SLB, Red Cross partner for inmates
‘MAKERESEMESE LETUKA
MASERU – The Maseru Central Correctional facility on Wednesday received ‘tippy tanks’ from a joint venture of Standard Lesotho Bank (SLB) and Lesotho Red Cross Society. The tippy taps were made by inmates the Leribe correctional facility and handed out to sister facilities in Maseru, Mafeteng, Mohale’s Hoek; each was provided with two. M8 000 was facilitated by the SLB for completion of the project.
Speaking at the handover on behalf of the Minster of Law and Justice Principal Secretary, Lebeko Sello, said he was grateful to the two organisations which were able to cater for the facilities – especially in this time of the Covid pandemic.
“These tippy taps will come in handy for the convicts in these hard times,” Lebeko said. “When the pandemic started we were very worried about what would happen if anyone within our facilities got infected, looking at the number of the people who stay in this place.
On behalf of the Lesotho Correctional Services community Acting Commissioner Joel Chabana Majara said: “Water was already scarce because of the high demand in this place, these tippy taps will meet us half way in adhering to the COVID-19 protocols.”
In the same vein the Secretary General of the LRCS Kopano Masilo indicated that since the dawn of the pandemic his Society has spent over M46 million for projects of the same nature to curb the spread of infection. He said correctional service facilities remained one place at which when one is infected that the rate of spread can be very quickly and highly.
“Some of the funding comes from the Standard Bank build on the relationship we established a long time ago, and we are yet to go into more projects across the country during this time of the pandemic,” he continued. SLB donated M217 000 to the LRCS to construct 34 tippy taps, their tanks, soap dispensers and sinks.
The LRCS tippy tap project started in August 2020 with taps, tanks and dispensers installed in all the taxi ranks in the ten districts of the country. Four of the Society’s health centres (Kena, Kolojane, Mapholaneng and Thaba-Bosiu), schools, correctional service facilities and other public places such as Traffic Department were also beneficiaries of the project.
The launch of the project was officiated by King Letsie III and the Prime Minister Moeketsi Majoro in Semonkong while in other districts government ministers and other government dignitaries did the honours.
The SLB has on the other hand donated M1 million to the local private sector community drive in an independent non-profit making fund to contribute in national response efforts, pooling finances through ‘Sesiu sa letšoele le beta poho’ (SESIU) to procure and distribute Covid vaccinations.
This unified private sector initiative is mandated to augment and expedite government’s COVID-19 response plan.