Moroke Sekoboto
THE National University of Lesotho (NUL) and the Central Bank of Lesotho (CBL) have launched a Personal Finance Management programme which aims to educate people on budgeting, saving, and spending money wisely while considering various financial risks and future life events.
This programme will guide individuals on the suitability of different banking, insurance, and investment products, as well as the management of retirement funds and pensions.
The NUL’s Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences, Peter Khaola, emphasized the university’s strategic intent to produce practical and contemporary programmes tailored to meet the needs of Basotho. He said the faculty’s goal was to create programmes that were not only theoretically rigorous but also professionally and practically useful.
Speaking at a stakeholder workshop held at Lehakoe Recreational and Cultural Centre on Tuesday, Professor Khaola said, “Our programmes should be demand-driven and not supply-driven”.
“We aim to engage in action research that identifies and addresses the needs of Basotho. It’s one thing to have good intentions, but implementing them is another matter. For the past 50 years, we have had good intentions, but now we are committed to changing that narrative,” Prof Khaola said.
Prof Khaola said that NUL was planning to engage more closely with the public. He said the programme aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the National Strategic Development Plan II (NSDPII).
He further said the personal finance programme provided a platform for educating Basotho, aiming for a more financially literate society.
“Even educated people, some of whom are financially literate still continue to make the same mistakes committed by financially illiterate people. We are all suffocating in debt, we are not saving and investing enough, and we are not planning for retirement and yet we say we are financially literate,” he admonished.
Also speaking at the same workshop, CBL’s First Deputy Governor Lehlomelo Mohapi, said they had conducted research between 2016 and 2017 which revealed significant challenges in the financial sector, primarily driven by easy access to borrowing. The research found that people often preferred to borrow from lenders with fewer regulations, despite higher interest rates, leading them to seek intervention from the CBL when they struggled with debt.
“The main driver of our financial problems is the cost of borrowing. People would borrow at 50 percent interest rates to avoid the requirements of regulated financial institutions. We received numerous complaints daily, often about agreements with unregulated financial institutions,” Mr Mohapi said.
“Those emerging, common problems meant a cry for help, we acknowledged the problem in 2022 by starting with money month campaigns. In 2023 we held an indebtedness round table where we resolved to raise awareness about financial literacy. We mainstreamed financial education as a stand-alone matter,” Mr Mohapi said.
In response to these issues, Mr Mohapi said the CBL had initiated money month campaigns in 2022 and an indebtedness round table in 2023 to raise awareness about financial literacy.
The post NUL and CBL partner in personal finance programme appeared first on Lesotho Times.