnership is aimed at capacitating the University’s entrepreneurship students to prepare finance ready business proposals to be then able to access funding from the Youth Fund.
Speaking during the launch, Minister Bulunga said “The Fund has so far not run out of funding to finance youth-owned businesses due to the fact that there is still not enough business proposals worth funding being submitted by the youth. This partnership with Limkokwing University allows us to upscale our growing response initiatives to this challenge.
Minister Bulunga added, “We remain committed to making the Youth Fund sustainable, effective and adequately responsive to the needs of our young people.”
YERF CEO Bhekizwe Maziya also expressed great enthusiasm for the partnership between the Fund and the University. He said, “The partnership of the Fund with Limkokwing is focusing on training the would-be applicants on entrepreneurship while they are still at the University in preparing them for funding by YERF. The University will also provide mentorship services to funded beneficiaries under this program to ensure their success & sustainability.”
Maziya added “This partnership together with the first one signed with UNESWA in September 2021 will help improve the training programs by the universities to ensure that the graduates they produce have what it takes to access funding, not only from YERF but from any financial institution.”
Limkokwing University Director Tfobile Gumede expressed that the partnership is in line with their institution’s vision for the country’s youth. Director Gumede said “This partnership strengthens an entrepreneurship programme that already exists within the institution. Our vision is to truly accelerate entrepreneurship amongst young people.”
