Business veteran and Group CEO of ITHUBA Holdings, Charmaine Mabuza has scooped the Top Woman in Education Award at the Vision 2030 Awards recently held in Emperors Palace, Gauteng.



This award
recognizes Mabuza for her contribution in the South African education sector
through the Eric and Charmaine Mabuza Scholarship Foundation. 



The Foundation,
established in 1999 by Mpumalanga business veterans, Advocate Eric and
Charmaine Mabuza initially supported young and talented matriculants in the
Mpumalanga region to further their tertiary studies. Since then, the
Foundation’s reach has expanded throughout South Africa, producing Doctors,
Accountants, Engineers, Quantity Surveyors and many more.



Commenting on
the award, Mabuza said: “This award represents many years of hard work and
determination towards the advancement of equal access to quality education for
all South Africans. The mission of the scholarship foundation is to eradicate
poverty through education, particularly in previously marginalized communities.
As corporate leaders, we know that there is still a lot to be done, but we are
ready and willing to do our part. We look forward to another decade of serving
the nation”. 



One of the
beneficiaries of the Scholarship Foundation, Dr. Kate Lusiki who now works at
the Rob Ferreira Hospital expressed her gratitude: “Since I started working, I
have been able to renovate my mother’s house. I am currently staying with my
older sister whom I am putting through college so that she too can also have a
solid educational structure. I am able to do these things for my family because
the Advocate and Mrs Mabuza afforded me an opportunity to education. This
Foundation to me, has been like a better life handed to me on a silver platter,
and for that I am eternally grateful.”



The 2020
Scholarship programme will launch with the new intake of students on 12 January
with a week-long programme at the ITHUBA offices in Sandton.

ITHUBA CEO_Mrs Mabuza- 4

Business Veteran Scoops Top Vision 2030 Award

Ghana is one of the world’s fastest-growing economies this year, according to the World Bank, the African Development Bank and the IMF. Its projected growth in 2018 is between 8.3-8.9%.
The Ghanaian workforce is young, with 57% of the population under the age of 25. This means millions of new graduates enter the workforce each year. One woman who understands the struggle that awaits this unsuspecting group in corporate Ghana is Human Resources (HR) entrepreneur, Rita Kusi.
Kusi is the founder and CEO of Keeping “U” Simply Intact (KUSI) Consulting, a marketing, training and recruiting company based in the United States (US) and in Ghana. She is also the Managing Director of threesixtyGh, a social enterprise company with an online presence showcasing innovative ventures in Ghana and the people behind them.
Born in Bolga, Northern Ghana, Kusi’s family gained access to the US through the US Visa Lottery in the early 80s. The family relocated to the US in 1991 where Kusi remained until 2013. And that is also where she amassed a wealth of experience working in several sectors.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/entreprenuers/2018/04/24/cracking-the-code-and-bridging-the-gender-gap/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: Cracking the Code and Bridging The Gender Gap</a>
After college, Kusi worked a number of temporary jobs, from telemarketing in Atlanta to door-to-door sales in Maryland. She even tried her hands at customer services and working in cafes.
“I think for me having held all these jobs opened my eyes and I realized especially what I wanted to do in corporate America,” says Kusi.
All these experiences came together when she applied for a new role as HR assistant. When she did not hear back from the company regarding her application, Kusi took the initiative and called the hiring manager.
“So my dad told me to call and get feedback and as I called my CV happened to be in front of the hiring manager and he invited me in for the interview. I knew nothing about HR but I was just really looking for a job and I ended up getting that job and it was the longest I ever stayed at any job so that was a sign,” says Kusi.
She had finally found her calling in HR but it was not until a nostalgic visit back home that she would merge all her US experience together, ushering in a new life as an entrepreneur.
There were no real training programs at the time focused on improving the quality of customer service in Ghana. Kusi seized the opportunity to provide quality HR training programs, which she hoped organizations would pay for. And they did. This was the birth of Kusi Consulting.
From training services, the company has morphed its offerings into recruitment services and Kusi is now diversifying into skills-training as well as business process outsourcing, where the company handles the pay roll function for other corporate clients. Her timing couldn’t be more perfect. Hiring the right people is critical for companies to reduce employee attrition and enhance returns from HR. Companies face challenges in accurately perceiving and assessing an employee’s quality attributes prior to hiring that employee. This problem is more pronounced in African economies, which involves novices who do not have prior work records attesting to their raw skills, learning abilities and motivation. And this is where Kusi comes in.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/focus/2018/02/13/remembering-corporate-legend/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: Remembering A Corporate Legend</a>
She believes a specialist HR function is imperative in every organization to ensure maximum output by each employee. However, she has had some difficulty convincing corporate Ghana.
“It has been challenging operating here especially being a female because it is literally a man’s world and in this country, it’s all about who you know… There is that challenge of how do I make myself look older and more respected?” she says.
But ever resilient, Kusi refuses to back down. She hopes to create her own temp agency where she has skilled staff inhouse which she can outsource on demand to other companies. Her newly-formed team is just as passionate about the business and with that focus, she is rebranding her company to be a leader in HR not only in Ghana but across Africa.

Rita-1

The Ghanaian Who Brought HR Corporate America To Ghana

Tabitha Karanja is in a svelte black dress and seated in the boardroom of her well-appointed Nairobi office. She has a disarming smile and a gentleness that makes it hard to imagine that, in this very boardroom, this soft-spoken mother of four has struck many a business deal and battled feisty competitors. Those who work with her know that beneath the pleasant exterior is a hard-nosed businesswoman with a strong mind and a stronger resolve.
This is evident every morning she revs up her Range Rover to 120kph, driving an hour and 91 kilometers to her Naivasha brewery from her home in Nairobi. This is a woman with a drive few can match. She is the face of corporate Kenya.
Karanja is CEO of Keroche Breweries, Kenya’s second largest brewer (East African Breweries Limited is leader). In all of Africa, she is perhaps the only woman to have founded a beer company. It is an industry for the big boys, but an industry she says she has never felt out of place in. Her heart is in beer-making, and this is where she says she will continue to be, brewing up more action in the years to come.
In August, Karanja celebrated her 50th birthday in Nairobi with close friends and business associates. In many ways, it was a tribute to the milestones she reached in the industry.
“I don’t feel old,” says Karanja. Where most women would have contemplated slowing down after 50, Karanja does not see retirement anywhere on the radar. If anything, the game has only begun.
In January, her brewery in Naivasha will increase capacity by 10 times in a $100 million expansion plan. Where currently it manufactures 60,000 bottles a day, the upgraded facility will produce 600,000 bottles, as Karanja stridently looks to widen her reach in the rest of East Africa and increase her market share to 20%.
Her top-sellers are Summit Lager and Summit Malt, which started production in 2008 as “naturally-brewed, sugar-free, and hygienic alternatives” targeting consumers in the low-end alcohol market that could not afford elite brands or were more dependent on illicit brews.
Today, it is clear Kenya’s social climbers want more. Business is anything but flat.
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“We are launching another beer brand in the next six months. I want the Summit brand to be all over Africa. The brand should live beyond my time,” says Karanja.
Beer or paint?
Karanja’s story is one of resilience and determination. Her first job was with the Ministry of Tourism in Kenya. Thereafter, her maiden business venture, with husband Joseph Karanja, was a hardware store, which she ran for 10 years. She wanted to diversify, and began searching the market for ideas, which is when she saw a gap in the beer market. Her other option was to sell paint, but she thought: “How often will a man paint his house? I have to go in for fast-moving consumer goods.”
With a paltry KSh200,000 ($2,200) from her savings and the 30 acres of land in Naivasha that she owned, in 1998, she started manufacturing fortified wines from a one-room facility. After 10 years in the wine and spirit business, she entered the beer market with the Summit brand.
“People were left to drinking anything that was available in the villages. I came up with a product that was affordable, hygienic and met international standards,” says Karanja.
The challenges were many, as it took a whole year – and several desperate trips to the financing banks – before the brand finally gained traction.
“We didn’t have anyone’s support. People did not understand there could be another brewery in this country. We had to fight and break that monopoly by not giving up, and believing that if multinationals can do it, so can we, as it’s good for the country, and good for Africa, so we can create jobs. There was no looking back.”
Over the years, Karanja has taken on the might of the competitors and the many “smear campaigns” against her, but did she face any setbacks for being a woman?
“I guess I am one of the few lucky women in business. I have never had to face discrimination. People don’t see me as a woman, they see me as an entrepreneur. I believe in myself, and believe in whatever I am doing.”
This belief is an attribute she intends imparting to the next generation of Kenyan business leaders. In May this year, her company launched the Keroche Foundation to train and mentor upcoming entrepreneurs and small business owners. Her company employs over 300 people and gives back to the community through youth education.
The young ones in her own family are taking her cue. Karanja’s 26-year-old daughter Anerlisa Muigai is following in her mother’s footsteps. After a marketing degree in London, Muigai returned to Nairobi last year to launch Executive, a line of still bottled water for a niche market.
“I have always looked up to my mother. She has been my biggest inspiration, she gives me hope in so many ways,” says the young entrepreneur. “She is a successful businesswoman because she never gives up. She conquers every goal, is a go-getter and very smart. I like that she comes home and does not make the house an office.”
Karanja agrees that for a woman juggling work and family, there are immeasurable sacrifices to be made every day.
“Being at the top, you have to balance it all. When you sleep, you are so tired, because you have made sure everything has gone right, that you have fed your family, and you have given time for your business. It’s difficult as there are sacrifices you make, like giving up on your sleep. I sleep after midnight, and wake at six.
“Every day after work, I take a Summit Malt. It does not give you a hangover, it’s good for the body,” she says. Even at home, Karanja cannot stay without endorsing the brand she is so passionate about.

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The Iron Lady Of Beer

Saloni Wahi puts down her cup of coffee and shakes her head. The café we are in is buzzing with young TV journalists and executives respectful of her presence. Saloni smiles and exchanges a word with each of them, inquiring about their work, asking about their families, radiating the warmth she is synonymous with.
It is hard to ignore her; and harder to describe her. A few minutes with her and you are convinced no one description would suffice: she is wife, mother, businesswoman, artist, gourmet chef, philanthropist, and above all, a perfectionist.
“Credibility is everything to me,” she says, thumbing through a sheaf of papers. She is organizing a fundraising event for the ABN Education Trust on September 8, and there is much to do, details that need to be ironed out. Yet, you can tell it’s not the event she’s worried about. It’s the beneficiaries that are her real remit: children in need, women in despair, single mothers who are abandoned.
There’s pathos in her voice as she talks about acts of kindness that can change the lives of the less fortunate.
“It doesn’t matter whether you are in India or Africa, children are the same everywhere. To me, giving back is integral to my being,” she says.
Originally from Delhi in India but based in Dubai since 1989, Saloni moved to Johannesburg in 2007 after her husband, Rakesh Wahi, along with Zafar Siddiqi, set up the ABN Group, which includes CNBC Africa and FORBES AFRICA.
In 2011, they began talking about setting up a foundation, the ABN Education Trust, for their charitable activities, and decided on two causes. The first to develop skills in financial journalism by providing bursaries for a few children, drawn from disadvantaged families, each year at the University of the Witwatersrand and University of Johannesburg. During the graduation, they are offered internships and subsequently have the option of fulltime work with the Group.
“I received a bursary from the ABN Trust and the icing on the cake was the life-changing opportunity to work for an internationally-affiliated media company. Today, I get to live my dream every day,” says Leigh-Ann Carey, one of the beneficiaries who is now a trainee producer with CNBC Africa.
The second segment the Trust prioritized was orphans.
“We started working with an orphanage in Alexandra. Most children were abandoned by HIV-infected parents. It is creditable how the founders and caretakers of the orphanage have worked tirelessly to help children that would otherwise have died or ended up on the street,” says Saloni.
<img decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-29507 alignleft" src="http://www.forbesafrica.com/app/uploads/2017/05/Saloni-Wahi_7644-1-300x212.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="212" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Saloni-Wahi_7644-1-300x212.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Saloni-Wahi_7644-1-600x423.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Saloni-Wahi_7644-1-768x542.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Saloni-Wahi_7644-1-1024x722.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Saloni-Wahi_7644-1.jpg 1023w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />
Over the years, through the Trust, Saloni has committed her resources towards caring for the children, participating in Christmas parties, gifting them provisions, and buying them a bus to safely commute in.
“None of our efforts would have seen fruition without the efforts of the entire team at the ABN Group, particularly Roberta Naicker, Nola Mashaba and more recently, Sian Schlebusch. We are currently working with the orphanage founders and management to find a permanent shelter for the children. This is a critical requirement,” she says.
Saloni has made a significant financial commitment towards this cause. In addition, the ABN Group has also been blessed with support from partners such as the IDC that has contributed directly to the orphanage.
“Our intention is to help facilitate resources for these causes and take these initiatives to other parts of the continent where we are setting up meaningful businesses. We would be expanding these activities to Ghana, Nigeria and Kenya. Along with Roberta and the team, I will be now looking at how to put a formal structure to the foundation in these countries,” says Saloni.
Philanthropy is not new for the Wahis. Hailing from an illustrious business family in India, Saloni says she has seen acts of kindness from a young age. Marrying into an equally-philanthropic family has allowed her to continue to do social good all through her life which is integral to her existence.
And like most people, Saloni’s journey has not been without significant responsibilities.
“When my husband started out in business after leaving the Indian Army [in 1988], I had a challenging life. Ricki [Rakesh] was traveling to Russia and other parts of the world as he was trying to make a success in a very different world from the Army. Not only did I have the responsibility of bringing up Sidharth and Shweta, but I had to double up to support all the executive functions of the small trading business we had established.”
She continued through thick and thin as the solid anchor for the family making sure the children never missed anything and Rakesh had all the support he needed at work.
“I could never have achieved anything without her indulgence, positivity and perseverance,” says Rakesh, “she has truly been my compass and Rock of Gibraltar.”
With a continued focus on education, the Group has recently set up a university in Ghana with Lancaster University in the UK; it’s their second initiative after the Murdoch University in Dubai; and they offer scholarships to students on both campuses.
Excerpts from the interview with Saloni:
Your philanthropic take on wealth creation?
My great grandfathers had established charitable trusts in India and I have seen the family’s involvement in schools and hospitals in North India that benefitted children from disadvantaged families. Their work has outlived their time on earth. This is true wealth creation. Both my husband’s parents have been involved with setting up institutions to benefit the poor. For me, as a woman, if the work my husband and I are doing is carried forward and built on by our children, I would consider myself blessed. Both children have been involved with the Trust through their own contributions. Sidharth, our son, is a Trustee, while our daughter, Shweta, a young fashion designer, has raised significant funds through her own initiatives and has recently offered fashion school bursaries in Mauritius.
How important is it for African businesses to give back?
Africa occupies a unique position – on the one hand, it is the cradle of mankind and has abundant natural resources. On the other hand, it’s a young continent with respect to its economic development. For all-round inclusive economic growth, it is imperative private business plays an important role along with the state. While a lot is being done by both corporates and individuals, given the magnitude of the continent, and the nascent stage of its development, a lot more needs to be done.
Is enough being done to educate women, especially in areas such as reproductive health?
There are several programs undertaken by developed countries on issues of malnutrition, infant mortality and reproductive and maternal health. I do not believe enough is being done. Providing care in the early years of an infant is crucial for mother and child.
I would also like to highlight the prevalence of ‘single mothers’ across the continent. To my mind, this is what makes the African woman most vulnerable. There is a need to educate both boys and girls about the importance of family values and taking ‘basic responsibility’ for nurturing the infants they bring into this world. Education on the ‘development of a responsible family unit’ will be significant  in solving issues like crime, HIV, unemployment, and will provide protection for the girl child. The approach has to be preventative rather than only curative or crisis-based.
Any advice for juggling work and family?
You need to balance your life and set clear priorities. These must not be compromised either at work or on the family side. The second most important aspect is sharing responsibilities with your partner. This is critical for the right balance. Yet another aspect is developing hobbies. We tend to neglect what we are passionate about. Besides the Trust and my involvement with the family investments, I am passionate about cooking, golf and pottery.
A charity auction and fundraising morning with the theme ‘Heavenly White High Tea’ will be held in aid of the ABN Education Trust on September 8 at 54 on Bath, Rosebank, Johannesburg. To book a table, call +27113840314.

Going  Above & Beyond

The names Nhlanhla Nciza and Mafikizolo are like bread and butter. Nciza embodies style and elegance, but behind this creative, is a businesswoman trying to make her mark parallel to her music career.
When she grabs the microphone, the world dances at her feet. Nciza fills the stage with joie de vivre and ebullience. She has the voice most people only dream of, that contemporary, yet retro throwback to Miriam Makeba, which appeals to both young and old. She dances on stage with panache, like a shy child being encouraged, but with elegance and class.
Nciza, 36, is not just the ‘first lady’ of Mafikizolo, but a woman harnessing another passion into a business. Having taken interest in the imaging of her career, it naturally followed that this stylish songbird would make a successful foray into fashion design, through NN Vintage.
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Mafikizolo, which means ‘new arrivals’ in isiZulu, has long outgrown its name. Nciza and fellow band member, Theo Kgosinkwe, have stuck it out for more than a decade, through thick and thin.
The duo has enjoyed a longevity uncharacteristic of many music bands. They started out competing at talent competitions, and now they’ve ended up winning numerous accolades.
“The awards mean a lot. We’re getting more love than we did before,” she says.
At the fourth MTV Africa Music Awards (MAMAs) in June, in Durban, Nciza thought she had no chance. A Nigerian was certain to win with their country’s 125 million subscribers ready to cast their mobile votes. A safe bet, since the Nigerian mobile market is the largest on the continent. Instead it was Nciza and Kgosinkwe who ended up walking to the podium for Song of the Year, for their hit anthem Khona. They also won for ‘Best Group’.
“Winning Song of the Year means a lot especially that Nigeria has a bigger population than South Africa, and we still won the award. It shows that people still love our music all over the continent,” says Nciza.
Mafikizolo returned from the United States (US) in June following their debut at the Black Entertainment Television (BET) Awards in Los Angeles. The judges nominated Mafikizolo for Best African International Act, pitted against other exceptional African musicians including Nigeria’s Davido. Together, they had collaborated on a song called Tchelete, meaning money in seTswana, that’s currently ruling the airwaves in South Africa. Davido won on the night but for Mafikizolo, just being there – and performing for the first time in the US – was remarkable.
Fifteen months after releasing their double-platinum eighth album, Reunited, following their hiatus, the group sealed their comeback with eight wins at the South African Music Awards (SAMA) in April, along with Channel O and Metro FM Awards, also in South Africa.
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Trials And Tragedy
Mafikizolo’s story is also one of struggle. The band formed in 1997, and signed with one of South Africa’s biggest recording companies, Kalawa Jazzmee Records. Their first four albums barely made a ripple.
Worse was to come&#8230;
In December 2001, the group, then a three-member band, nearly died in a car accident. The trio had decided to drive to Katlehong, following a performance in Durban. Once home, they decided to drive in the dead of night to Mafikeng for a performance the next day.
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“Theo wanted to drive, I guess he wanted to impress his new girlfriend, now his wife. So the rest of us fell asleep and we were woken up by a big bang. And the next thing I remember was lying on the gravel on the side of the road,” says Nciza.
Their car had been hit by a train. Fortunately that night, all of them survived. The rest of the band was discharged the next day from hospital, but Nciza had to stay on for over three months.
Lucky to be alive, the group released an album the following year, Sibongile, meaning ‘we thank you’ in isiZulu. It was their breakthrough.
All was well. The group had picked up the pieces and were getting back on their feet when tragedy struck again on Valentine ’s Day in 2004. Vocalist Tebogo Madingoane was shot and killed in a road rage incident in South Africa.
Madigoane had brought the Kwaito sound to the group and his loss was another blow. Nciza and Kgosinkwe never thought they would end up as a duo, but in sadness, they did. After mourning Madingoane, the two picked themselves up with the sound of Mafikizolo.
Then came a purple patch. They released three more albums, Khwela, Van Toeka Af and Six Mabone.
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Mafikizolo 2.0
Their popularity grew but in 2008 they took a break to reinvent themselves as solo artists.
“It was scary for me and a completely different experience as I was so used to depending on Theo for so many things… I had to gain confidence and believe in myself, so I used my other talent to grab people’s attention and that was my [passion for] fashion,” she says.
During this time, Nciza released two albums, Inguquko (Change) and Lingcinga Zam (My Thoughts), and also started to put more hours into her clothing business, which she had started a year before.
However tragedy followed her. Nciza and her record company executive husband, Thembinkosi Nciza, lost their five-year-old daughter Zinathi in a car accident in December 2009. She was with her grandmother on their way to a pre-school to pick up a cousin when their car crashed into a tree. The grandmother blacked out behind the wheel and suffered minor leg and chest injuries.
“My work was greatly affected. I was in the middle of promoting my second album when Zinathi passed, so everything was on hold. A part of me is gone and it is the kind of emptiness that I may have to accept that may never be filled… I really did not know where to begin, where to start picking up the pieces and for a very long time I just remained in one place not knowing how to move on, it felt wrong to move on,” says Nciza.
“Were it not for my husband, I really don’t know how I could have started living again. In 2012, I was blessed with a son, Luvuyo and I am just grateful to God that he gave me a chance to be a mom again.”
<div id="attachment_6345" style="width: 310px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-6345" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-6345" src="/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/451413792-300x210.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="210" />LOS ANGELES, CA &#8211; JUNE 28: Singers Theo Kgosinkwe (L) and Nhlanhla Nciza of Mafikizolo perform onstage at the Music Around the Globe during the 2014 BET Experience At L.A. LIVE on June 28, 2014 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Tommaso Boddi/BET/Getty Images for BET)</div>
After mourning her daughter, she pulled herself together, mustered strength and continued with her career. Her family kept her going.
“Keeping busy helped me focus on other things, so I started writing music again, performing and started designing again,” she says.
Through NN Vintage, Nciza started to hire young people looking for jobs.
“I wanted to develop young talent. It was more about the love [of clothes and music] and not making money. I didn’t look at it in the business sense,” she says.
Nciza says she acquired her compassionate nature from her father, a court interpreter, who, even when his immediate family was struggling, would invite cousins into his home. Nciza ventured into the fashion business without any prior experience.
She hired eight seamstresses, a receptionist and rented a small studio where they could work from, financing it all herself, at a cost of around R70,000 ($6,500) a month. Revenue from her music career kept the business alive. But it was doomed from the first stitch.
“I realized a year and a half into my business that I had employed too many people and [had] too much equipment. When the recession came, I was probably the first person to go down,” she says.
“I lost a lot of money, around R600,000 ($56,000) including my savings. I was new in fashion and I needed to prove myself. I was a new designer and I couldn’t sell a R10,000 ($930) dress.”
Most times, the people who bought her dresses were those who knew her and her music, yet there were times when she struggled to make sales. She was so proud she kept the business failures to herself.
“I didn’t want to tell people that NN Vintage wasn’t there anymore,” she says. Her husband could have helped financially, but Nciza wanted to go it alone. She had to let go of nearly all the employees who worked for her. By the end of 2010, to keep her brand alive, Nciza stopped dressing clients and only designed for herself.
The following year, she went back to the drawing board. She started by sketching her own designs and slowly hired seamstresses to bring her designs to life.
“Right now it makes sense. I still want to learn more and empower myself. I want to learn how to make a garment,” says Nciza.
“When I started out, I was a bit conservative. I wore below-the-knee dresses. It was me at the time. What I do is not necessarily following trends.”
And indeed, Nciza is a fashion risk-taker. She is a musician with a palette for setting trends, just like the black and white dress on the cover of this issue, which she first wore for the opening act of the MAMAs.
“For this particular performance, I wanted attire that commanded attention, so I played with a lot of color and bright accessories. My designs are always inspired by Africa. They are feminine, yet bold and fierce at the same time,” she says.
At last year’s SAMAs, she wore a long-sleeved silver umbrella shirt with a pink ribbon around her waist and skirt. Another risk she took was at this year’s Metro FM Awards where she wore a monochrome striped peplum shirt with an umbrella skirt.
Her designs are for her fans. The revived NN Vintage is aimed at making garments for young adults and older women carving a niche in their industries.
Having been in the fashion business only a few years now, Nciza admits she is not making “crazy” money just yet, but claims people trust her brand. Nciza says she now sells garments costing up to R7,500 ($700), and is slowly getting her clients back, some from as far as Tanzania and Botswana. This would allow her to employ designers and more seamstresses and also open a store when the time is right.
“I plan to create a special range to supply to bigger stores, so it can reach all parts of the country, as that is my biggest challenge right now. I have also started with a men’s range and it will be launched soon,” says Nciza.
Few musicians are able to juggle their music careers, business and family, but Nciza is doing well.
<div id="attachment_6346" style="width: 210px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img aria-describedby="caption-attachment-6346" decoding="async" loading="lazy" class="size-medium wp-image-6346" src="/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/451412938-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="300" />LOS ANGELES, CA &#8211; JUNE 28: Singer Nhlanhla Nciza of Mafikizolo performs onstage at the Music Around the Globe during the 2014 BET Experience At L.A. LIVE on June 28, 2014 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Tommaso Boddi/BET/Getty Images for BET)</div>
Mafikizolo’s music is inspired by their upbringing, their neighborhoods, their stories of love, and hardship.
“You don’t need to sell your soul in order to get ahead. Try and push, only talent will get you where you want,” she says.
Indeed, hard work and talent have taken Nciza and Mafikizolo to attain the success they are enjoying today. Nciza has created a new brand of South African music and a new brand of fashion. Both have her unmistakable stamp.

The First Lady  Of Afropop

Beauty queens are tall, slender 20-somethings with wavy hair and porcelain skin pledging for world peace. While that is the widely-held perception, older women will also get to do their turn on the ramp as the contestants of Mrs South Africa on August 8 at the Emperor’s Palace
in Johannesburg.
This year, the event will see 41-year-old South African Riana Mooi try her best to win the crown; she is the oldest finalist to participate in the pageant’s history. As its name implies, Mrs South Africa is aimed at married women between ages 25 and 50. For Mooi, age is no deterrent as she hopes to inspire others like her.
“Your life does not end when you get married and have kids. You don’t need to let your age define you or limit you from opportunities,” says Mooi, who is a mother of two and works for Nedbank
in Johannesburg.
For some like Joani Johnson, who won Mrs South Africa in 2009, the contest was a stepping stone for a full-time career as a businesswoman. Two years after she won the crown, she bought the pageant for R500,000 ($47,600) from its previous owner. Since then, Johnson has been working hard on the image of the contest, and is now readying for the 2014 event. Johnson is also trying to shake off her beauty queen persona as she wants to be seen as more than just a pretty face.
“Being in the pageant industry, a lot of people assume that you’re this beauty queen, this ‘poppy’ with no brain. Sometimes you can actually use that to your advantage; I’ve walked into a lot of meetings where people have underestimated me.”
Johnson would like to see the pageant gain as much recognition as its better-known counterpart, Miss South Africa, which dates back to 1956, when Norma Vorster became its first winner.
The 2014 edition of the pageant televized to a national audience in March was a glamorous night replete with celebrity judges and special performances by famed South African musicians Mi Casa, Bucie, Matthew Mole and Brendan Jury. This was the night 23-year-old Roulene Strauss was crowned Miss South Africa 2014.
While most competitions stipulate a minimum height and size requirement, Melinda Bam, a former Miss South Africa (2011) and currently Executive Director of the pageant, says the organizers don’t put any pressure on the girls to look a certain way. Bam credits much of the success of this year’s competition to its re-branding through wide television coverage of the run-up to the pageant as well as its publicity on social media.
The pageant has been a great platform to launch careers. Basetsana Makgalemele (now Basetsana Kumalo), arguably its most successful winner, was crowned Miss South Africa in 1994, the year South Africa became a free, democratic country. Later that year, she was also crowned first runner-up at the Miss World pageant in Sun City, South Africa.
Kumalo is today a successful businesswoman in the entertainment industry. Other Miss South Africa winners to have gained fame in the entertainment sector include Jo-Ann Strauss, Cindy Nell, Nicole Flint, Bokang Montjane and Peggy-Sue Khumalo.
Strauss, this year’s winner, put a hold on her medical studies to pursue her dream, and says the win is part of her bigger plan to start a medical business. Mixing medicine and business would be following in the footsteps of her role model Precious Motsepe, a medical doctor and Executive Chairperson of African Fashion International in South Africa.
“I’ve always looked up to her. You see these business couples where the man is the strong one and the woman is the one who supports the husband. But I’ve always seen Dr Precious as someone who is independent and strong in her own way as well,” says Strauss.
While there are many critics of the beauty pageant industry, winners attest such contests lead to empowering careers like any other – only that they have to look beyond the gloss and the glam.

Beyond Lipstick & Luster

Archel Bernard sits on a bar stool in the middle of her little boutique in downtown Monrovia as a handful of customers drift in and out. Pieces of West African lapa hang over wooden ladders and colorful African-Western fusion designs sit on either side. A sign beside the counter that is made up of bamboo stakes reads ‘Life is Too Short to Wear Boring Clothes’.
The 25-year-old designer and businesswoman moved from Atlanta in the United States (US) in 2011 to her family’s hometown for a job at the government’s oil corporation, and now moonlights as a fashion designer in her spare time. Bernard established a fashion label called ‘It’s Archel’ and set up a shop called Mango Rags in downtown Monrovia, with her business partner Tania Abraham, who also grew up abroad, mainly in the United Kingdom. The shop celebrated its first anniversary in February and is among a small number of boutiques specializing in contemporary African designs, in a country where small fashion businesses are just beginning to emerge over a decade after the civil war, when shopping for clothes was a luxury many could not afford.
Mango Rags, now a polished little shop located in Bernard’s grandfather’s compound that was formerly a car garage, had less glamorous beginnings. Bernard would chug around the city in a white pickup truck driven by her mother Brenda Bush, a producer and writer for CNN, with a tape measure and notebook into which she would jot down her customers’ measurements. Building up a collection of tailors from the workshops spread throughout the city, she dropped off fabric and sketches of designs in between working her nine to five job producing multimedia for the National Oil Company of Liberia (NOCAL). Bernard began to save money to open and fit the shop; now with a steady stream of mainly expatriate customers, she is looking to expand.
Born and raised in the US, but always identifying as Liberian and African, Bernard grew up in Atlanta, one of the few black kids in her community of Marietta.
When her mother did carpooling, she dressed in funky African clothes and head wraps.
“Can you dress like the normal mums do?” she had asked her, but later grew to appreciate her style. Named Archel, after her father Archie (a cultural quirk in Liberia), few of her schoolmates could pronounce her name, and so her label is ‘It’s Archel.’
When she was 16, Bernard returned to Liberia after the war to visit her grandfather, a businessman who had stayed throughout the 14-year civil war, despite the family’s insistence that he leave.
“When we landed you could have fried an egg on the runway because there was nothing. It was just a stretch of huts and then you approach the city and there are more concrete structures, but it’s still not America,” says Bernard.
She says the government offers few incentives for young educated Liberians to return, but chooses to stay because she wants to help change Liberia, and transform from a chronic charity case to a ‘place to be’ in Africa.
Now a Liberian returnee, self-described “third world socialite”, designer and government worker, Bernard has capitalized on her social networks, family connections and sense of style to build up her business in a climate that is challenging for entrepreneurs and where a fashion scene is fledgling. Three fashion weeks have been held within the past five years, with the most recent being Monrovia Fashion Week that was held in December, and only five designers have boutiques throughout the city.
“I still kind of feel like a fraud in this; I never went to fashion school,” says Bernard.
Most of the local designers haven’t studied fashion and draw on West African lapas and traditional fabrics and the flamboyant Liberian style as inspiration.
“Liberians really like to dress, they always want to have the nicest thing on,” she says.
Bernard’s main buyers are expatriates; she wishes she had more Liberian customers, but a strong bargaining culture coupled with a lack of respect for intellectual property make things difficult.
Like many Liberians who lived in exile with their families in the US during the war, Bernard returned to her family’s homeland in search of opportunity. With only one subject left to complete of her Science Technology and Culture degree at the Georgia Institute of Technology, Bernard decided to head home to Liberia to work in the local media. She harbored dreams of being Liberia’s Oprah and wanted to create a lifestyle series that focused on the more positive side of the nation that would air on local television stations.
Liberia wasn’t quite ready for a ‘queen of talk’, so instead Bernard worked for Monrovia’s controversial former mayor Mary Broh, and presented updates about the Monrovia City Corporation’s work through short broadcasts, and dressed up in African-inspired fashion. One day, Bernard went to her tailor to pick up a dress she had designed for a show and found the designer both wearing it and stitching it together for another customer. She decided to go out on her own and founded her label ‘It’s Archel’.
While Bernard says Liberia has offered her great opportunities that wouldn’t be available in America, she must juggle the business and a full-time job and has found it impossible to export her clothes due to the high shipping costs. Expanding her business beyond Liberia’s shores still poses a major challenge as it does for most Liberian businesses.
“We can’t be global if it costs so much. People are not going to see the point in paying so much for a little piece from Liberia. We used to make cigarettes, we used to make cans for the goods we made here. We are so small scale here,” she says.
Chid Liberty, the founder of Liberty and Justice, Africa’s first fair-trade-certified apparel manufacturer says that although the business climate is improving, lack of access to finance and the presence of “small manufacturers that can produce international quality” remain ongoing challenges for Liberian designers and the expansion of clothing manufacturing.
“I’m actually quite proud of the job Liberia is doing to make things better but we have a long way to go,” says Liberty.
Liberia’s economy is a concession-based economy with natural resources such as rubber and iron ore making up the majority of its GDP. Critics argue the government has done little to move the nation’s economy from the old plantation style model that has dominated throughout its history.
While signs of change are visible in Monrovia, new shops and office complexes have been constructed, roads repaired, the city is a shadow of the one Bernard’s parents grew up in. Access to steady electricity and running water comes at a high price and many buildings stand in a state of disrepair.
The Wealth of Liberia, a short film shot in the 1970s during the rule of President William R. Tolbert, depicted an image of modern Monrovia and industrial development – factories manufacturing paint, cigarettes, soap, windows and cement – a place where tourists flocked and the Liberia in which her parents grew up. While Bernard acknowledges the major developmental challenges ahead for one of the world’s poorest nations and is concerned about the capacity of her business to expand beyond Liberia’s borders, she is confident she can play a role in changing the image of the small nation and first independent republic in Africa.
Inspired by Louis Vuitton’s partnership with iconic alcohol brands Moët Hennessy, Bernard hopes to create a small sewing shop and African cane juice bar in the room next door.
She also has aspirations of going global and sending Mango Rags stores to Brooklyn, Cape Town and even Maui and develop a range for Swedish multinational retail giant H&amp;M and take Liberia to the world.
“We’re still dreamin’ and working,” she says.

What Do You Do If You Can’t  Be Oprah?

A giant tobacco leaf carving greets visitors to Boka Tobacco Auction Floors, a few kilometers outside Harare city center, along the road to the Beitbridge border with South Africa. Carved by sculptor Dominic Benhura, the towering tobacco leaf is an embodiment of the past and present of the biggest tobacco auction floors in Africa.
The tobacco auction floor is part of a diverse business empire that was built by Roger Boka, one of Zimbabwe’s most controversial and successful black businessmen. Rudo Boka, the eldest of seven children, has been the CEO of Boka Tobacco Auction Floors since 2011, but only after an acrimonious battle to have the family inherit their father’s business, after he died onboard a private jet in February 1999. The 54-year-old was returning from the United States, where he had undergone treatment after a lengthy illness.
He is said to have been the first black Zimbabwean to own a chauffeur-driven Rolls Royce and was no stranger to controversy. At the time of his death, he was under investigation by the central bank for alleged money laundering. For 34-year-old Rudo Boka, and her siblings, who are co-shareholders, it has been a bumpy ride. Growing up, they had no interest in his business empire, which spans gold and chrome mining, agriculture, transport and construction. Rudo was more interested in the photography sessions her father, a former teacher, conducted. Today, Rudo and her sister, Chido, who is 10 years her junior, have a keen interest in photography when they are not busy during the peak tobacco selling season that runs from mid-February to October. When the auction floors open, Rudo spends seven days a week at work and rarely has time to relax.
“I literally live here when it’s auctioning season. I start at five in the morning and don’t go home until there is an acceptable level of satisfaction for clients. It’s always a long day,” says Rudo.
Boka Tobacco Auction Floors is the biggest and most lucrative entity under the family’s wings. It handles 15% of Zimbabwe’s tobacco crop of around 148 million kilograms. The company auctions 10,000 bales on peak days and pays up to $2 million a day. In 2013, the company auctioned tobacco worth $92 million, according to Rudo.
“This year we should exceed this because we have a bigger crop. It is our ability to function through all conditions that makes us the preferred auction floor for tobacco in Zimbabwe.”
Rudo’s first day at the company was also the worst of her career.
“My dad built this place in 1996 and he first operated as an auction floor in 1997. When he died, his other businesses, especially the bank, collapsed. ”
With the collapse of the bank, the liquidation process attempted to liquidate everything that Roger Boka had.
“I was only 19 years old and I had to start defending what my father had built. From 2000, these premises were leased to ZITEC and we battled, they didn’t pay rent and they ran the facility down. We eventually won the court case in 2010.”
Just when the family thought their troubles had ended, the following day they discovered that this was only the beginning of another taxing period.
“We had just won the court case and thought we are going to patch up the place and rehabilitate it, only to be told that the farmers wanted the place opened because they wanted to sell their tobacco,” she says.
Rudo had plans to use the premise for warehousing, while contractors worked to rehabilitate the sections that were in bad shape. And there was no money to start. So how did the company manage the situation?
“By the grace of God, I must say, the farmers were very understanding. They knew that we were not fully prepared, but they had pressures and they wanted money.”
The advantages of a family-run business is that the family motivates each other when times are tough. While some family businesses crumble due to fights over inheritance, this has not touched Roger Boka’s empire.
“All of us [the children] are accountable. All of us are involved in certain areas where we are qualified, some in accounts, others in marketing and we all go through performance appraisals. But we have external people who run this company and keep it going, like our finance manager and managers, they are all professionals whom we are not related to,” she says.
The credit for building the empire goes to the late businessman, but Rudo says that it was her late mother, who inspired him to pursue his dream of becoming one of Zimbabwe’s wealthiest black businessmen.
“A good man leaves an inheritance for his children’s children. It was my mom who said to him, ‘why don’t we start something of our own?’ Sometimes it takes a woman to tell a man that you will do it. Not that you can do it, but that you will do it.”

Turning Over A New Leaf

Stella Buthelezi has a confession to make.
“I don’t know how to write a CV, all my life, I have practically been self-employed,” she says. Born in Port Elizabeth, South Africa, to a family of business owners, Buthelezi had a privileged upbringing, and has never had to work for someone else. Moving to Johannesburg in 1998 post marriage, along with her husband, she has been a businesswoman, her prime areas of interest being the mining and commercial property industries.
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“They [the staff] call us Mr and Mrs B and we’ve got a few offices [in Johannesburg] , London, Australia, but whenever he walks [into an office] – which I always find funny – everyone gasps, and when I walk in, everyone is like ‘oh there she goes’, because I am always screaming from the door,” laughs Buthelezi.
At home too, she says she is the CEO. She professes a love for beautiful things, so evident in the aesthetics around her.
“This house was meant to be our house,” says Buthelezi when we meet her in her sprawling golf estate home in Dainfern, Johannesburg. Buthelezi’s six-bedroom, seven-bathroom abode is a striking, modern monolith featuring a glass façade.
The glass door at the entrance leads to a grand stairway with a gurgling waterfall under it that runs as a feature throughout the house. Besides the natural acoustics, each room in this high-tech home is fitted with speakers and a sound-system. On the walls of every room are pictures of the Buthelezi family. In the entertainment area is a framed photograph of American singer-songwriter Ne-Yo posing with Buthelezi’s son on one of their overseas trips.
Buthelezi’s idea of a warm, inviting home is the alluring aroma from the kitchen.
“Even if I am not here and we are dining out, I have trained my helpers that there [should] never be a time when you open the fridge and there is no food – it is a cold house then,” she says.
Buthelezi’s favorite room in the house is the private lounge, so private it does not boast any intrusive gadgetry – no television or electronics here, only beautiful Italian furniture, lots of reading material and a view of the garden and pool.
“I love the peace and quiet, we get to read, we get to talk.”
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The fancy gadgets are reserved for the private home cinema – cleverly concealed behind a door in the bar area – where the family gets together for movie nights.
There are luxe reclining couches – complete with cup holders and ‘B’ symbols on them for each member of the family – in this roomy private theatre fitted with a state-of-the-art screen and acoustics.
Buthelezi has it all but being a wife and a mother is what she says she is most proud of.
“It’s possible you can be a mother, you can be a wife and you can still be successful.”

IMG_4292

Sound Investment

A Tuesday night in early October marked yet another victory for African women with the launch of this publication in
Johannesburg, South Africa. The bold monochrome cover and red lettering of the inaugural issue sent the message that African women were seated at the boardroom table and ready to make their voices heard.
But even in the atmosphere of affirmation and optimism, the keynote speaker, businesswoman Cheryl Ca-rolus, pointed out that women still face many challenges, from the kitchen to the office.
“Even Superman had a mother,” said the Gold Fields chairperson, reminding the room full of powerful women that their ancestors had played a key role in men’s success for centuries.
What then about Wonder Woman? The iconic comic book character is a demigoddess who battles other-worldly villains with little more than a lasso of truth and a tiara of tele-pathy. Today, Wonder Woman would be wearing a business suit, multitasking her way through the corporate world with a personal digital assistant. But even she would probably buckle under the pressure.
In her book, Wonder Women: Sex, Power, and the Quest for Perfection, former Harvard Business School professor Debora L. Spar explores the demands on women.
She notes that women may have broken through the glass ceiling, but they still face a plethora of obstacles in the corporate environment, which have not adapted to the professional and domestic demands of working women.
Referring to the impossibly high standards that women in the American workplace hold themselves to, Spar says the woman in the perfume advertisement has become the icon of the working girl: “It conveyed this image of this sort of effortless combination of work and motherhood and sexuality and professionalism and ease.”
As an increasing number of African women become a formidable force in business, a reinterpretation of traditional family values seems to be neces-
sary to ease some of the pressures on working women.
“If someone were to ask me what makes successful women, it’s about the infrastructure. But it’s also about love and the giving spirit,” says Basetsana Kumalo. The beauty queen-turned-media maven attributes much of her success to Agnes Mofokeng, the woman who has lived with her since she was 10 days old.
“She’s an extension of my mother. For me, she epitomizes grace, kindness. A good soul, who, in all my years, has been with me. She has always just been the rock for my family. My husband and I often ask each other what we would do without her.”
Shared child care is a common fixture in African homes, but not for Kumalo. “I don’t see her as an employee. It’s never been about that. We have a mutually respectful relationship and it’s about family. They say it takes a village to raise a child and she’s part of my village.
“It goes beyond employee-employer. It’s about being in a village and having an elderly person in my village helping me raise young men who will hopefully be trailblazers, world shakers and history makers,” says Kumalo.
Mofokeng agrees: “This doesn’t feel like work to me… sometimes I have to remind myself that she’s my boss. But often I feel like she’s my daughter –  having watched her grow and go through the different phases of her life.”
However, Mofokeng emphasizes the importance of trust in such a close domestic setting. “If you’re in my line of work, you need to respect your job, take it seriously and be professional. You must know why you’re working and throw yourself in.”
Meanwhile, performer and businesswoman Unathi Msengana describes her decade-long relationship with her project manager, Colene Arendse, as one that relies on this trust.
“I think, because there’s a lot of trust, and I know her intrinsically as a person and she knows me as a person and we know each other’s value systems and how we want to do business with dignity… It’s a huge trust that she has in me because her company is a corporate commodity,” says Msengana.
Currently Arendse is working toward launching the first music and business conference in South Africa next year. And Msengana is acutely aware that her professional behavior directly impacts on Arendse’s business. “It just takes one bad spell to tarnish her company.”
The usually shy Arendse, who prefers to work behind the scenes, jumps in: “It’s her brand, it’s my company. I take my hat off to her. She’s in music, on radio, on TV and not everyone will like you. The only place she’s not criticized is at home.”
As business partners, they are aware of each other’s strengths and weaknesses. Where Msengana excels at sales, Arendse closes the deal with a watertight proposal and streamlined logistics management. It’s also a business model built on family values. “You identify strength in someone because you know that person and you use that professionally because trust is intrinsic in the relationship,” Msengana explains.
“Professionally, you know they have the capability. But personally, there’s that trust and if you betray it, it would not only destroy the professional relationship, but it would destroy families. We know there’s a lot at stake if we disappoint each other.”
The pair is also planning a series of wine and music festivals across the continent, modeled on the Soweto Wine Festival. The event aims to introduce South African blends to new audiences, while simultaneously promoting South African musicians. Msengana is not only a business partner but will also perform at the events.
When Kumalo began building her career, she knew she wanted Mofokeng to be a part of her life. After she won the Miss South Africa beauty pageant in 1994, Kumalo moved from her family home in Soweto to an apartment in northern Johannesburg. At the age of 20 and alone in the city, Kumalo asked Mofokeng to live with her and help manage her life in the public gaze, with the demands of being a beauty queen.
A year later, that beauty queen relaunched her career as a businesswoman, becoming an equal partner in Tswelopele Productions. The company would later merge with Union Alliance Media and was listed on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange.
Kumalo’s latest venture is the acquisition and redevelopment of abandoned buildings to create new urban spaces. But when she was building a family, Kumalo again turned to the woman who had helped to raise her and her siblings.
Kumalo and her husband, Voda-com CEO Romeo Kumalo, insist that their two sons speak Sesotho at home. And, with Mofokeng’s help, the children are taught to respect traditional values.
“When I look around, this family hasn’t changed much from the atmos-phere in the Makgalemele home. These families have the same values,” says Mofokeng, comparing Kumalo’s home to that of her parents.
“If she comes home late and leaves very early in the morning she will call and say: ‘would you please sort out this and that in the house?’ She’ll ask: ‘how are things going?’ and so on. I also give her feedback when she’s not around… There’s constant communication between us,” explains Mofokeng.
Kumalo values these regular updates: “There is an amount of guilt, when you feel: ‘I wasn’t there for this and that milestone in my child’s life’. I think guilt will always be there. As mothers we’re nurturers, we want to be there, we want to raise our children, but times have changed…
“People may say I’m a workaholic but it’s who I am, as well as a mother, and it makes me a happy mother.” Msengana believes her close relationship with her project manager has enabled her to be a better mother.
“I remember, in the first couple of meetings, Colene said: ‘You need to let go, you need to let go’. Because I used to micromanage. It’s allowed me to be more present as a mom.”

Tag: Businesswoman

FORBES AFRICA SOCIAL MEDIA

Business Veteran Scoops Top Vision 2030 Award

The Ghanaian Who Brought HR Corporate America To Ghana

The Iron Lady Of Beer

Going Above & Beyond

The First Lady Of Afropop

Beyond Lipstick & Luster

What Do You Do If You Can’t Be Oprah?

Turning Over A New Leaf

Sound Investment

The business of family