Ouname Mhotsha

It’s not a common thing to see other young girls playing golf in Botswana. It was mostly older people that were playing. I literally had to force my friends from school to try it and be like, “Hey, come and play golf with me,” because there was really no other young girls that were playing golf. But as I started playing on the national team, other young people started taking an interest in the sport.

Botswana has always had athletes, but it has never had a young golfer that played on the international stage—so I am a trailblazer. But even though it hadn’t been done before, I got endless support from my immediate family members, my community members, even teachers at school, and people at the golf course. Their belief in me has really been the fuel for my journey and what helped me go international. Because of my success, I was able to attend college in the U.S. on golf scholarships.

Growing up in Botswana, we are taught to be proud about who we are and where we come from, so that’s something I’ve always carried with me in all the tournaments that I’ve played internationally.

Peace. There’s a lot of peace that comes with playing golf because it’s a very individual sport. It’s four hours out in nature, whether you’re playing by yourself, you’re playing with friends, or you’re playing with competitors—even then, you’re really competing against the course. That process of internalizing your strengths and weaknesses and knowing how to navigate the challenges on the golf course is peaceful for me.

Trazinah Marudu was one of the older people who was playing when I started. I was a young star getting into the national team, and she took me under her wing. I call her my aunt. People thought she was my real aunt because we were that close. My old coach, Joseph Marudu, is her father. He’s coached every junior golfer that has come out of Botswana. He’s probably one of the longest standing legends of the game. Just to learn from him was amazing. Older people have a way of doing things, so I learned a lot of tricks from him.

When you’re a young person growing up in Botswana, you don’t really think about the impact that the diamonds have on you. We know we’re a diamond country—we hear about it from our adults and all of that—but we don’t really know the context of how diamonds actually fund everything. We know we go to school and that we don’t have to pay, or if you’re paying, it’s just a minimum fee. As I grew up, I got to learn about how much these diamonds support us. I think it’s really amazing that I come from a country that is peaceful, has resources that can support me, and makes sure I have the best opportunities to be the best that I can be.

Being a young person who was by herself playing golf with a lot of adults, I knew I had to share the opportunities and the access that I had. A bigger dream was to have something with more impact that can reach more young people, so I applied for the International Olympic Committees Young Leaders Programme. I received funding to start a nonprofit, so I formed the Ouname Mhotsha Foundation and established Thanya Monana Projects as our first initiative. We are trying to give access to golf to young people in Botswana who don’t have access—whether it’s a barrier to information, that they live far from the golf course, or that they just don’t know that golf is a sport with opportunities they can use.

Through the Botswana Golf Courses Activation Tour, we are going to be hosting a nationwide tour to show people who live close to a golf course that they have a golf course next door and that the doors are open to come and practice. They can take their kid there, there’s a coach, and most of the lessons are going to be free for young people. We’re also going to host Botswana Golf Week, which will be more of a business-themed event to bring all stakeholders in the sport together. We want to make sure people know that, in Botswana, we can look at golf as not just a sport but an industry that can supply jobs.

My favorite part of our work is our youth mentorship group. I want to help young people like me to access the academic opportunities that come with golf by giving them information about tournaments and scholarships that are available in the U.S. and really starting them young. By the time they’re 16 and 18, they’ll know they can qualify to play for a university abroad, be able to access that opportunity, and benefit from it as much as I have.

It’s something that I’m really proud of. It’s the spirit of Botswana: If you find something good, you have to share it with others.