​Bokamoso Skills and Economic Development Center is an organization with a general objective to nurture a new generation of commercial and social entrepreneurs who are change agents and change-makers within their communities. Additionally, the objective extends to contributing to poverty reduction through entrepreneurship development programs that focus on incubating and mentoring emerging entrepreneurs.
According to coordinator Elizabeth Marabe (64), largely known as Mme Lizzy, Bokamoso was initially founded in the year 2000, when a Roman Catholic Priest had an interest in teaching the youth technological and computer skills as at that time they were using typewriters, so the priest wanted to teach the youth new technology in the Sedibeng District Municipality. ”Back then, it was just me, the priest and a few members of the congregation, as most people were not interested in what was a startup in the early days of the rise of technology, so it was challenging to start a programme from the ground” said Marabe.

‘We had struggled for 6 years until in 2006 when then MEC of Social Development was in a quest to find projects and Nonprofit Organizations that are pioneered and or led by women, and found that in our area Evaton in Sebokeng there was a Roman Catholic’s church project I was involved in called Children’s Room. So in 2006, we got funded by the Department of Social Development where our programs focused mostly on teaching English, computer literacy, typewriting, and tackled some of the issues faced by the youth,’ explained Marabe.

From then, the organization gradually expanded and developed new programs, then began to receive a large influx of local people interested in partaking in different programs, varying from life skills, computer skills, financial literacy skills , the food bank and other programs. This attracted attention and led to more support from local businesses, added Marabe.

Pholo Molote (18) from Evaton, was a guest during a launch of Food Relief by the Department of Social Development and Solidarity Fund. Molote is one of the beneficiaries from the Bokamoso Skills and Economic Development center, doing merchandising. ”I found out about Bokamoso through Lulaway’s website, a job/skills and employment engine that assists people with job opportunities and skills development programs.

This site referred me to a merchandising course at Bokamoso. The course is for 4 months, I started in March 2021 and it’s in Small Farms. This is an example of what practically would be like as merchandisers; therefore, we were invited to further explore what Bokamoso does. Bokamoso tries to find us companies to do our practicals and this counts as experience that we can use to sell ourselves when we look for jobs” said Molote.