In the mountainous kingdom of eSwatini, a former pre-school helper is turning trash to treasure.

On a sunny afternoon in May, Swaziland entrepreneur Lungile Beuta sets up her stall in the swaying sugarcane fields of Malkerns, a small sleepy town with a magnificent view of the mountains in the landlocked country now known as ‘the Kingdom of eSwatini’.
May is also when the annual bushfire festival brings together thousands of music-lovers from around the world to this little strip of land for a cultural fiesta. Beuta’s stall selling bric-a-brac is set up in a corner of the marketplace surrounded by other stalls.
A banner fronting her stall and created out of used paper packets says ‘ban-twa-na’ – the name of her business – meaning ‘children’ in siSwati. Around her are more empty packets and wrappers that contained chips, snacks and sweets. It’s a riot of plastic and color at first glance, but passers-by soon realize this isn’t just meaningless rubbish, but everything from purses to pencil cases to handbags made out of them.
<blockquote>“For me, there’s nothing more that brings joy than making these products,” says Beuta.</blockquote>
The 43-year-old grew up in Mbabane, the mountainous capital city of the kingdom.
After high school, she wanted to study design. Her parents sent her to Technikon Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa, where she pursued a diploma in fashion design.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/entrepreneurs/2018/09/26/ghanas-wastepreneur/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: Ghana’s Wastepreneur</a>
In her last year at college, tragedy struck. A week before the 21-year-old Beuta’s graduation, she was asked to leave for Swaziland immediately. Her mother had gone missing. Her world came apart.
Even today, Beuta is hopeful she will one day find her mother.
“We tried to search and search and it didn’t help. We were told to look here and go there, but I still do have the hope that she is alive. That’s me. And people look at me like ‘ok, she should be in her 70s’ and I’m like, ‘is there anything wrong with that’?”
As Beuta gets emotional, passers-by stop by her stall, intrigued by her products. One customer asks for Beuta’s business card. She wants to make a bulk order of her bags for a wedding in South Africa.
“Thank you for giving us something worthy to buy,” the client says.
Her sorrow forgotten, Beuta’s face lights up. The over five years in this business has been worth it.
After her studies, she had been a self-employed designer, working from home. It didn’t work. In 2006, she secured a job as a helper in a pre-school in the town where she lived. Beuta loved children, would help them learn nursery rhymes and take them for nature-walks. She would also pick up the waste scattered in the streets a few meters from the school.
Beuta planned on giving the children farewell gifts for their end-of-year party. She then had the idea of creating beautiful objects out of the waste packets she picked up. With her sewing skills, she made them pencil cases out of used chips packets. The children loved them.
“Their parents were like ‘hmm, chips? Why are you giving my kids chips?’ And I had to tell them, ‘no it is actually a chip bag’,” she says.
“It was exciting and then the parents were like ‘ok, you know what? Why don’t you try and turn this into a business’.” The rest was history.
Beuta decided to join the Swaziland Fair Trade (SWIFT) to attain crucial skills selling handicraft and running a business.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/life/2018/07/31/kingdom-calling-at-the-bushfire-festival/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: Kingdom Calling At The Bushfire Festival</a>
Her husband worked with Beuta to get her business off the ground. They would collect the waste bags, she would sew them and he would manage the brand and finances.
She says the business has since grown by 75% and she plans to employ more people to help with the production and grow her business into a wholesale company.
In 2016, she participated in 100% Design South Africa, a large curated exhibition platform for sourcing high-end contemporary design in Africa. She stocks her products in stores and hotels around the country and has become a SWIFT board member.
“I use [the profits] to support my family. I am now able to save and not just [live] hand-to-mouth, which is important,” says the mother of two.
Besides the growth in the business, she is content she can also give back to the environment.
“…you’ve got the aspect of knowing what you are doing out there for the environment as well, because we have a major problem here in Swaziland, with plastic flying all over the place, and people burning plastic,” she says.
Beuta has also expanded to up-cycle cans, washing powder packets, newspapers, magazines, maize meal packaging and more into nifty key holders, coin purses, eye glass cases, wallets, sling bags, shopper bags.
This year, she has also introduced limited edition Afrocentric laptop bags, toiletry bags and backpacks.
In her search for more success, Beuta hopes that one day she will also find her missing mother, who she says has been her biggest inspiration.
Nothing is life is a wasted opportunity for this Swazi entrepreneur.

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No Wasted Opportunities For Swazi Entrepreneur

It’s an early morning in May and as the sun rises, red, orange and yellow hues bathe the swaying sugarcane fields of Malkerns, a small town in the landlocked southern African country of Swaziland.
Swaziland, renamed ‘the kingdom of eSwatini’ in April this year on its 50th birthday, awakens to the sounds of the rustling wind and chirping birds. Very soon, these natural notes will be replaced by the cacophony and camaraderie of thousands of guests jetting into the country for the annual Bushfire Festival, a three-day fiesta of art, culture, music and food in the last week of May.
It’s a busy time of the year for a kingdom that is one of the world’s last remaining monarchies.
Within the Bushfire Festival arena, djembe drums beat to the rhythm of the heartbeat of Africa. Revelers indulge in traditional feasts at the food markets as the musicians take center-stage.
The likes of South Africa’s Samthing Soweto, Brazil’s Flavia Coelho, Nigeria’s Yemi Alade and Mali’s Salif Keita are present, offering a profusion of sounds and melodies.
In the camping arena is a confluence of cultures, as over 29,000 guests who have traveled here to attend the festival make new friends and form unlikely collaborations.
Many stop to admire a hand-crafted grass hat worn by a young woman who has traveled from Lesotho. Anna Thai is originally from Memphis, Tennessee, in the United States.
“The people here are very relaxed and accepting of each other. There are so many from different countries, so many languages and so many different faces and I really enjoy the diversity of it,” she tells FORBES AFRICA.
What started as a cultural meet around a small amphitheater, where artistes performed in front of a crowd of no more than a hundred, is today one of Africa’s most talked-about festivals.
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<div id="attachment_36776" style="width: 955px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-36776" class="wp-image-36776 size-full" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Jiggs-Thorne_KM.jpg" alt="" width="945" height="628" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Jiggs-Thorne_KM.jpg 945w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Jiggs-Thorne_KM-300x199.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Jiggs-Thorne_KM-600x399.jpg 600w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/07/Jiggs-Thorne_KM-768x510.jpg 768w" sizes="(max-width: 945px) 100vw, 945px" />Swazi-born Jiggs Thorne. Photo by Karen Mwendera.</div>
<blockquote>“We started off as kind of a charity running a business and very quickly learned that it needed to be a business running a charity.” &#8211; Jiggs Thorne</blockquote>
Swaziland-born Jiggs Thorne, the founder and director of the festival, always had a passion for the arts, but admits he had to learn the business aspect of the festival the hard way.
“The important thing is I never studied to become a festival director and that’s the thing with entrepreneurs, you are driven by passion; the kind of passion that gets you up and creates that drive you need to make something work. And you have to be incessant,” Thorne tells us.
Born in Manzini, he was inspired by his parents who owned a restaurant. He went on to pursue a degree in drama and politics at the University of Natal in South Africa.
In 1994, when he finished his degree, he decided to return to his home country and apply his passion for the arts. Thorne wanted to develop the local arts scene.
In 2000, he set up House On Fire, the eclectic venue where the festival is now held.
However, its business model wasn’t sustainable, and Thorne realized that if he didn’t act quickly, his dream would slowly fade away.
“Well, I was very much an artiste and I think I’ve become entrepreneurial along the way and we started off as kind of a charity running a business and very quickly learned that it needed to be a business running a charity,” he says.
The Bushfire Festival came into being.

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“It was always about a positive light, warmth, about celebrating diversity,” he says.
A majority of the funding came from sponsorships, and partnerships – the festival is called MTN Bushfire.
With his brother Shelton, Thorne fine-tuned the business model to keep its mandate as a creative arts platform and business at the same time. As Thorne came from an arts background, he had to depend on others to make his dream work.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/focus/2012/07/01/setting-fire-swaziland/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Read More: Setting Fire To Swaziland</a>
“There needs to be integrity in the way in which you deal with people so I think that’s kind of paramount in this equation where you are dependent on others to make it happen,” says the 48-year-old father of two.
The festival grew beyond what Thorne had imagined, he says, contributing over E50 million ($3.7 million) to Swaziland’s economy.
“When the king travels overseas, people ask him about Bushfire, you know. So it’s quite a surreal thing that the concept that came up all those years ago in a sense has become owned by others,” laughs Thorne.
This year, the local newspapers, radio stations and social media were abuzz with news on the festival.
Thorne owes its success to his team and his parents who left the legacy for him and the family to build on.
“It was kind of the fire they started and it’s a light that we’ve been able to follow. They are the legacy, says Thorne, who runs the festival with his siblings and extended family.
“Entrepreneurship is something that you don’t really study, you learn, and it’s something that takes over, and it’s kind of all-encompassing,” he signs off.
After the curtains come down on the festival, it’s back to the idyllic sights and sounds of Swaziland, until next year, when the little town of Malkerns will fire up again.

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Kingdom Calling At The Bushfire Festival

Crossing the Oshoek Border Post from South Africa to Swaziland, I was excited to be visiting the realm of Africa’s last absolute monarchy. Not realizing that it was the Easter weekend, I got caught standing alongside Swazis trying to re-enter their country for the holidays.
I also realized that I was entering a country with the highest incidence of HIV in Africa with a stabilized number reported at up to 30% of the population. While this is not the subject of this article, I must satisfy the curiosity of the reader nevertheless. Social scientists have determined that the itinerant workers with whom I was lining up were one of the major reasons for this scourge.
<div id="attachment_34571" style="width: 510px" class="wp-caption aligncenter"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-34571" class=" wp-image-34571" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Swazi-dance-e1512028782448-300x180.jpg" alt="" width="500" height="300" />Swazi women perform a traditional dance. (Photo by Ramdas Iyer)</div>
Being away from home and working in the mines and timber industries of South Africa, these men infect their many wives in a polygamous society, along with their girlfriends. In addition, traditions such as the inheritance of widows from a deceased brother, does not help HIV’s continuing spread.
The border crossing was smooth confirming my notion that the Swazis were a relaxed and nice people. Though lacking in size, this interesting country makes up for it with its rich culture. While the monarchy has its critics, the history of Swazi resistance to the British, Boers and the Zulus has fostered national pride. As a result, local culture is flourishing along with Christianity.
Many Swazis combine Christianity with indigenous beliefs, and religious freedoms are written into the country’s 2005 constitution. However in January, the education ministry instructed all head teachers to ensure that the syllabus would not mention any religion other than Christianity, including Islam and Judaism.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/woman/2017/10/03/professor-saved-african-rainforest/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: The Professor Who Saved An African Rainforest</a>
Driving into Mbabane, the capital city, I found it to be an attractive and functional place perched in the cool highveld (4,000ft) of the Dlangeni Hills. Swaziland with its population of 1.5 million is a low middle income country where most citizens are ethnic Swazis. The official languages are both Swati and English.
Its ruler, King Mswati III, is one of the world’s last absolute monarchs, and a man who is not too keen on handing his throne over entirely to parliament. The Borgen Project, a nonprofit organization, reports that about half of <a href="http://borgenproject.org/poverty-hunger-swaziland/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Swazis</a> live in poverty. Forty percent of Swazis are unemployed and 70% of the workforce is employed in sustenance farming. But it’s not all bad news. Roads are well-paved and <a href="http://borgenproject.org/combating-rural-poverty-in-swaziland/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">far-reaching</a>. The literacy rate is over 91%, which might be expected when 8.3% of the GDP is spent on education; which is why I saw the entire city swarming with nicely-uniformed schoolchildren in the afternoon.
<div id="attachment_34572" style="width: 260px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-34572" class=" wp-image-34572" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Swazi-dance-1-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="250" height="375" />A drummer provides the beat for the traditional dance. (Photo by Ramdas Iyer)</div>
In order to find the old Swaziland, which has rapidly modernized itself, I went in search of old villages and cultural events. More than 70% of Swaziland’s population is of ethnic roots, which means that all the traditions and beliefs are upheld throughout the year and are evident in daily life through dress and other activities.
I soon arrived in Mantetenga Swazi Cultural Village, a living museum of old traditions and representing a classic Swazi lifestyle during the 1850s. The village is a large family homestead of 16 huts, each with its own specific purpose as well as kraals for cattle and goats, reed fences that serve as windbreaks and various other structures. The building material is strictly traditional: poles, grass, reeds, leather stripes, earth and dried cow dung. The adjacent 725-acre Mantenga Nature Reserve is made of a combination of middle and highveld habitat, and more than a third of the reserve is covered by eucalyptus (gum) forest. I explored the reserve by foot, with two walking trails leading up the mountain towards the summit of Sheba’s Breast, made famous by the book King Solomon’s Mines written by Sir Rider Haggard, a Victorian adventure writer in 1885. Birdlife in the reserve was good, with wildlife such as baboons, vervet monkeys, nyala, duiker and mongoose regularly seen.
<a href="http://www.forbesafrica.com/woman/2017/07/11/a-paradise-in-retreat/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">READ MORE: A Paradise In Retreat</a>
After visiting the village, I patiently waited for a large contingent of dancers to perform the Umhlanga followed by the Incwala dance. There are two main kinds of dances, each done by women and men respectively and done at most of the celebrations and gatherings throughout the year, but predominantly at the two most popular events: Umhlanga in August and Incwala in December. The spectacle I enjoyed seemed to be a hybrid version of both.
<div id="attachment_34573" style="width: 260px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-34573" class=" wp-image-34573" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Swazi-dance-2-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="250" height="375" />A man performs a traditional Swazi dance. (Photo by Ramdas Iyer)</div>
Umhlanga attracts thousands or women from near and far and once the entire group has concluded dancing and singing, different villages take center stage and put on a display as a sign of respect for the Queen mother. The different villages are distinguishable by their beaded outfits and jewelry. Even the king’s daughters are involved and distinguishable by the bright red feathers they wear in their hair. The king will usually pick his new wife from the crowd of dancers.
Incwala, which means first fruits, is probably the most important and significant of the two. Dancing plays a prominent role here as men gather at the Royal Kraal at Ludzidzini and dance for a few days. Known to be the most honorable on the Swazi events calendar, the Incwala dates are determined by the phases of the moon and begins with a journey to the Indian Ocean to collect water. The third day sees the men slaughter a bull with the fourth day welcoming the arrival of the king who dons his traditional dress and joins in on dances with the other men before returning to his hut to enjoy the first fruit of the season.
However, these aren’t the only dances in Swaziland; other events boast their own dances such as the Sibhaca dance performed by groups of men throughout the country at any opportunity. One cannot but appreciate this gentle land with its handsome men and women and their penchant for dance.

A Land Of Many Dances

Ali Resting, the pioneer of Swaziland’s internet, chuckles when he speaks of failing first-year computer science at university. As a tech entrepreneur and university drop-out he is in esteemed company. He follows a well-worn path walked by Apple’s founder Steve Jobs through to Twitter’s Jack Dorsey and the most famous drop-out of them all, Microsoft’s Bill Gates.
Resting’s parents did not quite see their son through that prism of the failed graduate set to blaze new frontiers of technological advancement. He returned from South Africa’s Rhodes University in 1996, aged 18, and got the silent treatment.
His university studies at a premature end, Resting began work at his father’s civil engineering company in Swaziland’s capital Mbabane, which shared offices with an architectural firm. At a younger age, Resting had ambitions of becoming an architect, attracted by its “visual aspect”, and drifted unconsciously to that side of the offices.
He found the architects somewhat bemused about how to network their 20-odd office computers and took on the “pet project” and successfully built an intranet system. It was a pivotal moment for Resting as he realized then that his passion was his vocation.
Resting had failed his university year through the distraction of Rhodes University being one of the earliest among South Africa’s tertiary education institutions with access to the internet and he soon went walk-about from his studies.
“I would spend a lot of time fiddling in the labs (at university) and I learned and understood about the internet, which at that stage was just known as the World Wide Web. I found out about an internet research project, which had nothing to do with the curriculum perse, and I soon became well acquainted with it.”
An only child, born in 1978 to a Welsh father and Swazi mother, he was exposed to rudimentary PCs at an early age and quickly became astute with DOS and other programs. His academic primary school progress saw him accepted as a weekly border at the Sisekelo High School, initially established by sugar milling companies to provide well-resourced education for the children of their expatriate employees.
“It was very strict. We were not allowed to hold hands with the girls, we were not even allowed to be within five foot of a female,” says Resting.
The school on the banks of Usuthu River in Swaziland’s Lowveld region, however, had a couple of computers and Resting spent leisure time writing computer programs and a 3D version of the game Minesweeper. He became so proficient he assisted in teaching computer studies to his classmates.
His maths teacher advised him: “Maybe I should think of IT as a profession and not architecture. So he got me thinking about IT as a career. But back then the only company that anyone had really heard of was Microsoft… I didn’t see it as a skill then; just a passion.”
Following Resting’s intranet installation, the “pet project” quickly established a momentum of its own. Working with Lachezar Karadjov – an architect fascinated by the concept of global connectivity and who was to become his business partner – he created a basic gateway to CompuServe, the first major US commercial online service provider. Swaziland joined the internet age.
Real Image’s formative years saw the door-to-door selling of internet dial-up email services, initially signing up five subscribers who remain on the books today. The fledgling company built the country’s first internet website portal and claimed some prime digital real estate with the ownership of the legend swazi.com. But income remained elusive and Karadjov shared some of his architect salary with him.
“We had no idea how we were going to make money at that stage,” says Resting.
His partner was 30 years senior to the teenage tech entrepreneur. Resting acknowledges, although at the time it went unrecognized, the benefits of Karadjov’s mentoring of him in the ways of business. Karadjov was to retire from Real Image a few years later in 2004 and Resting bought him out to become the company’s majority shareholder.
In the early days Real Image’s office space was a cubicle in the architect’s offices. As the business expanded, so did the computer hardware which began to spill out and display tangles of electrical wiring and connections.
“It was damn hot, and it never looked good, as we had customers walking in and seeing all these things.”
At 19 years old, Resting’s company, Real Image, became Swaziland’s first internet service provider (ISP).
The financial gravity of Johannesburg pulls the bright and the talented to it from throughout southern Africa. Resting’s lack of a degree would not have handicapped him from employment in South Africa, where the IT industry’s rapid evolution thrives on the innovative.
But he never considered it as an option.
“I want to leave a legacy behind and I want to be known as the guy who brought connectivity to this country and I continue lobbying to bringing proper connectivity.”
“To go to South Africa is about making a quick buck and a substantive living working in those markets. In Swaziland I get to experience all the challenges there are to rolling out a network, be it terrestrial or wireless. Money will come in due course, I am not worried about that. But what we are doing is building value.”
“Our (Real Image) rate of growth used to be 6 or 7 percent. Now we are hitting the 15 percent mark compounded, which is 17 to 20 percent year on year. We may be doing R30 million ($2.3 million) [annual turnover] today, but in five years we may be beyond the R50 million ($3.8 million) mark and it is an organically grown company.”
As a dominant player in connectivity, employing 40 full time staff, Real Image hosts 80% of the country’s internet content, and provides a range of services, including internet or intranet, through to website development and tailored software.
“One of the ways to quickly grow your numbers is buying up the small operators. But then what are we trying to achieve. We are very much driven by quality of service and believe that we provide a superior product.”
The geographical triangle of Mbabane, Manzini and Matsapha, about 20 kilometers apart at their furthest apex, forms Swaziland’s industrial base and hosts its manufacturing and finance industries, some of King Mswati III’s myriad palaces and the seat of government.
Swaziland’s comparatively much higher internet costs to neighboring South Africa is a consequence of a government parastatal acting as the gatekeeper for importing bandwidth and able to charge monopoly prices in an uncompetitive arena. Within this constricted operating environment, Resting is on a mission to reduce data costs and increase connectivity speeds by making the epicenter of the Swazi economy a WiFi zone.
Owing to Mbabane’s mountainous terrain five WiFi towers have been built to service the capital, each structure costing R500,000 (around $38,000) before the installation of the electronics, but fewer are required in Matsapha and Manzini as the landscape gives way to shallow undulating hills.
In October last year, communications minister Dumisani Ndlangamandla cut the ribbon to open Real Image’s Mbabane headquarters. The double–story, open-plan offices has a public internet cafe – with limited free data access – and amid the workspace’s rows of computers a tabletop football game. The architecture firm that provided him a small cubicle for his initial foray into the digital world is now a tenant at the new offices.
Resting says he has the “ear of government,” and continues to lobby for the liberalization of the sector, including the removal of the “exclusivity clause” that makes the import of bandwidth the sole preserve of a government parastatal.
“My hope is that by the end of this year (2017) the pricing of the internet is going to drop dramatically in the country. Dramatically,” Resting predicts with a smile.

Drop Out, Cash In The King Of The Kingdom’s Internet

After a decade studying and working in Australia, Swazi-born Roberto Russo had just been granted citizenship when he took a phone call from his father in Swaziland. The telephone conversation was to change his life’s trajectory overnight.
“I never thought of coming back to Swaziland. I was happy in Perth. But when my old man said to me he was thinking about selling the business I thought ‘what is the worst that can happen?’ I can always go back to Australia. I have not looked back,” says the 35-year-old Russo.
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The lay of the land for entrepreneurs in Swaziland and Australia are poles apart. Australia is an open democratic society with a large middle class customer base, government support for emerging businesses, and perched on the doorstep of Asia’s huge and burgeoning economies.
Swaziland is an undemocratic feudal society ruled by sub-Saharan Africa’s last absolute monarch, King Mswati III. It has a population of 1.3 million, the majority living in poverty, unemployed or practising subsistence agriculture, and a government actively favoring international and local corporations at the expense of small and medium enterprises.
To compound its reputation as an entrepreneurial backwater, Swaziland’s tentative claim to being a stepping stone between the economies of South Africa and Mozambique is wishful thinking at best.
In reality, the construction of world class road infrastructure between the industrial and business hubs of Johannesburg and the port city of Maputo has left Swaziland out of the loop. The South African city of Mbombela boomed at Swaziland’s expense by servicing the trade route.
Swaziland’s national economy is habitually mismanaged for the benefit of Mswati and his expansive royal household and was one of the factors resulting in the country flirting with a financial meltdown in the wake of the global recession in 2008. A lifeline of a $335-million loan from neighboring South Africa was refused as the fine print included political reforms. Financial oblivion was only averted after the Southern African Customs Union (SACU), discovered that Swaziland, as a customs union member, was eligible for an $88 million windfall in 2012 and it came with no strings attached.
The financial crisis was caused by a drop of more than 50% in SACU receipts as a consequence of the recession and squeezed Swaziland’s public sector wage bill that accounts for about 18% of the approximately $4 billion GDP – the highest ratio on the continent.
Russo was clearly looking through a different lens at the business opportunities that existed when he decided to return home in the midst of the country’s financial crisis and swing for the entrepreneurial fences. In the eight years since buying out his father, his businesses have grown eightfold to record a $10 million annual turnover. Russo’s stable includes a paint manufacturer, tool supplier and advertising firm.
Swaziland’s proximity to Mozambique has proved an advantage against Russo’s South African competitors.
“We export seven to eight tons of paint daily to Mozambique. Purely on geography we are able to load two trucks in the morning and make delivery and they are back by 5PM,” he says.
Sandwiched between two countries allows for different business strategies for each, while also benefitting from lower water, electricity and labor costs. Mozambique provides for bulk paint sales, while the South African market offers a niche that sidesteps the competition from South Africa’s thousands of paint manufacturers.
The company supplies specialized paints to a Johannesburg-based architectural firm, including insect repellant paint for malarial areas and paint that can be applied in wet weather.
“We are small enough to be able to custom-make our product to fit client needs… the bigger guys would ask ‘look, how big is the project?’ and it would not be worth their while,” he says.
“One of the downsides of being such a small, isolated country is that you get comfortable at what you are doing, even though you do it well. It’s important to attend tradeshows and ensure we remain current, to give us a competitive advantage.”
Technical staff recruitment can also be difficult.
“There is only a small pool of paint chemists that you can get hold of in southern Africa… but people are quite naive. People in South Africa think that Swaziland is a small little farm town. People that do know the lifestyle we live in Swaziland would come at the drop of hat.”
Swaziland’s formal economy is dominated by corporates, from telecoms to sugar producers. At its center, and controlled by King Mswati III and his coterie, is the opaque Tibiyo TakaNgwane, meaning  wealth of the nation, fund that has shares in many foreign and local corporates operating across diverse sectors.
Tibiyo was envisioned as a national empowerment vehicle and was established by Mswati’s father King Sobhuza II after independence in 1968. From its small beginnings, where every Swazi man was required to donate to it, usually a cow, the fund has grown to an estimated $2 billion. Like Mswati, whose personal fortune was put at $200 million by FORBES in 2008, the fund is exempt from tax, as well as civil and criminal scrutiny.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignleft size-medium wp-image-4688" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Swaziland-Lynette-Fraser-300x200.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="200" />
The fund’s rapid expansion is attributed to many factors, including eviction of small-scale farmers without compensation to grab some of the country’s best agricultural lands for the fund’s sugar interests and the government’s favoritism for contracts, tenders and beneficial regulations to foreign and local corporates the fund has stakes in.
Swaziland has the trappings of a democracy, but is not recognized as one. Mswati and his royal household, government and the state have become all but indivisible.
A small business owner based in Manzini with an annual turnover of R10 million ($770,000), who declined to be identified, says “If you fly too high, you are going to come short if you come up against businesses with government interests.”
“The main driver of business in Swaziland is the government. Pretty much everyone is dependent or indirectly dependent on government,” he says.
Lynette Fraser, Russo’s 38-year-old sister, established her own water bottling business, Viva Beverages, through purifying municipal water using reverse osmosis. She sells about 100,000 500ml bottles monthly and is able to compete with her South African competitors through lower transport costs. There was a business spike recently for sales of her five liter water bottles, after the capital Mbabane experienced debilitating water shortages, where Matsapha did not.
In recent years, she says there is a growing number of entrepreneurs opening businesses, where in the past “a lot of people would go to Johannesburg because the opportunities are just so vast.”
Excluding sugar production, about 90% of Swaziland’s economic activity occurs in the Mbabane, Matsapha, Manzini corridor and entrepreneurs recognize the benefits of businesses being concentrated within easy reach of each other.
But government business involvement remains a debilitating factor. Founder and Managing Director of the internet service provider Real Image, Ali Resting, has wrestled with government for deregulation of the sector, especially a legislative clause giving Swaziland Posts and Telecommunications Corporation (SPTC) exclusive rights for importing bandwidth, resulting in hugely inflated and uncompetitive internet costs stifling investment.
“The first question investors ask is if connectivity is reasonably priced? …It does deter investors if they are spending huge amounts of money towards connectivity, when they shouldn’t have to,” says Resting.
Deregulation would not only act as a lure for companies to invest in Swaziland, it would also benefit connectivity in the region.
“There is an opportunity for Swaziland to become a transit location between Johannesburg, Durban and Mozambique by using it as a conduit for fiber infrastructure. If you can position yourselves to have the shortest route, because the internet is distance sensitive, it makes more sense to go through Swaziland… it’s a huge opportunity,” says Resting.
For entrepreneurs in Swaziland, opportunities seem to be limited to the government.

The Call  Of The African Kingdom

Here is a festival which is growing despite the unofficial cultural boycott called on Swaziland by the Swaziland Solidarity Network (SSN), a South African-based organization. The “cultural boycott” is called in support of political reform in the monarchy; and  has already kept South African musicians such as Ringo Madlingozi and newcomer Zahara from performing  in Swaziland.
<div id="attachment_894" style="width: 210px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-894" class="wp-image-894 size-medium" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/photobramlammers-0131-200x300.jpg" alt="" width="200" height="300" />SWAZILAND, MALKERNS &#8211; 20120525 &#8211; The Giant Puppets od Mozambique performs during the Bushfire Festival, Swaziland International Festival of the Arts. Photo: Bram Lammers</div>
Bushfire has grown from the initial 4,500 visitors to 17,000 with an impressive number of artists from all across the continent and Europe performing. The offering is great—from comedy to spoken word, reggae, house and theater, all on a small budget of R3.5-4 million ($476,000). It’s Swaziland’s biggest event and employs over 1,000 locals.
The MTN Bushfire festival took place during the last weekend of May. This idea which formed in Jiggs Thorne’s mind, has grown into a Swazi institution that has attracted many from across the globe and a major sponsor like MTN.
<div id="attachment_891" style="width: 484px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-891" class="size-large wp-image-891" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/jiggs1-1024x683.jpg" alt="" width="474" height="316" />SWAZILAND, MALKERNS &#8211; Jiggs Thorne Photo: Bram Lammers</div>
Jiggs Thorne (Jiggs) is a Swazi native who studied drama and politics in South Africa, two subjects he feels are pretty much the same thing. As a creative, whose passion was theater, Jiggs’ first job in Johannesburg was at the Market Theater, as a waiter, as well as at the adjoining jazz club. He opened up a shop selling African crafts from Swaziland and got the idea for ‘House on Fire’ where the festival took place.
Jiggs refers to ‘House on Fire’ as an “on-going creation&#8230; a fantasy scape” that started 10 years ago, and sits on what is now a family business complex on their farm in the Malkerns valley, in rural Swaziland. His idea was to create a space to nurture the local creative industry.
Bushfire is six years old and all the festival proceeds go to an NGO called ‘Young Heroes’, started by Steve Gallagher, a former member of the Peace Corps. Young Heroes tries to help the AIDS orphans in the country. It keeps the orphans with relatives and allows people to sponsor them, these 1,000 sponsored households receive monthly cash stipends to assist with food, clothing and education. When Gallagher and Jiggs came together they realised that they were both looking for the same thing and found a partnership that has worked for them both.
Jiggs says that the name Bushfire comes from “the flames from ‘House on Fire’ expanding and growing outwards”. Its primary focus is developing the local arts while its secondary focus is raising awareness and addressing Swaziland’s great social issues.
The festival receives funding from local partners and businesses and MTN has just signed a 3 year title sponsorship.
This is something that takes a year to plan and implement. Walking through the festival, you could see Jiggs carrying sculptures; running around approving requests; trying to find crew on the two-way radios and keeping an eye on things.
Keeping in line with sustainable growth and sharing, Bushfire participated in the AFRIFESTNET, an African Festival Network, launched in Accra, Ghana. The launch was attended by 37 festivals from 18 countries. The idea for Bushfire’s involvement is to be able to share artists and connect with other festivals— taking advantage of economies of scale by coordinating their efforts, dates and acts.
<img loading="lazy" decoding="async" class="alignleft size-large wp-image-890" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Csydwillowsmith_bushfire_friday_56-1024x683.jpg" alt="" width="474" height="316" />
Entering the festival, one gets a condom to spread the message of safe sex and responsible fun. Swaziland is said to have the highest HIV prevalence rate in the world, which was sitting at 26.9% in UNAIDS’2009 estimates.
Music was not the only entertainment on offer. There was a market with locals selling their wares and a great focus is placed on free trade and being eco-conscious. The food stalls had everything from pizza to Indian and Mozambican food. The two campsites were full of festival goers who braved the winter chill, all in the name of a good time. Walking along the campsites you heard distinct murmurs of siSwati, German, French and a mixture of accents.
It was a great success in anyone’s eyes and a lesson to all about using whatever means available to push your message across, by celebrating diversity and making a difference.
Africa, where’s your fire?
<h3>“Ayo, Marry My Brother!”</h3>
The crowd stood patiently under the stars on a clear, cool, night, as the band set up for the artist they’d all come to see. Then, there she was… cut-off denim shorts, long legs and Chuck Taylors.
She sings like only she can, drawing you in, then she stops.
<div id="attachment_895" style="width: 484px" class="wp-caption alignleft"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" aria-describedby="caption-attachment-895" class="size-large wp-image-895" src="/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/photobramlammers-0918-1024x703.jpg" alt="" width="474" height="325" />SWAZILAND, MALKERNS &#8211; 20120525 &#8211; Ayo performs and moves through the audience to dance and sing with the crowd during the Bushfire Festival, Swaziland International Festival of the Arts. Photo: Bram Lammers</div>
“The stage is too far. I don’t like it,” she says.
She makes her way to the edge of the stage. The crew and her manager look on stunned as they realize what she wants to do. Jump! Security rush to help her down. She says she hates distance and climbs onto the barrier to sing. The guard is standing there, holding onto her legs; the people are ecstatic; phones, cameras, tabs and ipads capture it all. In the blink of an eye she leaps from the barrier and is among the singing crowd. There’s a mad scramble by the crew to get to her, they jump the barrier, struggle with the gate. She doesn’t seem to notice or care very much… You may not see her but you can definitely hear her. What a voice. What a woman. It’s no wonder they wouldn’t let her end the set.
“We want more. We want more. Down on my knees… Down on my knees,” the crowd chanted for their favourite song.
“Ayo kissed me,” says one ecstatic fan as she screams out, “Ayo, marry my brother!”
If you haven’t guessed who was making waves, we are talking about singer, songwriter and mother—Joy Olasunmibo Ogunmakin, better known as Ayo. This 32-year-old German-Nigerian—who was born near Cologne, Germany—blew onto the music scene with her 2006 debut album “Joyful” and hasn’t looked back or stopped dancing.
She may be scared of flying, but after six years and three albums, she’s a true gypsy. In about a week Ayo flew from Guadeloupe to Paris, then into Swaziland for the MTN Bushfire festival. Then it was off to the Réunion Island, via South Africa, and then back to Paris—where her two children eagerly awaited her return.  Such is the life of one of the hardest working women in soul. Twenty-nine scheduled performances and an album recording between May, 11 and August, 3 alone. And she still has the energy to climb barriers.
It’s amazing to think how she manages to juggle her many roles with such grace and humility.
Her life has not been an easy one, with a mother who struggled with addiction and stints in foster homes. As a biracial child, fitting in was a challenge. Ayo points out that her middle name— Olasunmibo—means “the one who was born outside” and she doesn’t like the term “mixed” being used to describe her race.
“Mixed means 50/50, I think of myself as 100/100,” she says.
Ayo‘s music appeals to so many different people from so many different walks of life and transcends generations. She doesn’t know why this is but notes that we all share more than we think.
“My music is a therapy. Instead of going to the shrink, I’m playing music and writing music.”
‘I’m Gonna Dance’, ‘What Is Love’ and ‘Down On My Knees’ are only a few of her songs, which she calls antibiotics.
This mother of two, who’s all about connecting and sharing, is a true child of Africa, who feels she draws her strength from the continent.
“To me Africa stands for strength. I see strong people and people who have a lot of hope, who believe. People who know what it’s like to get up every day and fight.”
To her, it’s not about following the American and European industries but embracing the talent in the continent from whence it comes.
Not a fan of reality talent shows, she believes life is where you learn.
Heavens, I ran into her again the next day, waiting for the fight to Johannesburg and she looked just the same as she did on that stage; smiling, open and casual. We parted ways at O.R. International, in South Africa, with a promise that she’ll be back to perform in Africa.
It was off to Réunion Island with her straw hat in hand. I wonder whether she jumped the barrier there?
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Tag: Swaziland

FORBES AFRICA SOCIAL MEDIA

No Wasted Opportunities For Swazi Entrepreneur

Kingdom Calling At The Bushfire Festival

A Land Of Many Dances

Drop Out, Cash In The King Of The Kingdom’s Internet

The Call Of The African Kingdom

Setting Fire To Swaziland