An annual employee community initiative spearheaded by Bank Windhoek has reached N$4 million in total community investment following a N$700,000 funding allocation for this year’s project.
The Empathy Project provides nearly 2,000 Bank Windhoek employees nationwide with seed funding to directly identify and respond to urgent social needs in their surrounding areas. This year, staff members are actively working to build, equip, and renovate local schools, care centres, and community facilities.
In Omborondo, 55 kilometres outside Omaruru, the laughter of children carried across a dusty yard as Bank Windhoek employees unpacked tables, chairs, crayons and colouring books. For many of the children, it was the first time they had sat at a proper table rather than on a thin mat on the floor.
“Empathy is more than a slogan on a banner. It is our people walking into a community, asking what is really needed and staying long enough to help fix it. That is the kind of bank we want to be: one that knows its communities by name,” said Bank Windhoek’s Head of Strategic Communication and Social Impact, Bronwyn Moody.
In Ongwediva, branch staff helped build a traditional pit latrine at the Dr Frans Aupa Indongo Special Children Centre, which cares for about 40 children with special needs. Working alongside community members and local development officials, the team dug, lifted and built a facility that will improve sanitation and dignity for years to come, and handed out sweet packages to the children.
At a small rural school in the Omusati Region, the Oshakati North Branch team found that a lack
of water storage meant precious water was lost with every delivery. The team responded with a new 5 000-litre water tank and stationery, helping the school make better use of its limited supply while supporting more than 300 learners. In Eenhana, employees donated fencing to a newly established school of 131 learners, where security is one of the biggest challenges.
In Noordoewer, a team provided toiletries to 40 high-school learners after teachers noted that many families struggle to afford basic hygiene products. In Swakopmund, employees honoured the car guards who keep watch outside the branch, handing over care packages, vegetables, soup jars, gas stoves and gas bottles.
In Windhoek, the Collateral Compliance Department contributed bricks and cement to the Home of Good Hope in Goreangab for a new facility that will support hundreds of vulnerable children and young people.
For the Omaruru Branch team, the difference lay in doing the work themselves. “We did not simply purchase and deliver items. We personally painted, installed, welded, created and built,” the team said. Their lesson was simple: what may seem small to us can mean everything to someone else – a sentiment that echoed through many of this year’s projects.
Across Namibia, Bank Windhoek employees planted seedlings, delivered food, built infrastructure, painted classrooms and spent time with people who are often overlooked, showing that the true return on the Bank’s investment is not measured in Namibian dollars alone.
Bank Windhoek has run the Empathy Project since 2015, giving staff the opportunity each year to support communities across the country. The initiative reflects the Bank’s belief that a bank is more than buildings, ATMs and debit orders; it is also its people, who live in the same towns and care about the same communities as their customers.
By the end of this year’s projects, there were no grand speeches – just children settling into new
chairs, learners behind a safer fence and communities knowing someone had noticed. And sometimes, that is where meaningful change starts.
