MASERU – You care about your legacy?
Then the Education Legacy Plan, launched yesterday at a local hotel, will ensure that your children’s educational future is well secured.
Speaking at the launch, Liberty Lesotho Managing Director, Makhakhe Maliehe, said education is the key element in rolling back poverty.
Maliehe said education raises the people’s productivity and creativity while promoting entrepreneurship and technological advances.
He said education plays a critical role in ensuring social and economic progress while improving income distribution.
However, because of rampant joblessness in Lesotho, education is becoming a luxury as parents struggle to feed their families while paying for their children’s fees. Maliehe said the sponsorship programmes are fairly limited in scope with the National Manpower Development Secretariat (NMDS) struggling to meet demand.
It was with all these factors in mind that Liberty Lesotho has come up with a new investment product to help parents and guardians safeguard the educational future of their children. The product is said to be an accessible, innovative and differentiated solution that makes financial freedom possible for Basotho.
Available from as little as M200 per month the policy “encourages savings even among low income earners.”
The ground-breaking savings plan does not only make it easy to save for the child’s education but the product also takes into consideration the financial circumstances that can be faced by a parent which could interrupt their plan to save for those big dreams.
Policy holders have an opportunity to deposit lump sums into the investment scheme as long as the source of income can be verified.
“Those who have won tenders, lotto or perhaps have per diems that are in large sums and do not want to end up misusing the money are allowed to put it in their policies while continuing with their monthly premiums,” Mabohlokoa Makosholo of Liberty said.
Makosholo said this is an answer to even those who were saying that they do not have money on a monthly basis but can actually pay up when they get the money without any penalties.
Customers are allowed to pay their annual premiums once, twice or in a manner preferable to them.
According to Maliehe, the Education Legacy Plan offers the customer a retrenchment protection should they be retrenched.
“Liberty Life Lesotho will pay their premiums for up to six months while they find new employment and get back on your feet so that their children’s big dreams don’t get interrupted,” Maliehe said.
“We are also never going to charge our clients penalties when they want to terminate their policy because as their insurance partners it is also our duty to protect and grow their wealth,” he said. Maliehe said they understand that there are many inevitable events in life hence they give customers an option to stop and restart their payments with no charges or penalties.
“The investment the customer puts in will continue with the funds they have already invested and they can start with payments again at any time thereafter,” Maliehe said. Maliehe said the savings plan is an answer to the people’s needs and wants to make a meaningful contribution to the socio-economic development and future growth of the country.
He said this kind of a product is essential because education expenses are hefty. “We know that it’s more than just the tuition fees to pay, you also need to think about stationery, uniforms, school trips, projects and the list goes on,” he said. He said although the government provides free primary education, families are responsible for paying for secondary tuition and providing other school supplies such as stationery, uniforms and transport.
“The financial strain of paying these supplies is often too high for the family to sustain.” Liberty Lesotho is a specialist life insurance company that provides group and personal risk insurance solutions to clients.
Lemohang Rakotsoane