During his time in Windhoek’s informal settlement, Nafimane Halweendo, a then-unemployed law graduate and other unemployed youths used to sit under a tree to discuss various topics daily. 

This motivated him to create Bashu, an information-sharing media platform that serves as a database that connects people based on various topics of interest. 

This has become known as a safe place for teaching, learning and connecting. 

“These impoverished people from the informal settlements are smart and informed. They discuss issues properly and orderly. This moved me greatly,” he said. 

He added: “In 2015, I started visiting the Bashus with other professionals on an initiative called Bashu Attack, which was an initiative to support as many Bashu businesses as possible. The people there welcomed us, despite the deplorable living conditions. They were vibrant and full of energy”. 

This catapulted him into creating the Bashu platform. 

“It’s then that I decided to create social media platform Bashu to symbolise the tenacity and spirit of coming from such deplorable living conditions, and still be able to keep a smile and respectfully interact with each other,” detailed the founder of Nafimane Halweendo Legal Practitioners. 

He said Bashu was first conceptual i sed in 2015. However, the prototype was only developed and coded in 2019, during which time he kept improving the functionalities before it first went live on the AppStore in 2022. 

“We kept it in the Beta testing phase since then to improve the functionalities. We are now ready to make it accessible to the public,” Halweendo said. 

He believes that Bashu is the future of social media interaction in Africa and the world at large, as its features and styling are unique from any other App in existence. 

“In two years, Bashu will be a key player in the social media space. The App currently has over 10 000 registered users that are growing rapidly by the day. Bashu is a topics-based app. It connects people based on topics,” he said. The vocal legal head noted that the problem today is that social media posts are not arranged into topics so that users can choose which topics they want to engage with. 

“The current social media platforms are disorganised. Bashu solves this by properly arranging each post into a specified topic, which makes it easier for users to find and engage with relevant content – be it for research, social interaction, music or just fun,” said Halweendo. 

-psiririka@nepc.com.na