By: Reitumetse Mahloane
Maseru
Entrepreneurship is one essential component to ensure any country’s economic growth. Young people, with their energetic and entrepreneurial spirit, may positively influence generations and communities within which their businesses operate. In our country, Lesotho, there are brilliant minds as well. In this article, I will focus on one, whom I had the pleasure of interviewing. Mohlaoli Mahamo, who owns an incredible company – Mahamo Construction.
Mohlaoli is a young, enthusiastic entrepreneur, who has always been interested in business operations from a young age. At the age of 22, he founded Mahamo Construction, on August 12th 2022, located at Ha Besele Maseru. The company offers various services: carpentry and joinery, and plumbing. The young entrepreneur has admitted to having partnered with a few of his fellow classmates, from the institution of Lerotholi Polytechnic. Having been inspired by their lecturers who have had the experience of this kind of work for many years, they decided to follow in their footsteps.
As a young person, Mohlaoli understands the struggles of the youth, since for a while now employment of young people remains one of the main problems that persist. So, being the selfless person he is, he decided to teach his community age mates all about his job. He believes that the free lessons he offers them will help improve their lifestyles for the better and that the business will grow on them as it did on him. He proudly mentioned that he is in the process of working with some architectures, and that is how vastly the business has progressed.
At the moment, him and his work team are working on log homes. “I am eternally grateful for the opportunity I have been given to work on Mimosa car wash and Dong Dong club.” He expressed. “I feel like every project I work on is an opportunity for me to keep showcasing my talent, hence I do it with so much pleasure and passion.” He continued.
He also mentioned how happy and satisfied all his clients have been. He has not come across any complaints or bad reviews about his work. On the contrary, he has had quite a few recommendations from his past clients because he had left them amazed with his work.
Mahamo Construction owner emphasized that the company did not start off easy, taking it up from the ground took a lot of patience and hard work. He mentioned this in regard to how the business was financed. He said that although they would have liked some help when they began, they were never able to get any sponsors, investors or any kind of external help of any kind. They have solely depended on themselves since the very beginning. Hence he is grateful to his partners, who are now his friends. He did mention however, that they are still open for any kind of donations.
He said that at this time the donations would come in handy as he is planning and hoping to open a school of the same field he is in in the near future. A school where all young people will be able to present their talents, learn new things from their mentors and even come up with new creative and innovative ideas. Mohlaoli says that this is not only for his businesses’ economic growth, but for the development of his community as well. Moreover, he believes that the parents and guardians of these young people will forever be thankful to him as he ensures that he will take care of them, away from all the mischief and only towards success.
I personally believe that Mohlaoli has done a remarkable job as an entrepreneur despite all the challenges, the lack of funding and the fear of the bureaucracy. Also, he is very brave for taking the initiative to help out his fellow community members.
At his age, he has offered what the government has continually experienced hiccups in trying to perform and so coming to its aid to a certain extent. He has created employment for the youth and even offered something priceless – education. Him, and other young people just like him are active participants of the pulse of this country, the cadence to promote positive changes, performance and desire to succeed.