What can 655 kilometres on a bicycle achieve? For the Nelson Mandela Legacy Ride4Hope, the answer is measured in classrooms, learning environments and opportunities for children.
More than 100 cyclists, including 10 Absa colleagues, took on the journey across Mozambique and South Africa as part of the ninth edition of the Nelson Mandela Legacy Ride4Hope, an initiative endorsed by the Nelson Mandela Foundation that raised funds to improve foundation-phase education infrastructure in disadvantaged schools.
Ride4Hope has evolved from providing school uniforms, food parcels and classroom furnishings to a longer-term commitment of # Classrooms4Hope – rebuilding and developing classrooms that give children better environments in which to learn.
For Absa, the initiative demonstrates what sustained partnerships can achieve when social impact moves beyond once-off interventions towards lasting infrastructure.
“ At the heart of our Corporate Citizenship work is a commitment to creating tangible and sustainable impact,” said Setlogane Manchidi, Managing Executive: Corporate Citizenship at Absa.“ Education is fundamental to that ambition because a child’ s learning journey is shaped not only by what they are taught, but also by the environment in which they learn.”
Through its partnership with Ride4Hope, Absa has contributed 12 classrooms across four schools in Gauteng, the Eastern Cape and KwaZulu-Natal.
This year ' s ride ended at the Nelson Mandela Capture Site in Howick, a fitting destination for a journey centred on education, opportunity and creating a better future for children.
For the 10 Absa cyclists who joined the ride, the journey also represented an opportunity to act on the organisation ' s purpose of Empowering Africa’ s tomorrow together, one story at a time.
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“ The significance of this journey is not simply that more than 100 people cycled 655 kilometres. It is that every kilometre connected to something much bigger; the opportunity to give children classrooms in which they can learn, dream and build their futures. Nine years on, we can see what sustained commitment and collective action can achieve,” said Manchidi.
The journey concluded with an Absa-hosted congratulatory gala dinner at the Nelson Mandela Capture Site, bringing together cyclists, partners and supporters to commemorate the impact of this initiative and reflect on the continued commitment to being a force for good.
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