Two of Nelson Mandela’s granddaughters have partnered with the Relate Trust in a bid to raise more than R100-million for job creation and literacy.
In a joint media briefing, Princess Zaziwe Manaway and Princess Swati Dlamini-Mandela announced the launch of a Mandela Centenary Relate bracelet‚ which will retail for R50.
Dlamini-Mandela and Manaway are the directors of the company known as Long Walk to Freedom Brand.
The money raised would be used to pay makers of the bracelet‚ which include the elderly and the unemployed youth in townships from the Western Cape and Durban.
The rest would be donated to charitable causes‚ which include the Nelson Mandela Literacy Project‚ whose libraries are donated to schools in need.
Relate Trust has raised more than R50-million through its crowdfunding model of selling bracelets globally since 2010.
“If every tax-paying South African bought one Mandela Centenary Relate bracelet‚ we would achieve our vision of raising R100-million in honour of what would have been Nelson Mandela’s 100th year‚”
Relate chief executive Neil Robinson said. Robert Coutts, of the Mandela Education Programme, said the donation would assist the programme in ensuring that it continued to deliver portable libraries to reach more primary school children.
Coutts said the literacy rate at Grade 5 level had been measured at 32% in the country. He said schools that had been supplied with its libraries had passed the 50% mark for Grade 5s.
The programme provides a shipping container library which is fully stocked with reading materials.
