Thembalethu Primary School in Soweto played host today to the official handover of 10,000 netballs and 5,000 rugby balls to underprivileged schools across South Africa. The donation comes from Discovery and its clients, who contributed either by donating their rewards through Vitality’s philanthropic crowdfunding platform “MoveToGive” or by tapping their Discovery Bank virtual cards around the 2023 Rugby World Cup. Discovery also donated a netball for every goal scored by our national side, the Spar Proteas during the Netball World Cup.
Thembalethu is one of more than 1 000 schools, which are beneficiaries of the donation that will be distributed by six non-profit sports development organisations. The organisations are Netball South Africa, Tag Rugby Association, VUKA Rugby, South African Deaf Rugby Association and Dreamfields Projects, each of which work with communities where sports opportunities are limited, and provide coaching, equipment, and tournaments for young players.
Firoze Bhorat, Discovery’s Chief Marketing Officer said, “Sport has the power to inspire young girls and boys to achieve their goals and dreams, and we’re excited to make this donation as part of our commitment to promote sports development and physical activity to build a healthier society. We also thank Discovery clients for making this donation possible through their incredible participation in the campaigns we ran over the Netball and Rugby World Cup tournaments last year.”
The official handover ceremony was attended by representatives from the receiving organisations as well as officials from the Department of Sports & Recreation who expressed their gratitude for the support.
Driven by its aim to be a force for social good, the two campaigns Discovery ran – #LetsGoal and Discovery Bank’s TapToGive – worked as follows:
• #Let’sGoal allowed Vitality members to donate the Discovery Miles they earned by reaching their weekly exercise goal through MoveToGive (Vitality’s philanthropic crowdfunding platform) towards a netball. A total of 2500 netballs raised.
• Discovery Bank’s TapToGive campaign coincided with the 2023 Rugby World Cup between September and November and through it, clients donated rugby balls and netballs. If a client used their Discovery Bank virtual card for 50 in-store taps or online payments, one rugby ball or netball was donated on their behalf. Discovery Bank clients embraced the opportunity to give and activated almost 46,000 new limited-edition virtual cards. A total of 62,000 clients shopped enough to achieve a total of 590,000 taps, enabling the donation of 5,000 rugby balls and 5,000 netballs.
As the official wellness partner to Netball South Africa, Discovery also donated netballs for every goal scored by the Spar Proteas during the World Cup. This resulted in the donation of 2500 balls.
“South Africa had a remarkable year in sports in 2023, and we all experienced the excitement of being united through sport. These campaigns came at the perfect time to enable sports supporters across the country to help develop sport at its foundation,” Bhorat added.
About the beneficiaries:
• Tag Rugby Association – a non profit, public benefit organisation and an Associate Member of the South African Rugby Union (SARU) that develops youth sport programmes.
• VUKA Rugby – a sustainable rugby programme developed by the South African Rugby Legends (SARLA), in partnership with SARU, that aims to develop and promote rugby in disadvantaged communities and areas where it is not being played.
• South African Deaf Rugby Association – an associate member of SARU that supports deaf and hard of hearing youth and creates opportunities for them to play rugby regionally and internationally.
• Dreamfields – a non-profit organisation that uses the power of sport – including finding and coaching the next generation of netball stars – to create better schools, more opportunities and stronger communities in rural areas and townships.
• Netball South Africa – the governing body for netball in South Africa which is responsible for overseeing the practice of the sport across the country.
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