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FORBES AFRICA

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CONTENTS • VOLUME 11 NUMBER 3

08 | EDITOR’S NOTE Renuka Methil

10 | PUBLISHER’S NOTE Rakesh Wahi

12 | LEADERBOARD

COVER STORY 26 | Class Of 2021: ChangeMakers In A Historic Year

Members of this year’s list of Under 30s have one thing in common: a new Covid-induced agenda for social change. So what would a historic pandemic year throw up? Groundbreaking entrepreneurs and thinkers.

Our 2021 class of Under 30s are just that: influential creatives, imaginative business owners, innovative techies and gifted sports stars. Celebrating seven years of the FORBES AFRICA 30 Under 30 list, these achievers prove that now more than ever, they are crucial to the African growth story.

By Karen Mwendera, Chanel Retief, Simone Umraw

FOCUS 18 | ‘A Risky Time For Gender Parity’

Namibia is now the most gender-equal country in Africa and sixth in the world, but there are mixed views on the reality in the southern African country.

By Chanel Retief

20 | A Story Of Reconciliation, Healing And Hope How do you forgive a man who has killed all your loved ones? Rwanda’s reconciliation efforts have seen survivors and perpetrators of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi living next to each other, healing and transforming. FORBES AFRICA travels to Bugesera to capture one such moving tale.

By Tesi Kaven Cover image by Motlabana Monnakgotla | Retouching by NewKatz Studio

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FORBES AFRICA

CONTENTS • VOLUME 11 NUMBER 3

ENTREPRENEURS 52 | Driving Feminist Data For Change

54

East African techpreneur Neema Iyer works at the intersection of data, design and digital to eventually enable products, policies and programs that take into account the needs of African women.

By Inaara Gangji

54 | Palate Pleaser

There is a spot of Thailand in a bustling Johannesburg suburb, and its owner, Chef Micky, is giving private dining a whole new meaning.

By Chanel Retief

CONTRARIAN 72 | Model Entrepreneur

Elizabeth Isiorho is ramping up her modeling business to provide more young people international opportunities and put African beauty on the map.

By Peace Hyde

TECH

72

90

64 | The Other ‘C’ That Has Dominated News From Last Year

In the midst of the pandemic, cryptocurrencies also made surging headlines, with news about it changing faster than you can say Bitcoin, Ether and Dogecoin.

By Peter Engelbrecht

68 | Why NFTs Are Having An Arty Moment Art’s valuable digital future, a recent boom in NFT sales and blockchain with an important role in preserving an artist’s legacy.

By Tiana Cline

SPORT

LIFE 74| Daddy Cool

In recent years, surrogacy has become increasingly popular among single women and gay couples. For heterosexual single men, it’s still a rather unusual path to follow but that is changing.

By Paula Slier

2 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

86| Whatever Clicks For Business

89 | On The Ball

The scene is not picture perfect yet, but ace photographers are slowly capturing the creative market in Ghana.

Female CEOs in African football are rare, but Goabaone Taylor is hoping to bring her almost two decades-worth of experience from the corporate world to revitalize the sport in Botswana.

By Peace Hyde

By Nick Said

90 | Fully On Board

South African professional surfer Jordy Smith is gearing up for Olympic gold and also making waves in the business world.

By Nick Said

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CONTENTS • VOLUME 11 NUMBER 3

78 | Fashion On The Coast Move over Lagos and Cape Town.

It’s Durban’s turn to dazzle the continent’s fashion fraternity.

By Simone Umraw

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JUNE | JULY 2021 • VOLUME 11 NUMBER 3 Chairman: Zafar Siddiqi Founder & Publisher: Rakesh Wahi Managing Director: Roberta Naicker Executive Director: Sid Wahi Non-Executive Director: Sam Bhembe

MANAGING EDITOR

Renuka Methil

ART DIRECTOR

Lucy Nkosi

MULTIMEDIA JOURNALIST

Chanel Retief

JOURNALIST – WEST AFRICA

Peace Hyde

RESEARCH ANALYST

Simone Umraw

HEAD OF PRODUCTION

Sikona Cibini

BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT MANAGER – WEST AFRICA

Patrick Omitoki

ABN GROUP MANAGEMENT TEAM Group Head of West Africa: Frederic Van de vyver Editor-in-Chief, CNBC Africa: Godfrey Mutizwa Group Head of Technical Operations: Jean Landsberg Head of East Africa: Denham Pons Head of Finance: Thameshan Sooriah Head of Content Studio: Jill De Villiers ABN Publishing, South Africa: Ground Floor, 155 West, 155 West Street, Sandton, South Africa, 2196. Contact: +27 (0)11 384 0300 ABN Publishing, Nigeria Ltd.: Sapetro Towers, 6th Floor, East & West Wing, No 1 Adeola Odeku Street, Victoria Island, Lagos, Nigeria. Contact: +234 (1) 279 8034 and +234 (1) 277 8236 ABN Rwanda: Rwanda Broadcasting Agency Offices, KG 7 AVE, Kacyiru, Kigali, Rwanda. Contact: +250 788 314 354 FORBES GLOBAL MEDIA HOLDINGS INC. Chairman and Editor-in-Chief: Steve Forbes President & CEO: Michael Federle Chief Content Officer: Randall Lane Design Director: Alicia Hallett-Chan Editorial Director, International Editions: Katya Soldak Executive Director, Forbes IP (HK) Limited, Global Branded Ventures: Peter Hung Vice President, Global Media Ventures: Matthew Muszala General Counsel: MariaRosa Cartolano Founded in 1917 B. C. Forbes, Editor-in-Chief (1917-54); Malcolm S. Forbes, Editor-in-Chief (1954-90); James W. Michaels, Editor (1961-99); William Baldwin, Editor (1999-2010) Copyright@2020 Forbes LLC. All rights reserved. Title is protected through a trademark registered with the US Patent & Trademark Office.

‘FORBES AFRICA’ is published by ABN Publishing (Pty) Limited under a license agreement with Forbes IP (HK) Ltd, 21/F, 88 Gloucester Road, Wanchai, Hong Kong ‘FORBES’ is a registered trademark used under license from FORBES IP (HK) Limited

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FORBES AFRICA

EDITOR’S NOTE

I

WAS IN MY IMPRESSIONABLE TWENTIES WHEN I first watched James Cameron’s magnum opus Titanic.

Among the many clever quotable quotes sprinkled throughout the film that made it iconic, there was one particular line

by Leonardo DiCaprio’s character Jack Dawson that I found particularly powerful. I scribbled it down in my notepad and made it my everyday mantra as a young reporter working for a big Indian news daily at the time. And I have carried it to this day. The lines go: “I got everything I need right here with me.

I got air in my lungs, a few blank sheets of paper. I mean, I love waking up in the morning not knowing what’s gonna happen or, who I’m gonna meet, where I’m gonna wind up…”

Besides applying it in the professional context, I have been summoning up those lines more often lately with a fresh impetus on the words: “I got air in my lungs.”

Who knew that intangible commodity would become contentious in these times?

I lost a friend in India recently to Covid-19 complications; she died because she didn’t have access to an oxygen cylinder on time. She succumbed to the brutal, tidal Covid-19 wave throttling the subcontinent currently where the variant is outracing vaccine valour and the deeply troubling losses are weighing heavily on the healthcare system and the country’s future.

O2, the simple chemical component we take for granted has become the all-new currency in a world choking for breath.

With all the calamitous news coming out of India and Gaza at

RENUKA METHIL, MANAGING EDITOR letters@abn360.com editor@forbesafrica.com www.forbesafrica.com

Views expressed by commentators in this publication are not necessarily those held by FORBES AFRICA or its members of staff. All facts printed in FORBES AFRICA were confirmed as being correct at the time of going to press. Note: Dollar prices in the magazine are approximate figures and based on exchange rates at the time of going to press.

8 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

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Photo by Motlabana Monnakgotla

The Continent’s Talent Pipeline

this time, it’s hard to stay optimistic. What happens in India could happen in Africa too. What we need are not challenges but breakthroughs that can bring profound change, and now.

If Covid-19 has accelerated digital adoption, so too it has pushed the button on business to come up with more viable solutions to counter cataclysmic events that crimp growth.

Which is why it is also an incredible time to be young, and for the planet’s youngest continent to be vaulting change. Every year, the FORBES AFRICA 30 Under 30 list is our annual report card on the continent’s talent pipeline. But our seventh outing of this coveted compilation charted a historic pandemic year.

The 2021 list is The Covid Class facing unprecedented adversities in their growth trajectory. Put together by FORBES AFRICA’s young and talented team of curators and creatives – dispersed and untethered to their desks in a remote working environment – they sifted through countless applications that streamed into our online portals for months, eventually coming up with a cast of superstars and virus-busters that made the final cut.

These are the bright young men and women who have competence and compassion and know their purpose is beyond platitudes.

And they have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to turn things around, and fast! May their tenacity and temerity save us all. It’s what we need to make sure the Titanic does not sink.

Lessons From India’s Covid Carnage And Need For Preemptive Action

BY RAKESH WAHI, FOUNDER AND PUBLISHER, FORBES AFRICA

W

E ALL BECOME PHILOSOPHICAL at some point in our lives; every time we go through a crisis, some aspect of philosophy becomes my default setting.

I look at purpose, reason, truth and all the fine things that are the critical ingredients of our lives.

Introspection leads to finding reason for all the blunders that could have been overridden by common sense. Every time disaster has struck, we know that there was something we could have done to prevent it. The logic of it all is so elementary, but in reality, we know that common sense is not so common. Although Mel Brooks was belittled as a ‘stand-up philosopher’ in the 1981 film History of the World, Part 1 and called a ‘bullshit artist’, I do believe there is merit in philosophical immersion from time to time. This subject is more relevant today than ever before as we try and really define the meaning of life and the rules of engagement.

One of the branches of philosophy that I was more interested in was epistemology. I came upon it by chance very early in life as one of my favorite authors, Ayn Rand, wrote the book, Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology. I will not dwell on Rand at this time, but only acknowledge that it was her profound work that prompted me to search for meaning. The subject of epistemology rests on the values of truth, belief and justification.

That pretty much sums up a lot of situations in life. What is the truth, what do we believe and finally, how do we interpret or justify things? Sadly, it’s not always the truth that people are looking for; they are only seeking justification for what they want others to believe is true; the optics.

I recently wrote about the Covid-19 crisis in India in an opinion piece titled From the Eye of the Storm published on forbesafrica.com. It was my message to leaders in emerging countries to start taking preemptive action, after witnessing a complete systems breakdown in India to tackle the second

10 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

wave of the pandemic; a wave far fiercer than the last one as it attacked even the young. Despite over 180 million people being vaccinated in the country, the last six weeks were sheer pandemic carnage fueled by super-spreader events. It did not have to be like that. The collapse took place out of a sense of complacency, misplaced arrogance, not reading the environment well and most certainly, poor planning; it boils down to poor leadership at the national and state levels, both political and bureaucratic.

Ours is a small family-owned business. When Covid-19 caught us unawares last year, we focused on a few important values, at the heart of which was business continuity. I defined this as any risk that could bring the business to its knees has to be mitigated as a priority. We listed these as the safety of

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REFLECTIONS

our staff and stakeholders, truthful stakeholder communications, management of resources, innovating our products and services and finally managing cash judiciously. A year down in the crisis, I sat with all our CEOs and asked them to rework what business continuity meant for us today and add to the values that we had defined a year back. In recognition of the fact that the pandemic is far from over, as cautioned time and again by the World Health Organization, we agreed unanimously that we needed to ensure that we did not put our guards down on the aspects of safety and ensuring safety protocols.

We ensured social distancing, established work-from-home protocols, educated and encouraged our staff to get vaccinated and in many countries, helped them to register in a timely manner. With all this done, we are now working on product development and ensuring that the customer needs remain at the heart of our offerings and solutions.

While Paul Krugman wrote in Harvard Business Review in 1996 that a country is not a company and correctly summarized that business leaders lacked the strategic thinking of economists, I believe that from a leadership and accountability point of view, there are few differences. In today’s crisis, what is critical for business continuity in a small business also applies to a country; except the variables and permutations are several times more complex but then so are the available resources commensurately larger. When as a small business, we could navigate the pandemic in a pragmatic manner and take precautions, why is it that governments (politicians and bureaucrats) with all available resources are unable to analyze data, forecast sensibly and avoid the embarrassment of repeatedly finding themselves in déjà vu moments?

There is one stick that keeps leadership in check – accountability. In business, one can deal with it clinically; hiring and firing decisions can be made by a Board. With politicians, there is no accountability because the Board are the people that elect them, and it takes an election to fire a party; it takes too long, and the decay can cause a lot of damage in times of crisis. The judiciary is there to protect the people but are appointed by the politicians; we live in a vicious circle of incestuous self-serving misconduct that fuels the flames of anarchy.

As in any chaotic period, you see the rise of human scum from the gutters of society that thrives on the suffering of others. We witnessed people begin to hoard medicines and profiteer from selling oxygen and medicines as well as transporters charging exorbitant fees to take people from one place to the other.

Victims paid these fees with the hope that they could save their loved ones. Most constitutions do not approve capital punishment and for all the arguments against it, this is the one time in my life I would encourage the introduction of punitive

action commensurate with the crimes of manslaughter.

We have sadly witnessed a very chaotic phase in India’s history.

Nobody wished for it but no one has the integrity or moral fiber to take responsibility for inaction. The poor and rich have suffered alike in what was nature’s cruel sense of equality.

This suffering can only be narrated by people that have witnessed it from close quarters. The anger caused by the pandemic’s carnage, the anguish and complete helplessness will leave a very hollow and emotionally-drained society for posterity.

The pictures will remain embedded in the hearts and minds of people for a long time to come. Leaders from around the world must take lessons and prepare as this pandemic is far from over.

Amidst all this chaos, there are strong believers and positive people who have rationalized their abilities into a simplified binary equation of “what you can do and what you can’t”.

This, basically, is the realistic understanding of your limitations. We have all participated in endeavors to help the needy and in addition, frontline healthcare workers; there are so many others who have put their own lives at risk and provided food, transport, medication, oxygen and care for the needy, the sick and people in distress. There are also caregivers within each family who have sacrificed their own pain and suffering to care for their families; my younger sister Shalini is one such braveheart who despite being severely affected not only nurtured her children through a three-week ordeal but also, against doctors’ advice, sat by her husband in the ICU ward of a Covid-infested hospital caring for him and giving him hope until she finally collapsed from exhaustion. These selfless messiahs make you regain your faith in mankind and the belief that we have angels walking amongst us.

To draw lessons from the experience in India, I would first advise everyone to adhere to all preventive actions of social distancing, wearing masks, personal hygiene and staying away from super-spreader events. Take the first opportunity to get vaccinated; this is the only real line of defense. For families faced with severe effects of the coronavirus, you must get hold of an oxygen concentrator, appoint an experienced doctor and have faith in the individual, give a lot of compassion and hope to the sick and keep them very calm, be extremely patient as recovery is slow and above all, believe in the power of meditation and prayer.

In today’s crisis, what is critical for business continuity in a small business also applies to a country; except the variables and permutations are several times more complex but then so are the available resources commensurately larger.

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JUNE | JULY 2021 FORBES AFRICA | 11

WHAT’S NEW

FRONTRUNNER

WHO’S NEXT

“F

OR ME, CHALLENGES ARE LIKE THE work itself,” says 28-year-old Nigerian recording producer, songwriter and artist, Ayoola Oladapo Agboola. “So I don’t really see them as challenges, I just ask myself ‘ok what’s next?’

So, when I have situations where things are a little bit complicated or complex, I always find my way around it.”

The Lagos-born artist, also known as KDDO or Kiddominant, recently made headlines with his new single Beamer Body, featuring Davido.

The release of this new banger became highly anticipated after the success of his recent and criticallyacclaimed hit, eWallet, that featured South African artist, Cassper Nyovest.

“I had already started working on the single back in Los Angeles. Davido and I were playing music back at the hotel in Vegas, then the beat came on and we were all just vibing. David really liked it, he got mad hyped about it and added a verse on the spot,” Agboola says.

In a Zoom interview with FORBES AFRICA, Agboola speaks about some of the highlights in his career including when he became the first platinum-

selling Nigerian record producer to be certified by the Recording Industry of South Africa (RiSA). Further, also celebrating the fact that he produced Afrobeats’ longestcharting billboard single Fall by Davido.

Agboola also spoke about his new business venture; he says he has just signed an equity deal with Nigerian beer brand, Star Beer USA. The record producer will officially serve as the Creative Director for the US. “I’m on a mission to let the world experience Africa not only through my music but the whole culture from fashion to food to our art and designs.”

Along the way, he wants to ensure he inspires young Africans to pursue their passion.

“I do feel like our leaders in Africa are almost not there. The talent we have are really the flag-bearers: from sports to music, to arts, to fashion and to even food.

“This generation, especially, we’re doing amazingly well. And it’s very important that the world focuses on us as talent because we are the ones that are just waving the flag for the continent right now. I think it’s gonna be like that for a long time,” Agboola says.

– By Chanel Retief

Photo supplied

On Afrobeats, Davido And Beer

FORBES AFRICA

LEADERBOARD

A Trip To The Moon Next Year?

South African-born tech billionaire Elon Musk’s SpaceX is planning to launch a mission to the moon in the first quarter of next year.

According to Forbes, this mission, known as DOGE-1, is being entirely paid for with the cryptocurrency Dogecoin.

In a press brief released on May 9, the mission in 2022 will commence from Canada’s Geometric Energy Corporation (GEC) and will see a 40-kilogram CubeSat launch on a rideshare Falcon 9 rocket to the moon.

“Having officially transacted

An Oscar Too For Uganda?

with Doge for a deal of this magnitude, Geometric Energy Corporation and SpaceX have solidified Doge as a unit of account for lunar business in the space sector,” Geometric Energy's Chief Executive Officer Samuel Reid said, according to Forbes.

Making his Ugandan mother proud, British actor Daniel Kaluuya took home his first Oscar on April 25. Although he played the lead in the drama Judas and the Black Messiah, Kaluuya won best supporting actor at the Academy Awards.

In his acceptance speech, the actor thanked his mother which brought her to tears, “Thank you for

pouring so much into me.

You gave me everything.

You gave me your factory settings so I could stand at my fullest height.”

Burna Boy Goes Gold

Grammy award-winning African singer, Burna Boy’s single Ye has been certified Gold by the Recording Industry Association of America. The certification was announced on May 3 by the Nigerian artist on Twitter with the caption “still striving”.

According to the Guardian, the song earned over 11 million streams over seven months across major United States streaming platforms after its release.

“The official music video, which Burna says ‘essentially shows the unrelenting nature of Nigerians’, is currently sitting on 137 million views on YouTube, one of his highest streamed songs on the platform,” the article read.

South Africa Takes Home Gold

In a spectacular performance by South African relay runners on May 2, it was 27-year-old Akani Simbine who led the country to victory.

South Africa won gold in the Men’s 4x100m relay at the World Athletics Relays in Silesia, Poland.

According to SuperSport, Simbine's time and dramatic victory were spectacular especially as he took over the baton three meters down on Brazil's Paulo Andre Camilo de Oliveira. Simbine snatched the victory on the line by a hundredth of a second in a time of 38.71sec.

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THE BILLION-DOLLAR WEALTH TAX RAISE

The net worth of South Africa’s richest people could raise as much as R160 billion (about $11 billion). A study done by the World Inequality Lab, which French economist Thomas Piketty is co-director of, assessed the personal wealth in South Africa. According to Bloomberg, the study proposed a range of tax increases on people who have a net wealth of above R3.82 million ($273,000), or the top 1% of the population.

JUNE | JULY 2021 FORBES AFRICA | 13

After a two-year study was published into the controversial practice of captive lion breeding, it has been decided by the South African government to put a stop to breeding lions for hunting or for tourists to pet cubs. “What the majority report says, with regards to captive breeding of lions: it says we must halt and reverse the domestication of lions through captive breeding and keeping," the country’s environment minister Barbara Creecy said, according to the BBC. "We don't want captive breeding, captive hunting, captive petting, captive use of lions and their derivative.”

What Travel Freedom Looks Like In The Pandemic World As per this year’s latest Henley Passport Index — the original ranking of all the world’s passports according to the number of destinations their holders can access without a prior visa – Japanese passport holders theoretically are able to access a record 193 destinations around the world visa-free.

Singapore remains in second place, with a visa-free/visaon-arrival score of 192, while Germany and South Korea again share joint-third place, each with access to 191 destinations.

The index provides exclusive insight into what postpandemic travel freedom might look like as countries around the world selectively begin to open their borders to international visitors.

Based on exclusive data from the International Air Transport Association (IATA), and as has been the case for most of the index’s 16-year history, the majority of the remaining top 10 spots are held by European Union countries.

Closer home, Seychelles and Mauritius are in the top 50.

Seychelles, the archipelago country in the Indian Ocean, is Africa’s top-ranking African passport in this regard, at 27 with access to 152 destinations worldwide.

It is followed by Mauritius which is at 30 with a score of 146 destinations passport-holders of this country can visit.

Ranked 53, the number of global destinations South African passport-holders can travel to is 103.

The rest of the African continent dominates the bottom quarter of the rankings with weaker passports than most.

14 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

From her shapewear line to her beauty business and the TV screen she shared with her family for 20 seasons, it’s not difficult to believe 40-year-old Kim Kardashian West has become a billionaire. Forbes estimated in April that West is now worth $1 billion, up from $780 million in October 2020. This is mostly due to KKW Beauty and Skims.

END OF LATEST EBOLA OUTBREAK IN THE DRC

The World Health Organization (WHO) was happy to congratulate all involved in bringing an end to the 12th Ebola outbreak in the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).

“Today’s declaration of an end to the latest Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo is a testament to the professionalism, sacrifices, and collaboration by hundreds of true health heroes, in particular the Congolese responders,” said WHO Director-General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus in a statement released in May. According to WHO, the latest Ebola outbreak started in North Kivu in February. This came nine months after an earlier outbreak in the same province was declared over. It was the country’s fourth in under three years.

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Photo by STR/NurPhoto via Getty Images; Photo by PAMELA TULIZO/AFP via Getty Images; Photo by Brad Barket/Getty Images for 105.1; Photo by David Livingston/Getty Images; Photo by Adam Nurkiewicz/Getty Images; Photo by Chris Pizzello-Pool/Getty Images; Gabby Jones/Bloomberg via Getty Images; Getty images; Image sourced from Timeslive

NO MORE CAPTIVE LIONS

KIM KARDASHIAN WEST IN BILLIONDOLLAR CLUB

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LEADERBOARD

VIRUS SCAN

WIPHOLD’S LOUISA MOJELA ON TURNING OBSTACLES INTO OPPORTUNITIES One of South Africa's most accomplished leaders in business, Louisa Mojela, the Group CEO and co-founder of Wiphold, was recently awarded a doctorate degree by the faculty of economic and management sciences at Stellenbosch University in Cape Town for her leadership in establishing platforms to empower women in Africa.

Wiphold, or the Women Investment Portfolio Holdings, is one of South Africa’s best-known first generation empowerment companies owned and led by women.

Founded just weeks before a free South Africa was emerging from the dark shadows of the apartheid in 1994, it gave financial power to grassroots black South African women, driving broadbased economic empowerment, and among other milestones, it also became the first women-only empowerment company to list on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange in 1999.

In an interview with FORBES AFRICA, Mojela shared some “transformative and impactful” anecdotes on the beginnings of Wiphold, which she started as part of the ‘Wip Four’ including Gloria Serobe, Wendy Luhabe and Nomhle

Tracking Covid-19 on the African continent: • As of May 16, the total number of active cases in Africa is 4,684,638; the death toll is at 126,138.

• The total number of recoveries in Africa is 4,238,692 and the total number of tests conducted is over 45 million.

• As of May 16, South Africa has the highest number of cases on the continent. Central Africa has been the least affected with just over 166,800 cases.

• To date, South Africa has the highest death rate and recovery rate.

Egypt has the second highest death rate while Morocco has the second highest recovery rate.

• Morocco commenced its vaccination strategy on January 28 and has since administered 10,131,795 vaccines to its population using the AstraZeneca vaccine. This is the highest on the continent.

Following Morocco is Nigeria which has administered over 1.6 million vaccines since beginning its vaccination drive in March.

Nigeria is also making use of the AstraZeneca vaccine.

(Source: Africa CDC) Canca – and how it has stayed the course.

Currently, one of the main focus areas for the company is agriculture.

“We have incorporated that sector into our strategy and encourage our women shareholders that we support them in attaining the dream of food security,” says Mojela, who also graced the cover of FORBES WOMAN AFRICA in 2014.

Mojela also founded Bophelo BioScience & Wellness in 2018 in Lesotho (focusing on medicinal cannabis), and is now creating new social and transformational development opportunities in the growing cannabis sector.

Watch the full interview on forbesafrica.com, in which Mojela also speaks about the future of women’s entrepreneurship on the African continent.

“To the women, I say, turn obstacles into opportunities.

Success is never easy, it’s a long road,” she says.

– By Renuka Methil

As of April 2021, the strain found in South Africa, 501Y.V2, has been detected in over 60 countries worldwide with this number growing.

(Source: Live Science) As of March 31, the World Bank has pledged an estimated $12 billion to help low- and middle-income countries purchase and distribute Covid-19 vaccines, tests, and treatments, and strengthen vaccination systems; this includes African countries.

South Africa is currently in the process of training dogs to detect Covid-19 at South African ports of entry. (Source: eNCA) As of May 12, both Nigeria and Algeria have reported cases of the Indian Covid-19 variant. (Source: Africanews) As of May 14, Zimbabwe has ramped up the use of antigen rapid diagnostic tests as a way of reinforcing its Covid-19 response. Their number of tests have increased to an average of 4,000 a day and at least 600 sites have been set up to conduct these tests. (Source: WHO) In March, the World Health Organization (WHO) issued a warning on the use of the drug Ivermectin. Used to treat parasites in animals, it has made the rounds in Africa, particularly South Africa, as a method of treating Covid-19. WHO however warns that there are no clinical trials that have been conducted to definitively prove the use of Ivermectin and it is likely that the drug will do more harm than good and could prove detrimental to use on patients who are suffering a severe case of Covid-19. (Source: EWN) – By Simone Umraw

DAVIDO’S FALL RISES TO BEST

Multi-award-winning Nigerian Davido’s hit single Fall is now the best-selling Afrobeats song of all time. According to a report on Twitter in April, Fall has sold over “1.5 million units worldwide and in doing so, it becomes the first Afrobeat song to achieve the feat”. The video hit 202 million views on YouTube making it the most viewed Afrobeats videos on the video streaming app. “.... I remember me and KDDO making this record as a joke... well, this ain’t nothing to laugh at! God is good and thanks to all of you for supporting me ever since m the start... I appreciate every single one of you,” Davido said on Twitter.

– Leaderboard compiled by Chanel Retief

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JUNE | JULY 2021 FORBES AFRICA | 15

FIT-FOR-FUTURE HEALTHCARE IN AFRICA Celebrating its two-year anniversary, the Lusaka-based Medland Hospital continues to deliver affordable, accessible and patient-centred healthcare throughout the pandemic.

Access is still the greatest challenge to health care delivery in Africa. Fewer than 50% of Africans have access to modern health facilities. Many African countries spend less than 10% of their GDP on health care. As a land-linked country with a young population, Zambia’s need to increase and improve its medical services have amplified with the rise of non-communicable diseases, lifestyle changes and rapid urbanization.

Medland Hospital was launched in June 2019 to provide highly specialised medical services for Zambians and citizens within the region. Medland is the first private facility to introduce a full time operational cardiovascular surgery department in addition to advanced surgical oncology and orthopedic services. Other medical, surgical and anti-aging specialties are also available using cutting edge technology.

By providing a sustainable infrastructure that delivers international standards across all levels of the healthcare system, Medland ensures that the patient experience in their facilities can match any facility outside the continent. “The International Standards and the National guidelines are key drivers in our daily operations,” states Dr Mohamed El Sahili, CEO of Medland Health Services. “However, what differentiates our facility is the fact that we deliver affordable, accessible and high quality healthcare to everyone in Zambia and the region.”

While the COVID-19 pandemic has affected every facet of the economy, Medland was affected just eight months after its opening. Nevertheless, the hospital responded swiftly setting up a COVID-19 response committee well before the World Health Organisation declared the outbreak a pandemic. They immediately moved into putting together an anticipated list of challenges; looking closely at the areas of supply chain, human resources and other details which would affect the overall day-to-day running of the hospital. With the guidance of public authorities, Medland became one of the first accredited hospitals in Zambia to conduct PCR screening tests through its existing PCR laboratory.

With the advent of international travel bans, Medland Hospital quickly became the facility of choice for services that patients used to seek abroad, fulfilling one of their chief objectives. The hospital benefitted from the increased contact with locals, cultivating a solid bond built on trust and accountability with patients and the community. To strengthen this communal bond, in May 2021,

Medland sent its Q-Medland Units to decentralize access to COVID19 related services. “In two years, these units may be serving our communities, specifically those in rural areas, by addressing health issues and assisting in raising awareness among the general population,” points out Dr El Sahili.

Dr El Sahili believes strongly in partnerships and teamwork to provide the highest patient-centred care. The School of Mental Health at Johns Hopkins University now implements a programme to support people with mental health issues while other relationships have been developed with oncology research institutions to provide updated protocols when it comes to chemotherapy. Medland Hospital is also a member at the International Hospital Federation and one of the first 100 signatories to Ethical Principles in Healthcare (EPIHC) worldwide. Dr. El Sahili himself sits on the board of the Africa Healthcare Federation and the Corporate Council on Africa, lending further credibility to Medland’s prestige.

As Medland Hospital looks forward to its two-year anniversary on June 29, it is proud to have raised the bar for healthcare services in the country and region, especially during this unprecedented and tumultuous period. Never settling for ordinary, the hospital has just launched its education programme, improving its capacity building and allowing a more technical transfer of skills across its team. “After two years, we have stayed true to our mission and vision,” states Dr. El Sahili. “Today, through our partnerships with the Ministry of Health and the multiple local and foreign insurers, Medland Hospital is giving affordable access to quality medical services to everyone.”

As the world slowly charts its exit from the COVID-19 pandemic, attention has been turned towards enhanced global collaboration to ensure health systems emerge from it stronger, more prepared and more people-centred. Within its two short years, Medland Hospital has utilised its partnerships and innovative services to become a benchmark for patient-centred healthcare on the continent. Through its visionary leadership, the Lusaka-based facility has demonstrated it is well-suited to answer to the many healthcare needs of the Zambian people, and those in neighbouring countries. “We have learned that a clear, futuristic and innovative vision must always be put in place for the organisation to succeed,” states Dr El Sahili.

“At Medland Hospital, we know how to listen and fulfill our patients’ needs and expectations.”

CONTENT PRODUCED BY PENRESA INTERNATIONAL LTD • WWW.PENRESA.COM

What differentiates our facility is the fact that we deliver affordable, accessible and high-quality healthcare to everyone in Zambia and the region.”

Dr Mohamed El Sahili, CEO of Medland Health Services

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FOCUS | GENDER

‘A Risky Time For Gender Parity’ Namibia is now the most gender-equal country in Africa and sixth in the world, but there are mixed views on the reality in the southern African country.

BY CHANEL RETIEF

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ATIENCE MASUA, 22, RECENTLY MADE HISTORY in Namibia when she became the youngest member of parliament.

If anything, it affirms Namibia’s newfound status as the sixth most gender-equal country in the world, a step ahead of even globally-renowned Rwanda, according to the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) 2021 Global Gender Gap Report released in March. Iceland is the most gender-equal country in the world for the 12th time on the list.

Namibia and Rwanda are the only two African countries in the top 10.

Vesselina Stefanova Ratcheva, the report’s Insights Lead, tells FORBES AFRICA: “What we see in the data is that there is political empowerment; we’ve seen this closing of political gender gaps, which is one of the reasons why Namibia has done so well.”

There are more reiterations of this.

Gender Links (GL), a southern African women’s rights organization, says in a 2020 report that women constitute 46% of Namibia’s parliament, narrowly missing the 50% mark. GL further states that “Namibia and South Africa are now tied for the highest representation of women in parliament in the Southern African Development Community (SADC)”.

But there are other voices that need to be heard too, on the gender-related issues in the country.

“Namibia on the list is a huge contradiction,” says Namibia-based gender mainstreaming consultant, Penohole Brock. “It’s our gender awareness that is lacking overall. You have women in leadership positions that continue to uphold conservative views and patriarchy.”

In October last year, a wave of protests against gender-based violence broke out in Namibia’s capital city, Windhoek. The #ShutItAllDownNambia protestors called for the government to do more to stop the spread of rape and the killing of women. On October 10, EWN reported that the protest was quickly dispersed by police and the Special Reserve Force using tear gas, rubber bullets and batons.

Since then, was it possible more political attention was given to improve issues?

“But it could be that politicians made a conscious choice to drive forward the number of women that are represented in government so

that they can help solve these issues,” Ratcheva says. “But I wouldn’t say certainly that it is, without knowing.”

Brock counters by saying that although Namibia ticks all the representation boxes, she questions what representation actually means, and how there are still gender issues in the country.

“Political parties are placing women in parliament now, but when you talk to the women, they say that the men still dominate the space.

From a quantitative gender audit, Namibia seems okay on paper, but a qualitative gender audit will show major red flags.”

Since its conception in 2006, the Global Gender Gap Report has highlighted the evolution of gender-based gaps in four areas: economic participation and opportunity, educational attainment, health and survival, and political empowerment. The 2021 report shows how it will now take 135.6 years – up from 99.5 years – to close the global gender gap. The pandemic has pushed back gender parity by a generation.

Sub-Saharan Africa has made slow progress, as this region will take 121.7 years to close the gender gap. More than half of the countries in the region (20 out of 34) made progress towards gender parity in the past year, though only Namibia and Rwanda have closed at least 80% of their gaps.

Ratcheva’s first assessment of the report is that “this is a risky time for gender parity”. She further explains that the issues of gender equality and equity plus Covid-19 equal an incredible amount of backsliding. This could result in that 136year figure increasing in the years to come.

“Covid-19 is posing challenges to all of us in very different ways.

Unless there is a concerted effort to reinvest in gender parity and to put in place the foundations for gender-equal recovery, there could be a lot more of that backward progress,” she warns.

Although politically, Namibia seems to be on the right track in achieving gender parity, Brock argues that from a local authority level, there is still much to be done.

“Gender parity and our 50/50 representation policy should be seen as a first step and not the end goal to combating gender inequality. If gender awareness and gender sensitivity are not pursued at all levels and taken seriously, then ideals of patriarchy will be impossible to dismantle.”

When you talk to the women, they say that the men still dominate the space.

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ADVERTORIAL BY BLOCKCHAIN

ID, The Unlikely Key To Economic Growth In The Developing World

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or you and me, and millions of people worldwide, we have the means to prove who we are. Via ID cards, driver licenses, birth or marriage certificates, household bills, an officially recognized document is never farther than arm's length for most of us.

But there are over 1 billion people out there who do not have this privilege. Because according to the World Bank, an estimated 1 billion of the world’s population face substantial challenges proving who they are.

And because of this, they can encounter issues in getting access to work, education, finance, e-commerce, and many other facets of daily life that most of us take for granted.

In fact, much of the structural and institutionalized inequality in the developing world can be linked to a lack of verifiable identity.

With blockchain, this no longer needs to be the case. By enabling someone to prove who they are, blockchain technology can provide the gateway to equality, and the key to unlocking economic growth and levelling up opportunity.

Blockchain-based ecosystems are fertile grounds for solutions to longstanding technological and societal challenges, and the provision of identity is just the beginning. We recently unveiled the largest –and the most significant – blockchain technology deployment ever. Our partnership with the Ethi-

opian Ministry of Education will provide a blockchain-based digital identity for 5 million students and teachers. Using our Atala PRISM digital ID solution built on the Cardano blockchain, we’re creating a nationwide attainment recording system that will verify attendance, grades, monitor school performance, and boost education across the country.

This novel application of blockchain technology in education is focused on improving academic outcomes. Yet by providing verifiable proof of qualifications and identity, beyond education, it will open up work opportunities both locally and abroad.

Atala PRISM is built on the principle of Self-Sovereign Identity (SSI), which refers to an individual's ability and entitlement to have and retain control over their credentials, without being forced to use a centralized, third-party authority as an intermediary. This 'gatekeeper' role is removed, handing control of the individual's identity credentials back to the individual and giving them a way to securely store their identity data.

SSI places the individual, rather than the organization, at the center of the identity framework. This means that SSI is the new paradigm for any user-centric identity management solutions, and cannot be locked down (centralized) to any one entity, locale, or geographical location.

What's next for blockchain Effectively, a decentralized identity built on the blockchain to common and agreed standards acts like an identity passport, opening up access to a host of services never available to an individual before. Blockchain pushes power to the edges, empowering thousands and potentially millions on equal identity terms, providing access to education, work, proof of ownership credit, and much more. Blockchain connects, but also liberates. It connects people with each other, and with opportunities to grow and develop as individuals. And this technology liberates the individuals from the constraints imposed by lack of identity, opening up a range of possibilities that had hitherto remained just beyond their reach.

Access to education and identity are just two of blockchain's many enabling powers.

The decision by the Ethiopian Government to utilise the Cardano blockchain to deliver key government services is just a seed that can grow into that all-encompassing connectedness that blockchain technology can generate. Future expansions into other aspects of society, such as civil registries, micro-loans, transport, etc., could very well place Ethiopia on the world's pole position for the blockchain race.

To learn more, visit: https://africa.cardano.org/

A Story Of Reconciliation, Healing And Hope

20 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

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FOCUS | RWANDA

HOW DO YOU FORGIVE A MAN WHO HAS KILLED ALL YOUR LOVED ONES? RWANDA’S RECONCILIATION EFFORTS HAVE SEEN SURVIVORS AND PERPETRATORS OF THE 1994 GENOCIDE AGAINST THE TUTSI LIVING NEXT TO EACH OTHER, HEALING AND TRANSFORMING. FORBES AFRICA TRAVELS TO BUGESERA TO CAPTURE ONE SUCH MOVING TALE.

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BY TESI KAVEN

T’S ONE THING TO FORGIVE a person who has committed a crime against you, and quite another to reconcile, live next to and even cultivate a strong friendship with the person, especially when he has horrifically claimed the lives of your entire family.

This scenario is not strange in Rwanda, a country once torn apart by the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi, when more than a million people lost their lives.

This year, in April, Rwanda marked the 27th anniversary of the genocide, and reconciliation, though unfathomable at one point, has become a concept the country has become known for.

On the outskirts of the capital city of Kigali, approximately a two-hour drive away, is a village with a rich history, one that’s not easily given away by the serene and beautiful surrounds.

In what almost looks like a gated community, 110 houses stand at the Rweru Reconciliation Village in Bugesera District.

To foster the concept of reconciliation, perpetrators and survivors of the genocide live next to each other.

In this village, we meet Maria Izagiriza and Philbert Ntezirizaza.

Targeted attacks against the Tutsi community had begun long before the 1994 genocide, resulting in mass killings and forced relocations.

Among the many affected, was 63-year-old Izagiriza, who lost some of her siblings in killings in 1973 and later, her first husband. Widowed at a young age, she later remarried and moved from her birthplace to Bugesera district, where she

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gave birth to four children.

News of the death of the then Rwandan president, Juvénal Habyarimana, was delivered to Izagiriza by a neighbor on that fateful morning of April 7, 1994.

She remembers it all as if it was yesterday.

“My neighbor informed me that the president had died the night before and went on to say that my people were responsible for his death,” Izagiriza tells FORBES AFRICA. “My neighbor said my people and I would pay dearly for what we had done.”

Indeed, nothing could have prepared Izagiriza, her family and millions of other Rwandans for the atrocities that took place over the next 100 days, following the death of Habyarimana.

The militia descended on Izagiriza’s home that morning, killing all her livestock, burning down her house and beating her husband to a pulp, leaving him for dead. The children were miraculously spared.

She managed to escape through a hole she had created in the mud wall of her kitchen.

When night fell, she returned to her compound to get her husband and children.

“Though breathing, my husband was so badly wounded and bleeding from all parts of

JUNE | JULY 2021 FORBES AFRICA | 21

Someone we thought was a friend offered to help us, but instead, he delivered my husband and children to the killers.

– Maria Izagiriza

I felt like I had been released from one prison and walked straight into another. I had no peace, no rest.

– Philbert Ntezirizaza

22 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

his body,” she says, pausing to wipe the tears streaming down her tired face. ”The children were scared stiff but unharmed.”

With the help of her children, Izagiriza somehow managed to drag her injured husband to a hiding place where she felt they would all be safe. This would, however, be the last time she would see her husband and children alive.

“Someone we thought was a friend offered to help us, but instead, he delivered my husband and children to the killers.

Again, I managed to escape, but this time, with my four-month-old baby strapped to my back. That was the last time I saw my family alive.”

Izagiriza’s family was led to a barricade where a group of young, blood-thirsty men were killing people. Among them that day was Ntezirizaza. He was only 18 years old at the time. Hatred for the Tutsi people, he says, was planted in him when he was still very young.

“In 1994, I was a teenager, my body full of youthful vigor and my mind filled with a terrible ideology, fed to me since I was in elementary school,” Ntezirizaza tells FORBES AFRICA. “Our mindset at that time was more lethal than the machetes we carried.”

Asked what happened to Izagiriza’s

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FORBES AFRICA

Photos by Ridhima Shukla

FOCUS | RWANDA

family, Ntezirizaza pauses, then, with a low voice and distant gaze, says: “We hacked her husband and eldest son to death and threw the remaining two children in a deep pit, alive. We knew they wouldn’t survive.”

A while after the genocide, Ntezirizaza was sentenced to 12 years in prison, after confessing to his crimes. It was while in prison that he met with members of Prison Fellowship Rwanda (PFR), an NGO that sought to unite and reconcile Rwandans.

“PFR helped us see how deadly the beliefs and ideologies we harbored were and the importance of seeking forgiveness from those we hurt,” he says.

In 2003, six years into his sentence, Rwanda’s President Paul Kagame pardoned prisoners who had admitted to their crimes. Though free, guilt kept gnawing on Ntezirizaza’s conscience.

“I felt like I had been released from one prison and walked straight into another. I had no peace, no rest.”

Izagiriza, who had managed to escape to Burundi with her infant daughter, was now back in Rwanda, trying to pick up the pieces of what was left of her life.

News had reached her while in Burundi that her family was no more, and she battled depression and suicidal thoughts.

Just like Ntezirizaza, she met members of PFR, who at the time were building the Rweru Reconciliation Village, to help settle survivors whose property was destroyed and perpetrators who were coming out of prison but with nowhere to call home.

Volunteers and pastors from the NGO counseled Izagiriza, helping her to come to terms with what had happened.

“The PFR team helped me realize that forgiving and letting go was for my benefit. Mentally, they prepared me to meet and forgive Philbert,” she says. “But I must admit, it wasn’t easy.”

As a sign of remorse for his actions, Ntezirizaza would work on Izagiriza’s farm under the cover of darkness.

“I would prepare the farm for planting on one night, then plant the seeds the following night and water them the night after. I wanted to do what the children or husband I killed would have done had they been alive,” he says.

Eventually, the two had a sit-down session and he narrated all that befell her family and asked to be forgiven.

At present, the two are genuine friends. Izagiriza asked Ntezirizaza to be her daughter’s godfather at her baptism. When her daughter got married and walked down the aisle, he was there to witness it all.

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We have built nine reconciliation villages across the country, and they stand not only as a monument of Rwanda’s history but also as an example to future generations that unity and reconciliation can be achieved.

– David Nsoro, the communication officer at Prison Fellowship Rwanda

The story of Izagiriza and Ntezirizaza may just be one story but it mirrors the experiences of many in the tiny East African hill country.

It is echoed by countless other survivors of the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi who have chosen the path of unity and reconciliation, however difficult it has been.

David Nsoro, the communication officer at PFR, says that seeing the survivors and perpetrators living together in harmony at the reconciliation villages is a huge milestone.

“We have built nine reconciliation villages across the country, and they stand not only as a monument of Rwanda’s history but also as an example to future generations that unity and reconciliation can be achieved,” Nsoro tells FORBES AFRICA. In his address to the nation on the 27th commemoration of the genocide against the Tutsi, Kagame emphasized on the transformation that had taken place not just in the country, but more in the hearts and minds of Rwandans.

Said Kagame: “The immensity of what has been achieved is almost miraculous. The results are attested to by Rwandans, and indeed indisputable. But the intangible transformation which has taken place in the hearts and minds of our people is even more important.”

JUNE | JULY 2021 FORBES AFRICA | 23

ADVERTORIAL BY MASTERCARD

TRENDS OF A TECH-TONIC AGE From ride-hailing services to online marketplaces, Mastercard’s new-era digital partnerships bring benefits to consumers and small businesses

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ross-sector, multi-segment, quick-thinking collaboration has taken on new meaning for most people. From perfumeries producing sanitizers and household appliance companies manufacturing ventilators, co-creation has resulted in much-needed innovation.

Deep down at the heart and center of it all, partnerships develop because of needs — identifying pain points, and connecting them with solutions. If we’ve learned anything over the past year, it’s that we are able to accomplish much more together than when we act alone.

Technology and change are here to stay Technology companies like Mastercard are transforming the partnership space into an exciting and evolving epicenter of

dynamic deals that are adding many more conveniences for consumers and small businesses. They are also saving time and money, all underpinned with the peace of mind that integrated cyber-secure solutions bring.

Even before the massive changes that led to digital adoption vaulting forward by several years in a matter of weeks, technology giants were creatively crafting solutions across multiple-use cases. Like most things related to tech, this process has just accelerated.

Through innovative digital partnerships, Mastercard is giving companies across multiple sectors the chance to diversify and transform their business operations by leveraging Mastercard’s secure payments technology, digital solutions and insights. In addition to

making payments seamless and secure, this is also enabling companies to expand engagement with their entire value chain, unlocking efficiencies of all kinds.

Contextualizing creativity beyond cards It is exactly these far-reaching value chain efficiencies that are hailed by many on-demand companies who are partnering with Mastercard in order to drive digitization across their operations. Uber, for example, is leveraging Mastercard’s infrastructure to boost safe cashless transactions, reward loyalty, and advance social impact by growing financial inclusion for drivers in the gig economy.

Delivery Hero, the world’s leading local delivery platform, has also partnered with Mastercard to digitize its payment chain.

Now, food delivery apps like talabat in

Egypt, can offer consumers the opportunity to pay contactless on delivery, but crucially, delivery riders can receive instant access to earnings and financial services.

It’s a win-win for everyone involved.

A new take on banking Another perspective is evident in the way that traditional banks and financial technology companies interact with one another, which is changing dramatically as open banking becomes the norm. It brings a new dimension and more choice to how consumers can manage and control their money.

When Spot Money launched South Africa’s first bank-neutral open banking offering earlier this year, it counted on Mastercard’s technology to develop the intuitive Spot app. Users benefit from access to personalized financial services such as loans and insurance, coupled with value-added lifestyle services, Scan to Pay functionality, direct contactless mobile phone payments, and the ability to transact at any retail location that accepts Mastercard.

Inclusion wins One of the biggest pain points in Africa is digital inclusion. How can we grow digital adoption – and therefore financial inclusion – when so many people don’t have access to a device? This is a need that Mastercard meets by connecting its innovative Pay on Demand solution to multi-partner collaboration. In this partnership, Samsung makes the devices available with an affordable installment model, Asante Financial Services provides the loan, while Airtel Africa coordinates the delivery.

By enabling digital access to everyday products and services for under-served consumers and micro merchants, the Pay on Demand platform, built by Mastercard Labs, drives digital and financial inclusion, leading to improved economic possibilities for people and businesses.

With use, a digital transaction history is established, which can unlock access to other financing solutions, such as credit, savings, investments and insurance. The convenience of buying a smartphone at a low upfront cost with affordable payments over time, means more people can interact with and benefit from the digital economy – and sustainably prosper.

Put your money where your mobile is A mobile phone has therefore emerged as an important tool in the quest for inclusion – not only to give people access to helpful information, but also to transact, buy what they need, pay bills, subscribe to services, and send remittances to family. QR codes – enabled by the widespread adoption of digital wallets – are now the second most-offered channel for merchant payments in Africa, after Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD).

Following double-digit growth in 2020, GSMA’s latest data reports over half a billion mobile money accounts in Africa – close to half of the global total. Customers are using their accounts for new and more advanced use cases, suggesting that more people are moving away from the margins of financial systems and leading increasingly digital lives.

They are being connected to opportunities and options – like ecommerce access to a global, online, international marketplace, which is what MTN MoMo wallet users now have, following MTN’s partnership with Mastercard.

This particular partnership is empowering millions of consumers across 16 countries in Africa to make payments on global platforms.

Future-proofing for continued success Since change is constant, solutions that meet the needs of today must also be adaptable in order to adjust to the needs of

tomorrow. Mastercard is future-proofing its solutions through continuous innovation, investments and acquisitions. From financing Africa’s leading online marketplace Jumia, to investing in its cybersecurity capabilities through acquisitions like NuData Security, Mastercard is staying ahead of the game on multiple fronts so it can continue to be a trusted technology partner for multiple industries.

Amnah Ajmal, who is the Executive Vice President, Market Development, MEA for Mastercard, describes the context of Africa’s digital journey. She explains: “The continent has leapfrogged some of the legacy financial systems of developed countries. Africa led the way with the development of mobile money – well before the smartphone fintech revolution.

As more African consumers embrace online and digital experiences, new digital payment partnerships are evolving – which is transformative for growth and life chances.”

By forging digital partnerships across sectors and participating in numerous payment flows through its multi-rail strategy, Mastercard is pivoting beyond cards in order to reach the 1 billion people it committed to connecting to the digital economy by 2025.

We may not yet have a world beyond cash, but its growth is thriving.

And its potential? Priceless indeed.

AFRICA

CLASS OF 2021 Change-Makers In A Historic Year

26 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

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MEMBERS OF THIS YEAR’S LIST OF UNDER 30s HAVE ONE THING IN COMMON: A NEW COVID-INDUCED AGENDA FOR SOCIAL CHANGE. SO WHAT WOULD A HISTORIC PANDEMIC YEAR THROW UP? GROUND-BREAKING ENTREPRENEURS AND THINKERS. OUR 2021 CLASS OF UNDER 30s ARE JUST THAT: INFLUENTIAL CREATIVES, IMAGINATIVE BUSINESS OWNERS, INNOVATIVE TECHIES AND GIFTED SPORTS STARS. CELEBRATING SEVEN YEARS OF THE FORBES AFRICA 30 UNDER 30 LIST, THESE ACHIEVERS PROVE THAT NOW MORE THAN EVER, THEY ARE CRUCIAL TO THE AFRICAN GROWTH STORY.

Words: Karen Mwendera, Chanel Retief, Simone Umraw Art Director: Lucy Nkosi | Photographer: Motlabana Monnakgotla | Retouching: Newkatz Studio Styling: Keabetswe Mafora; Outfits supplied by: Spero Villioti, Viviers Studio, Sisi the Collection, GertJohan Coetzee, Port of LNG, Amen Concepts, Europa Art | Studio: Light Station Studio, Johannesburg | Hair & Makeup: SnehhOnline Beauty

HANGE-MAKERS versus Covid! That’s what we were looking for when curating FORBES AFRICA’s 30 Under 30 list-makers this year.

After all, 2021 marks an entire year that has disrupted the world.

Businesses pivoted and so did our lives as we navigated the pandemic, and realized that the old ways of doing things no longer work.

But surely, there are answers, especially on the world’s youngest continent.

A report, Global Employment Trends for Youth 2020: Africa, by the International Labour Organization, says that “Africa’s youth unemployment rate is the lowest in the world and compared to other regions”.

So, we celebrate young talent that comes to the fore in finding sustainable ways to overcome the crisis but also helping those who have been the hardest hit. From philanthropic beauty influencers to tech geeks revolutionizing renewable energy and even a chess master championing entrepreneurship, the list features a motley cast of individuals wanting to change the world when it needs it the most.

This year’s list-makers – the youngest being 19 – will go down in history as the Under 30s who survived and thrived during one of the most turbulent chapters on earth. The following pages are a record of the enduring tenacity and fighting spirit of Africa’s young leaders charting a nonlinear trajectory to success.

The list is in no particular order.

FORBESAFRICA.COM

METHODOLOGY

The Covid-19 pandemic posed a unique challenge this year when collating criteria for the nomination process. A new set of factors had to be taken into account for the challenges this year’s hopefuls were faced with.

Yet, despite the adversities and setbacks, about 1,000+ applicants and nominees poured into our online portal, and we also dredged them from our 30 Under 30 alum and our own research. This was then narrowed down to the 30 finalists across the business, technology, sports and creative sectors.

The criteria employed this year was the most rigorous it has ever been. Nominees needed to provide valid evidence of their endeavors. Background checks were done to ascertain their calibre, conduct and personal track-record.

With audit partner SNG Grant Thornton, we were able to assess their company financials from losses to growth margins to overall revenue and profits since incorporation.

Our criteria for the 30 Under 30 list is that only those under the age of 30 ( just before the publication of this issue) may apply.

All decision-making and interviews were conducted digitally this year, as the pandemic did not enable meetings in person. In doing so, we had new appreciation for the technology that powered our research.

The finalists were vetted by the editorial team and a panel of high-profile judges and subjectmatter experts (see following page).

This list is only but a small indication of the inspiring young talent on the continent who will no doubt grace the pages of FORBES AFRICA in the months and years to come.

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FORBES AFRICA

COVER STORY • 30 UNDER 30

EXTERNAL JUDGES: THE CATEGORY EXPERTS WHOSE ROLE WAS TO SURVEY ALL THE FINALISTS OF THE 2021 30 UNDER 30 LIST, RANK THEM AND PROVIDE COMMENTARY ON EACH CANDIDATE. BUSINESS: Nigerian businesswoman Uche Pedro, the founder and CEO of BellaNaija, a media tech brand known for its entertainment and lifestyle content. She has been in the business game for over 15 years, collecting numerous local and international accolades along the way including making the FORBES WOMAN AFRICA 50 Most Powerful Women list in 2020.

TECHNOLOGY: Olugbenga Agboola, the cofounder and CEO of Flutterwave, an African fintech firm building digital payments infrastructure. He has contributed to the development of fintech solutions at several tech companies and financial institutions such as PayPal, Standard Bank, among others. Flutterwave recently raised $170 million, giving it ‘unicorn’ status with a value of over $1 billion.

SPORTS: Tendai ‘Beast’ Mtawarira, a Zimbabwean-born professional rugby player who plays for Old Glory DC in Major League Rugby and previously for the South African national team and the Sharks in Super Rugby. With 117 caps, he is the most capped prop in South African history and the third most-capped Springbok of all time. He is also a 2019 Rugby World Cup winner. He owns a security company in South Africa and The Beast Foundation.

AUDIT PARTNER: FORBES AFRICA partnered again with SNG Grant Thornton to vet the business and financial statements of the candidates. This involved understanding the landscape, the profitability, growth and most of all, the scalability of each business.

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TIMILEHIN BELLO, 27, NIGERIA CEO AND FOUNDER, MEDIA PANACHE INDUSTRY: MEDIA AND PUBLIC RELATIONS

When on-air personality and comedian, Steve Onu aka YAW, took under his wings a young Timilehin Bello in 2011 while he was in his third year at Lagos State University, Bello should have known that his life would change. Forever.

This would lead him in 2016 to his own public relations company, Media Panache, in Nigeria. He started small, but today, Bello is popularly known as ‘Big Timi’. The risk of starting a business when Nigeria was in a period of recession is something Bello admits was difficult.

“I started writing to all my friends, introducing them to my company, and begging them to help share the gospel around,” he says. “I got tired of staying at home, and I called some of my uncles to please give me N200,000 to N300,000 ($526 to $790) to rent an office space in the Ikeja area of Lagos, but none of them granted me this money because according to them, they do not see the success of this company and I do not have a business plan.”

That is when Bello decided to use WhatsApp to kickstart his business by creating a group whereby he added friends who then added companies who then asked him to do campaigns for them.

At one point, Bello received about a million naira ($2,632) for a campaign and his personal account was locked at this point because the bank had never seen so much money in his account before.

“That’s why I always say, Media Panache started on WhatsApp with zero money,” he jokes.

Media Panache is recognized in Nigeria as one of the youngest public relations agencies continuously recruiting young minds that would change the game of the industry. The oldest person working at Bello is 28.

“I started the company because I wanted to show the world something different and unique from what they have been seeing [so far], especially being executed by young minds.”

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Photo supplied; Photo by Motlabana Monnakgotla

CREATIVES: Dr John Kani, a South African actor, author, director, and playwright known for his roles in Marvel movies Captain America: Civil War and Black Panther as well as The Lion King. In addition, Kani is also the Founder of the Market Theatre LaboratoryAcademy, chair of the Apartheid Museum South Africa, patron and Ambassador of the Market Theatre, and Trustee for the WWFNedbank Green Trust.

Media Panache started on WhatsApp with zero money.

CLEO JOHNSON, 29, SOUTH AFRICA FOUNDER AND DIRECTOR, NUECLEO INDUSTRY: HOSPITALITY MANAGEMENT While many businesses were hit hard during Covid-19, Cleo Johnson’s company had the reverse effect. Here’s how.

When she resigned from the Radisson Hotel Group in 2017, she had no idea what she was going to do.

Her initial plan was an ‘eat, pray, love’ experience in India, blogging about it.

She registered a company to monetize her blog and in the three weeks that she was preparing to leave for India, she met her first client at Starbucks in Rosebank, Johannesburg, who needed someone to assist with his social media.

So, she decided to stay.

Using her savings, she developed her corporate identity, and shortly after, was approached by the developer for Signature Lux hotels to get their brand off the ground and she received her first real retainer payment in April 2017.

As a result, Nuecleo was born, as a hospitality marketing consultancy firm that operates solely on a digital platform with every 10% made injected into community projects.

“I initially thought that my goal should be to have a massive social media agency with floors of employees and as I started navigating this journey, I realized where my passions lie. I am grateful that I no longer have the dream of having a high-rise building, but I have found my niche which utilizes my years of expertise in the industry to not only better it but deliver out-of-the-box concepts not found in traditional establishments,” she tells FORBES AFRICA. Currently, Nuecleo is working with international clients in the US, UK, Dubai and Togo.

Like any other business, the pandemic hit Nuecleo indirectly, as many of her clients were in the hospitality business, which The World Travel & Tourism Council predicts would cut 50 million jobs worldwide in travel and tourism.

This left the Cape Town-born Johnson feeling like a sitting duck.

“The time away from my normal busy schedule gave me time to strategize and come up with innovative ways to help my business and the industry as a whole and the idea to build certain platforms and software for the industry was born,” she says.

She was able to secure two clients the same year; one a hotel and the other a restaurant, which is no easy feat for a small business run by a woman.

“I’m a lone consultant so [the challenges I face are] trying to persuade my clients that I am capable of doing the job and also being the youngest and only female in the boardroom is extremely difficult because I am very much overlooked most of the time but I am a little fighter so I make my way,” she says breathlessly.

From the lessons learned during the pandemic, she is currently working on hospitality-related software and platforms for the continent suited to her infrastructure, that are “cost-effective and will foster a financially sustainable industry and mitigate losses as we experienced with Covid-19”.

Being the youngest and only female in the boardroom is extremely difficult because I am very much overlooked most of the time but I am a little fighter so I make my way.

LEBOHANG MOELETSI PHADI, 26, SOUTH AFRICA CEO, BASADI LOGISTICS INDUSTRY: LOGISTICS, MINING AND FUEL

In the 13 years of the business’ existence, we have had zero fatalities in our operations.

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SEPENICA DARKO, 29, GHANA FOUNDER, FARMERTRIBE COMPANY INDUSTRY: AGRIBUSINESS

After her mother’s accident during her second year at university, Sepenica Darko found herself being the sole bread-winner for herself and her mother who was now confined to a wheelchair.

She sold sobolo (Ghanaian hibiscus juice), fried rice, and Indomie instant noodles to get by and after a short space of time, grew this simple business into a budding fast food takeaway company.

This was the first, and certainly not the last, of her entrepreneurial endeavors as she founded FarmerTribe, a company that focuses on the provision of seeds and grains at affordable prices as well as other agricultural products such as fertilizers and agrochemicals.

Her business also helps small-holding farmers through training and assistance with production resources. Darko started her company with just $7,000; $2,000 of which was from her own pocket and the rest provided by the Tony Elumelu Foundation.

Having grown from two districts to four in north Ghana, Darko has also seen international recognition for her efforts as she received a grant from the Global Distribution Company in 2020 and became a 2020 GSBI Women-Led JumpStart Alumni.

Enabling growth in her community continues to be at the heart of Darko’s business strategy as she assists farmers with increasing their yield.

Despite the adversities she faced, Darko is a pillar to her community and family and we look forward to what she accomplishes next.

FORBESAFRICA.COM

Photos supplied

Lebohang Moeletsi Phadi was on his way to becoming an audio engineer when his life changed drastically. As a result of his mother’s illness and the seriousness of her condition, Phadi made the decision to drop out of college and take over the family business.

Basadi Logistics, the company, was at the time a relatively small operation and only serviced one client.

Since Phadi’s takeover, it has grown in terms of both assets and manpower to cope with the huge demand coming in from the mining sector.

Phadi took what he was given and grew the company from having only seven transport vehicles to 35 in a short span of time. The same can be said of his staff who are now 37-strong.

As its CEO, Phadi takes pride in the achievements of the company and where it has come; part of this is its safety record.

“I am proud that we have an untainted safety record. In the 13 years of the business’ existence, we have had zero fatalities in our operations,” he beams.

Treating the business the way he does his favorite game, chess, has led him to make all the right moves and the company has seen both operational growth and profitability as Basadi Logistics managed to make money and grow during a period when most companies were unsure of where they would be in 2021.

Our audits reveal that his company had a growth margin of 139% last year.

His ability to manoeuvre his way through the financial strain Covid-19 presented and do so successfully makes Phadi one of our list-makers.

FORBES AFRICA

COVER STORY • 30 UNDER 30

DEBORAH MUTEMWA-TUMBO, 30, ZAMBIA AND SOUTH AFRICA FOUNDER AND CEO, TSUMBO SCOTT INCORPORATED INDUSTRY: LAW

Deborah Mutemwa-Tumbo is a Zambian-born South African lawyer who gained recognition for her work that has had a transformative effect on law in South Africa.

Mutemwa-Tumbo established Tsumbo Scott with her business partner, Dr Tshepiso Scott, as an all-black, young, female-owned-and-run corporate commercial law firm.

“While the fight to convince clients to trust two young black women to do the high-quality legal work that has, for centuries, been the domain of old white males, has been a difficult one, we have overcome through our consistency,” she says.

They provide legal services to companies and individuals alike based in the heart of Sandton, Africa’s richest square mile.

Our audits show that her company's revenue has grown 138% in the past year.

This self-funded business has grown against the odds.

Mutemwa-Tumbo was born in a small town in Kitwe, Zambia, to a pastor and a flight attendant.

When she was four, she moved to South Africa where she fell in love with the idea of justice and pursued a degree in law at the University of Johannesburg.

Shortly after her tenure at court, she and Scott started the business from Mutemwa-Tumbo’s mother’s dining room table in 2017.

Today, she has seven full-time employees and five consultants who are able to work because of the cloud-based technologies incorporated in the

We have overcome through our consistency.

business – this has been their biggest strength operating through the pandemic.

Some of the firm’s biggest highlights include being appointed to consult on an African Union project that saw Mutemwa-Tumbo working as a special secretariat drafting Common African Position on Assets Recovery.

This South African lawyer has worked on some of the top legal matters in the country.

Through her firm, she has represented hundreds of clients, representing small businesses, large corporates, international companies, and regional bodies such as the African Union.

“We are also presently embarking on an exciting journey to develop legal tech and AI solutions, in consultation with a digital solutions company, that will help our firm reach businesses across the continent and make usually expensive and lengthy commercial legal processes faster, more affordable, and accessible,” she says.

BONTLE TSHOLE, 28, SOUTH AFRICA CEO AND FOUNDER, BAAA HEALTH INDUSTRY: HEALTH FOOD

From the age of nine, Bontle Tshole knew she would become an entrepreneur when she insisted on helping her mother run the family business. Furthermore, she grew up in a home where healthy food was a priority and shaped the way she thought about food and the health benefits that accompany it.

Fast forward to 2017 when with just under $350 in savings and one final salary from her retail job, Tshole bought her first blender to start her company, BAAA Health.

BAAA Health is a health bar that is, as she puts it, “changing the narrative of healthy eating” by providing healthy fast food alternatives to consumers. Currently, BAAA has products in line with the South African lifestyle market, the most popular being the juices and energy balls.

“One of the biggest highlights for BAAA was being recognized by Unilever and Sunlight to be one of their female-owned business brand ambassadors,” says Tshole, who pivoted her business during the lockdown in South Africa.

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FORBES AFRICA

COVER STORY • 30 UNDER 30

BRIAN KAKEMBO, 26, UGANDA FOUNDER AND CEO, WEYE CLEAN ENERGY CO. LTD INDUSTRY: RENEWABLE ENERGY Born and raised in Kalangala Island, in a rural village, to a father who was a poorly-paid government school teacher and a mother working as a civil servant, Brian Kakembo grew up using firewood and charcoal to cook.

Understanding the effects these fuels had on the environment, Kakembo made it his mission to turn waste into wealth with only the $320 he had saved to buy his first set of manual briquette machines in 2016.

“There is a need for clean and renewable energy technologies that are both financially and environmentally sustainable,” he tells FORBES AFRICA. “The project was then registered as WEYE Clean Energy Co. Ltd in January 2018 and from then onwards, we have continuously scaled from the one unit making as low as $300 per month to making $41,000 a year,” he says.

The company is a social enterprise that uses business as a tool to promote waste management practices while reducing deforestation by making charcoal briquettes from organic agriculture and municipal waste.

Apart from providing

Our goal is to reach an annual turnover of $1 million in the next five years.

clean energy, they offer training and consulting services in briquette production.

WEYE Clean Energy has provided waste-toenergy cooking and heating solutions to three schools, two large-scale poultry farms, one medium scale industry, and also homes.

His waste-to-energy youth project in partnership with local NGOs and community based organizations has trained over 700 youth and women, empowering them with skills and equipment to start and run both briquette production units and plastic waste recycling businesses.

He currently employs a full-time staff of 14 and part-time staff of four.

Kakembo’s social enterprise has received both local and international recognition and awards by the iF Design Foundation and Global Green Growth Institute in South Korea, to name a couple.

He is currently pursuing his MBA in Energy and Sustainability awarded by UCAM (Universidad Católica San Antonio de Murcia) in Spain.

“Our goal is to reach an annual turnover of $1 million in the next five years. This is a very bold goal that we strongly believe we will achieve. We have a market that is constantly growing, demand that is currently higher than the capacity to supply, and a very capable team; what we need is the right access to capital,” he says.

FELIX BYARUHANGA, 27, UGANDA

“I embarked on a journey to document the Ugandan hip-hop industry that had been neglected by the mainstream media,” says Ugandan entrepreneur Felix Byaruhanga.

With a background in computer science, he began The Tribe whilst bored during a lecture.

His main goal? To create a platform that showcased the diverse and outstanding hip-hop culture that exists in Uganda. In doing this, he hoped to create necessary conversation on the expansion and inclusion of Ugandan hip-hop in mainstream media.

The platform has since grown and expanded in ways that not even Byaruhanga foresaw.

From being nominated twice for the Uganda Social Media Awards in 2015 and 2016 respectively, the platform, which began as a blog originally, has also developed a digital magazine and a network of podcasts.

The highlight of the company’s journey came when it was one of the organizers of the Ugandan Hip-Hop Awards in 2016 and have continued to be so to date.

The company also assists artists in branding themselves and monetizing their talents. All of this is done with a simple motto in mind – “Before one takes out of the industry, they should add to it first”.

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FORBESAFRICA.COM

Photo by Motlabana Monnakgotla; Photos supplied

FOUNDER OF SKYLINE MEDIA & MANAGEMENT INDUSTRY: ENTERTAINMENT AND MEDIA

SHAKEMORE TIMBURWA, 29, ZIMBABWE FOUNDER, ENERGY PLUS INDUSTRY: ENERGY AND GAS

Shakemore Wellington Timburwa is a tall man with a big dream.

When he appears for the 2021 FORBES AFRICA 30 Under 30 cover shoot in Johannesburg, at first glance, his height makes him intimidating, but this Zimbabwean businessman's endearing charm and people skills immediately kick in. Willing to engage with everyone and “asking the right questions” are probably the reasons why he is where he is today.

As the CEO of Energy Plus International, he hopes to alleviate the energy crisis that plagues his home country, Zimbabwe. With the aim to ensure a solar panel is installed in every room, Timburwa also has an ulterior motive to this goal, as he explains to us.

He started the company with only $433, mostly in personal savings, but also including $100 from his mother.

“I would say the inspiration came from something very disturbing that I witnessed near my home village in Zimbabwe and that was the destruction of trees because of fossil fuels and with the rate that it was happening, I felt that there needed to be a change and something needed to be done to preserve the environment,” explains Timburwa.

Servicing local clients and neighboring countries alike, Timburwa is earnest in his goal to ensure that renewable energy is the only form of energy for the future. As part of the 30 Under 30 list, he hopes it will create more awareness of his plight.

“Being on this list is going to create a wide range of connections which, if I am wise enough, I can turn into commerce and they will help me grow and push harder in attaining the goals and milestones that I have also set for myself.”

Hoping to inspire other young Africans, he wishes everyone will get into the business of saving and preserving the planet. Last year, he was appointed to the Global Chamber Business Leaders, Young Business Leaders Program in Zimbabwe.

Something needed to be done to preserve the environment.

partners. An angel investor, Bill Paladino, injected R5 million ($355,000) into Kabeya’s vision.

By 2019, 1,400 students had signed up.

By 2020, the business had evolved into a state-of-the-art learning technology platform specially designed for quintessential teaching and learning, particularly optimized for TVETs with the textbooks now digitized and available to students on the e-learning platform.

The reintroduced blended learning business model thrived in the Covid-19 lockdown, proving that Kabeya was a man ahead of his time.

The same year, the Naspers foundry invested R45 million ($3.2 million) into The Student Hub saying in a statement that the online learning platform “increases access to vocational education to large numbers of students while reducing the costs of delivery of education and training”.

The Student Hub specializes in business and engineering studies and currently services seven TVET colleges and operates in four of the nine provinces in South Africa; the Free State, KwaZulu-Natal, Limpopo and the Western Cape.

It was a wakeup call to be innovative and evolve with the market.

HERTZY KABEYA, 29, THE DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF THE CONGO AND SOUTH AFRICA FOUNDER AND CEO, THE STUDENT HUB INDUSTRY: EDUCATION TECH

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TEMIDAYO ONIOSUN, 26, NIGERIA FOUNDER, SPACE IN AFRICA INDUSTRY: SPACE TECH The subject of satellites does not generally come up in conversations.

But for Temidayo Oniosun, his life revolves around them.

Armed with a master’s degree in Satellite Applications from the University of Strathclyde in Scotland and secure in his reputation as one of the leading space professionals in the field on the African continent, he launched Space in Africa.

It is the authority on news, data and market analysis for the African space and satellite industry. The company works on corporate and government contracts alike and serves a unique market in Africa.

Oniosun has also grown his own network and brand as he was also the former regional coordinator for the Space Generation Advisory Council for Africa and is currently interested in the activities being coordinated by China as part of their collaboration to expand the African space and satellite industry.

The company will also be implementing projects on behalf of the African Union Commission and the European Union in the coming months.

Oniosun continues to reach for the stars, literally.

FORBESAFRICA.COM

Photos supplied

The story of Hertzy Kabeya is one of consistency, resilience and persistence.

In 2010, the Congolese-born, based in South Africa, started buying and selling textbooks to his fellow students at university at more affordable rates; he called his company Budget Books at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology (CPUT).

At the time, he operated the company from a table in front of the campus library. Kabeya recognized the need for students to access course material and identified the shortcomings and barriers that limited those who came from challenging socio-economic backgrounds.

With time, the demand for Kabeya’s services grew, which led him to partner with a similar brand called Pimp My Book in 2012 providing books at the University of Cape Town, at the Observatory and in Parow.

Kabeya extended his services to Stellenbosch University, to the Free State, to Pretoria, and even Polokwane to serve students of the University of South Africa. He took the company digital and rebranded Budget Books as The Student Hub, an education technology company that facilitates technical and vocational education and training (TVET) colleges in optimizing their curricula and migrating their courses on e-learning platforms. “It was a wake-up call to be innovative and evolve with the market,” he tells FORBES AFRICA. The company focuses on upskilling the South African workforce by offering online TVET courses at affordable prices to enable more people, who otherwise wouldn’t have access to it, to attain tertiary education. They worked well, receiving over R4 million ($284,000) in investments up until 2017 – then everything that could go wrong did.

“In 2017, The Student Hub did a 180 and developed and launched its blended learning model, which failed miserably,” he says.

The Student Hub was slapped a lawsuit by a marketing company that accused it of non-payment; the judgment was later lifted and The Student Hub won due to being billed for work that was not signed off. “[I] closed the blended learning division and was unable to pay salaries for eight months. The staff stayed amidst the challenges, even though every venture capitalist rejected the company's pleas for funding,” says Kabeya.

In 2018, things began to look up. The Student Hub officially had a business model and revenue model and signed a few more distance learning

FORBES AFRICA

COVER STORY • 30 UNDER 30

HARRYKRISHNA NIADASSEN POONOOSAMY PADIACHY, 29, MAURITIUS FOUNDER, NKH ENERGY

INDUSTRY: ENERGY AND CLEAN TECH

Mauritian-born entrepreneur, Harrykrishna Niadassen Poonoosamy Padiachy, built his cleantech business, NKH Energy, as a one-man boutique consultancy firm in 2016.

In addition, Padiachy also has interests in real estate as the executive director of NRP Properties, at present, developing a multistaged real estate project to the tune of around $15 million on 44 acres of land with other investors.

“The project has been vulnerable to the heavy consequences of the Covid crisis on the Mauritian economy, an economy whose main industry is tourism,” Padiachy says. “Nevertheless, I successfully maintained the progress of the project through notably debt restructuring, judicious maneuvering of the low-interest-rate environment, and calculated risk-taking, thereby safeguarding about 60 direct and indirect job opportunities.”

What made his application to the Under 30 list compelling was the fact that this young African is the first official representative

of Mauritius to the World Energy Council, a 98-yearold organization with over 3,000 member organizations in around 90 countries.

Padiachy was selected in 2020 with 40 other young energy professionals.

The project has been vulnerable to the heavy consequences of the Covid crisis on the Mauritian economy, an economy whose main industry is tourism.

LI-CHI PAN, 29, SOUTH AFRICA

ART DIRECTOR AND DIGITAL INFLUENCER FOUNDER, LI CHI PAN STUDIOS INDUSTRY: CREATIVE VISUAL ARTS Elle South Africa said that her photographs are “crisp, vibrant and styled to perfection, making her Instagram one of the most beautiful feeds” to be seen.

Li-Chi Pan decided to blog and build her lifestyle brand in 2013, at a time when this was still not easily recognized as a profession. Think of some of the most luxurious brands like Audi, Dior, Hermès, Louis Vuitton, Moët & Chandon; Pan has curated content for all of them.

Ben Smithurst, content director at MAXMEDIALAB and independent publishing professional, wrote that only a few photographers have the skill and instinct to leverage their unique talent in an entrepreneurial way.

“Li-Chi has managed to do all of these things in a competitive market, at an age where many creatives are still struggling to find their feet,” he said.

Li Chi Pan Studios is based in the heart of Africa’s economic hub, Johannesburg. Covid did take a toll on her business, especially when it came to her international clientele. However, when she decided to just focus on expanding her client base in South Africa and working with more local brands and businesses, things did take a turn for the best.

“To my surprise, business picked up again, and now it's been going extremely well... I also spent a large portion of my time during lockdown working on a new body of photographic work – it has been over a year in the making, and I’m so excited to be showcasing it exclusively at the end of June in my hometown,” Pan tells FORBES AFRICA.

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Business picked up again, and now it’s been going extremely well....

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Your art should reflect your truth. Do not ignore your truth trying to uphold someone else’s standards or expectations. uphold someone else's standards or expectations,” she says.

During the pandemic, her company was able to raise over $11,000 in Covid-19 relief for over 500 families affected by the pandemic through their community impact platform called Rise in Light.

She has since been featured by CNN, Afropunk, OkayAfrica, Vogue Arabia and Bloomberg.

“As the CEO of Melanin Unscripted leading a team of over seven people, my goal is to make [Melanin Unscripted] the biggest media powerhouse in Africa by producing both unscripted and scripted series around the world that bridge Africa, the diaspora and communities of color together,” she says.

SELF-TAUGHT VISUAL ARTIST, STORY-TELLER AND CEO, MELANIN UNSCRIPTED INDUSTRY: CREATIVE VISUAL ARTS

In the wake of Africa’s renaissance in the creative space, Amarachi Nwosu is a name to remember.

The young Nigerian-American is a self-taught visual artist, writer and project manager. Nwosu has worked with a number of big brands including Sony Music, Apple, Nike and Adidas, and artists such as Childish Gambino, Davido, and Mr. Eazi; she has photographed influential figures like Malala Yousafzai and Naomi Campbell.

On Instagram, she calls herself ‘Amara Worldwide’.

Because of her upbringing, one could consider her a cultural chameleon.

She was raised in Washington DC, lived in Nigeria and Japan, and currently lives in Ghana.

Nwosu was only eight years old when she realized she had a passion for poetry and writing.

By the time she turned 14, she received her first DSLR camera and started a fashion blog with a friend called Timeless Aesthetic.

“After a year of this project and collaborating with high fashion brands, going to New York and London Fashion weeks, I realized that my dreams were bigger than promoting consumerism. I wanted to tell unscripted, reallife stories of people around the world. I knew if I was going to bring that vision to fruition, I would have to take the risk and start telling those stories myself,” she tells FORBES AFRICA. This led Nwosu to found her own company in 2015 called Melanin Unscripted, a creative platform and agency aimed to dismantle stereotypes and blur the cultural lines by exposing complex identities around the world.

At the time, Nwosu struggled financially as she lived in a single-parent household in the United States.

“While my mother worked tirelessly to provide for me and my three siblings, I knew I would have to find financial resources and save up – which was not new to me as I had my own job since the age of 16 and side hustles like selling sneakers and clothes,” she says.

Nwosu was determined.

She worked hard and was able to win six scholarships to study abroad in Japan where she continued to pursue her work documenting the experience of black creatives from Africa and the diaspora living in Tokyo.

Black in Tokyo, her documentary was produced with no budget but on its debut, it was featured in over 50 publications and has garnered over 1.5 million views on YouTube.

Since then, Nwosu has continued her mission to highlight and empower black African creatives through story-telling.

“Your art should reflect your truth. Do not ignore your truth trying to

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MASTER KG, 25, SOUTH AFRICA MUSIC ARTIST AND PRODUCER INDUSTRY: HOUSE MUSIC

“Alexa play Jeruselema by Master KG”.

If you do not know ‘the Jerusalema challenge’ by now, then you have clearly missed the song of the pandemic.

Staying at home during the lockdown was made more tolerable as people uploaded TikTok videos of themselves with family, friends or colleagues wearing masks and dancing to Master KG’s Jeruselema, a gospel-influenced house song featuring singer Nomcebo Zikode.

The song went viral in South Africa and garnered international recognition from stars such as Portuguese footballer Cristiano Ronaldo and singer Janet Jackson.

“I remember telling my friends weeks ago that my wish is to see Ronaldo playing Jerusalema and today, he posted it,” Master KG, whose original name is Kgaogelo Moagi, tweeted last September.

The lockdown success did not end there; in May this year, he celebrated his global hit going triple platinum in Switzerland. It’s also triple platinum in Italy. The song alone is one of the most-streamed songs on Spotify with over 220,000 listens on the streaming platform.

For the Limpopo-born talent who began his music career barely five years ago, there's no telling where the global hit-maker will be in the next few years.

FORBESAFRICA.COM

Photo by Vanessa dos Santos; Photo by Motlabana Monnakgotla; Photo by Oupa Bopape/Gallo Images via Getty Images

AMARACHI NWOSU, 26, NIGERIA

I’ve already done more than I believed Icouldgrowing up in Kokstad.

MIHLALI NDAMASE, 24, SOUTH AFRICA CREATIVE AND DIGITAL INFLUENCER INDUSTRY: BEAUTY AND LIFESTYLE

“My future plans and dreams scare me sometimes…

I say this because I’ve already done more than I believed I could growing up in Kokstad.”

These are the words of the KwaZulu-Natal-born beauty influencer who went from $500 in her purse to over 300,000 YouTube subscribers, in a world where digital followers amount to creative capital.

Hailing from small town Kokstad, Ndamase has disrupted the beauty industry with her new makeup looks and content on multiple social media platforms.

Speaking to FORBES AFRICA, the creative says that growing up, she was always surrounded by fashion and beauty as her grandmother was a designer and local tailor. At the age of 15, her yen for creating beauty content led her to start her own YouTube channel.

“I knew then that I loved makeup, when I would steal my mom’s lipstick and wear them on school excursions,” she says. But it does seem like she was able to pay her mother back as she recalls the time she was able to buy her mother her dream car.

The multi-award-winning creator decided to use her platform to uplift the young people of South Africa through her non-profit organization, the Siyazana Foundation. The foundation runs sanitary pad drives, book drives, and stationery and clothing drives for various organizations in underprivileged areas.

During the pandemic, it was no different.

Four years into the game and her fans known as ‘My Loves’ have been the reason for her wanting to continue doing what she does as well as remembering her younger self as the girl from Kokstad.

“Fashion, the business of eventing and creating memories, creating makeup and dabbling more in television content – all of these are now within my reach and to say I’m grateful is an understatement!”

FORBES AFRICA

COVER STORY • 30 UNDER 30

TENDAI KEVIN ZHOU, 29, ZIMBABWE FOUNDER, VP HOSTINGS

INDUSTRY: WEDDING AND EVENTS PLANNING In any given year, Tendai Kevin Zhou would generally conduct and manage as many as 20 weddings and at least 10 to 15 lifestyle and corporate events in Zimbabwe. But with Covid-19 affecting the global eventing industry, VP Hostings was affected too and has had to diversify as a luxury flower gifting service delivering curated floral boxes to clients.

“In hindsight, business in 2020 was not so bad, it could have been worse given the situation. Weddings and events definitely downscaled in size,” says Zhou.

Wedding Expos calls him “the most sought-after wedding planner in Zimbabwe” with a body of work that shows that he has a knack for executing the best bridal events in the country.

Zhou, known as ‘Kevin, the wedding planner’, was initially to take up a career in medicine, but found himself in Harare, where, at his aunt’s place, for the first time, watched a wedding on TV, and was hooked by the nuances.

“I found myself so engrossed in wedding-related TV shows as well as fashion shows,” he says.

Raised by his grandparents, and looking back at his childhood, he was never too far away from an elegant setting.

“My grandparents were raised during the colonial era and picked up a few British norms like setting the dinner table, picking flowers from the garden for the lounge table, and rearranging the house for spring cleaning which are all skills I learned from them at a very young age.”

REMA, 21, NIGERIA

When former US President, Barack Obama, is a big fan, you know you are hitting the right notes.

Nigerian artist Rema’s song, Iron Man, featured on Obama’s 2019 summer playlist with artists such as Drake, John Legend and Lizzo.

The 21-year-old Divine Ikubor, known professionally as ‘Rema’, is best known for his breakout hit Dumebi. This was arguably one of the best Afropop singles of 2019 and he released more bangers such as 2020’s Ginger Me, Woman and Beamer, and 2021’s Bounce.

The young artist from Nigeria’s Benin City is taking Afropop from Nigeria to Africa and the world, becoming one of the fastest rising new stars in the genre.

It all started after his parents introduced him to artists such as Fela Kuti and 2Face.

As a seven-year-old, he would write rap songs and perform covers.

According to Dazed, one day, as a teenager, he decided to knock on the door of a recording studio after hearing music blasting from inside on his way to school.

Little did he know this moment of inquisition would change his life forever.

A man opened the door and Rema asked how much he would need for a recording studio.

“I didn’t have that amount of money, so I was about to leave and he was like, ‘what do you want to do? Do you want to record?’ ” Rema recalls.

In the end, the man allowed Rema to record for free, and until today, Rema thanks the man who took a chance on him and his dream.

Soon enough, the young artist was noticed by Nigerian recording artists, D’Prince, who introduced Rema to Don Jazzy, the head of Mavin Records, one of Africa’s biggest record labels.

He was signed on immediately and the rest became history.

This was the much-needed break after the loss of his father and brother and struggling to make ends meet for his mother and sisters.

His hard work and success paid off.

38 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

Today, Rema has worked with international artists such as Justine Skye, Skepta, FORBES AFRICA 2020 30 Under 30 list-maker DJ Cuppy and more.

He has landed a US tour, a headline slot at the Boiler Room Festival in London, and Nigeria’s 2019 Headie Award for ‘Next Rated Superstar’.

He was nominated as Best Viewers Choice: International Act on the 2020 BET Awards alongside Burna Boy and Wizkid.

“Talent is hitting a target no one else can hit; Genius is hitting a target no one else can see,” Rema said in a tweet.

It’s clear the young boy from Benin City took a chance on his dream and that vision is taking him to the global stage.

FORBESAFRICA.COM

Photo sourced from pitchfork.com; photo supplied

MUSICIAN INDUSTRY: AFROPOP MUSIC

FORBES AFRICA

COVER STORY • 30 UNDER 30

WALE LAWAL, 29, NIGERIA

FOUNDER AND EDITOR-IN-CHIEF, THE REPUBLIC INDUSTRY: MEDIA

CREATIVE ARTIST AND FILMMAKER INDUSTRY: FILM, FASHION AND ENTERTAINMENT At the tender age of 10, Ifan Ifeanyi Michael had a vision for himself.

His journey started the moment he left the formal education system behind in pursuit of an acting career.

Starting with minor roles as a child actor, he is now renowned for his work across the fashion, film and music industries in Nigeria.

Settled in Lagos, Nigeria, Michael pursued a fashion career when he was 21, at an age when most are still deciding on their professions.

Working as a fashion editor and brand consultant during this time saw him gain an interest in the fashion industry and become a stylist to the stars, both local and international.

He has styled the likes of Kelly Rowland and Omotola Jalade Ekeinde and these colossal feats saw his reputation as a stylist cemented in Nigeria.

Despite his raving success within the fashion industry, Michael did not forget his love for film. Hoping to revolutionize the narrative of Nollywood, Michael began his career as a film producer.

His perseverance and love for film came through with Lotanna, a film shot in Nigeria and bearing his name as a producer.

A movie focusing on the debt a son has inherited from his father, it included the likes of Liz Benson and Chris Attoh with Okagbue as the lead.

In 2019 he made his debut as a director, producing the film Foreigner’s God, set in Nigeria’s colonial past.

Since this mammoth achievement, he hasn’t remained still, and Covid-19 has not slowed down his ambitions.

He has since produced and directed a number of commercials and music videos and in 2020, debuted a short film for the release of singer Patoranking’s album unveiling.

Recently, he was featured in GQ’s Young, Gifted and Black interview talking about being black, telling stories about blackness, feminism and the LGBTQ community.

He was also named Ynaija’s 100 Most Influential Nigerians, in 2019 and 2020. Not hard to see why.

40 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

Photos supplied; Photo by Motlabana Monnakgotla

IFAN IFEANYI MICHAEL, 29, NIGERIA

The defining moment for Wale Lawal came on October 8 2020 when he received a message on Slack regarding the youth-led protests against police brutality in Nigeria known to the world as #EndSARS. “As an African who has spent his entire adult life devoted to the singular cause of improving what the world knows about Africans, that afternoon, I encountered my most challenging dilemma yet: ‘do we cover the protest and risk a crackdown from the government’?” says the Editor-in-Chief of The Republic, a Nigerian publication.

Since 2016, Lawal built the publication on his own keeping in mind the risks he was taking in Nigeria’s challenging business and political landscape.

“Running a political publication in Nigeria is risky, journalists are known to disappear, every day is a challenge, and there are days I ask myself why I keep going. But I started The Republic because I needed it,” he says.

“We don’t deserve The Republic. I’ll keep saying this. If any facet of Nigerian leadership (and followership) even as much as glanced at one issue of this journal in good faith, I wonder how many ideas for radical change the citizenry might have engaged with by now,” quotes Nigerian novelist Suyi Davies Okungbowa on the publication’s website.

A recognized expert on Nigerian and African affairs, over the past year, Lawal has made significant contributions to African media and youth representation through the publication. Most notably, it was influential in shaping the local and international coverage of the #EndSARS protests. This year, Al Jazeera recognized Lawal’s publication as leading a new generation of independent media in Nigeria.

“I did not know that I would become one of the protest’s leading voices or that The Republic’s #EndSARS coverage would become my proudest achievement yet,” Lawal says.

FORBESAFRICA.COM

REINHARD MAHALIE, 28, NAMIBIA

FASHION STYLIST FOUNDER, RM FASHION STYLING INDUSTRY: FASHION From a young age, Namibianborn Reinhard Mahalie knew he would be successful. Hailing from Keetmanshoop, a dusty town in southern Namibia, Mahalie was always spontaneous, outspoken, confident and inquisitive. The award-winning stylist launched the RM Fashion Styling brand in 2016.

“I always wanted to become a fashion designer, but then I realized my strength is more in fashion styling and image consulting,” he tells FORBES AFRICA. Mahalie quickly became a household name in the fashion and entertainment industry and was known for his smart, elegant style.

He has styled the likes of South African media personality Maps Maponyane, Namibian musician ‘Gazza’, Big Brother winner Dillish Mathews, Miss World Namibia Odile Gertze, amongst other media and entertainment personalities.

Mahalie also has international awards under his stylish belt, namely the Abryanz Style and Fashion Award Fashion Stylist of the Year (southern Africa) in 2016 as well as the Designer Award African Male Fashion Stylist of the

My strength is more in fashion stylingandimage consulting…

Year 2020. Locally, he also won SYMLAFA Favourite Stylist of the Year in 2019.

“All this acclaim before the age of 30, in a four-year span. I have accomplished so much in such a short time,” he says.

As Mahalie faces the cameras on the set of the 2021 FORBES AFRICA 30 Under 30 cover shoot in Johannesburg in May, the whole room stops to stare and marvel at his confidence and swagger.

FORBES AFRICA

COVER STORY • 30 UNDER 30

MUSICIAN AND CREATIVE FOUNDER, KNQR INVESTMENTS INDUSTRY: FASHION AND ENTERTAINMENT Born in Blantyre, Malawi, in a township called Chitawire, Hayze Engola always knew he was going to be “a conqueror”.

However, it was only in 2014 that his journey became really clear to him when the then 22-year-old heard his first single play on the radio.

At the time, he was part of a group called Home Grown Africa, with his long-time friend Yankho Zulu, aka Classic.

He has since performed at the country’s biggest festival, the Lake of Stars, touring with Coca-Cola in 2015 and 2016.

As the two spent their youth making music together, they were heavily influenced by artists such as Jay-Z and Nas. For Engola, that inspiration wasn’t only in terms of music but in how they did business too, paving the way for him to follow suit as a creative entrepreneur.

In 2017, he founded a brand called KNQR; he says the four-letter word means to overcome and take control; to conquer.

“It was then that I came up with the concept KNQR (conquer), which was going to be my version of ROCA WEAR or a SEAN JOHN, or something closer to home, AMA KIP KIP,” he tells FORBES AFRICA. KNQR is a creative house that specializes in fashion, music, marketing, content management,

Living in a third world country and owning a business may seem like an extreme sport at times…

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KABZA DE SMALL, 28, SOUTH AFRICA PRODUCER AND DJ INDUSTRY: AMAPIANO South Africa’s Amapiano genre has massively expanded not just locally but globally and Kabza De Small is undoubtedly one of the DJs responsible for that, ascending to the throne as the ‘King of Amapiano’.

De Small, born Kabelo Motha in Mpumalanga and raised in Pretoria, began his career as a DJ in 2009.

However, he only started gaining national recognition five years on, after releasing songs such as Amabele Shaya and Umshove.

In 2019, Spotify named him the moststreamed South African artist on the platform.

During the Covid-19 national lockdown in South Africa, he gave fans something to take their worries away by releasing an EP titled Pretty Girls Love Amapiano 2.

The same year, he released a solo studio album, I Am The King Of Amapiano, featuring South African and international artists such as Burna Boy, Tresor, Wizkid, Cassper Nyovest, DJ Maphorisa, and Samthing Soweto.

Tracks produced by De Small such as Sponono and Lorch, and the ones he features in such as Vula Vala and Woza, have easily become ‘groove anthems’ in every nightclub and bar in the country.

His music has gone viral around the world, and Amapiano, characterized by synths, airy pads, and a wide percussive bassline, is certainly infectious.

Last year, De Small bagged the 2020 DStv Mzansi Viewer’s Choice Awards for Favourite DJ and Favourite Rising Star.

“Never take anyone's dreams for granted no matter how small it sounds to you,” De Small said in a tweet.

For someone who started his journey over a decade ago, he has shown consistency.

FORBESAFRICA.COM

Photos supplied; Photo sourced rrom deezer.com

HAYZE ENGOLA, 28, MALAWI

and charity initiatives (through the KNQR foundation).

“He has fused music with fashion which has inspired a lot of young people in both sectors. His brand KNQR is quite famous among youth, his inspiration in changing the game is seen both in urban and rural,” says Gift Sukali, a FORBES AFRICA 30 Under 30 list-maker from 2020.

When he first started out, Engola would sell at least 20 to 30 T-shirts from the trunk of a car after he would drop his girlfriend at work; she later quit her job to help him pursue his dream.

The brand grew to become an apparel store in 2020, in the heart of Blantyre, at the height of the pandemic.

At the store’s launch, he released an EP titled Welcome to the Shop; half the revenue generated from the sales of the project went towards a ‘warm winter initiative’ providing warm clothing for the underprivileged in Blantyre.

The goal was to dress a 1,000 people, which they achieved, collaborating with the Blantyre City Council, Samaritan Trust and DAPP Malawi.

“Living in a third world country and owning a business may seem like an extreme sport at times and has more than enough of its share of challenges; challenges such as the inconsistent supply of raw materials, which in turn affects production, which affects sales,” says Engola.

However, they were able to overcome this with their own product range and by establishing relationships with reliable international suppliers.

Proving to be a conqueror during the pandemic, he won two awards at the first instalment of the Malawi Music Hip-Hop Awards 2020 as ‘Hustler of the year’ and ‘Verse of the year’ for his single Welcome to the shop title track off his album Welcome to the shop.

He plans to expand KNQR in and around Malawi and then to more African countries by 2025.

ADVOICE BY UJ

LEARNING IN A PANDEMIC. LEARNING FOR SUCCESS.

W JULIO ‘BEAST’ BIANCHI, 23, SOUTH AFRICA E-GAMER, FIFA PLAYER TEAM: SOUTH AFRICAN NATIONAL TEAM The one industry that has thrived the most during Covid-19, without question, has to be e-sports. And representing South Africa is the young competitive FIFA e-player, Julio ‘Beast’ Bianchi.

The uplifting story of Bianchi begins in Cape Town where he grew up often seeing gang violence and tough times.

As a teenager, his entire focus was on football, and he realized that football was an opportunity for him to “grow outside of his surroundings”. He played in the South African team at the provincial level (also competing overseas) and lived for school and soccer.

“However, during my downtime, I was known to pick up a gaming controller and jam FIFA.” As he got older, he began to realize that his football dreams might not materialize, because he was starting to feel the strain of injuries and the impact on his education.

His PlayStation allowed him to become immersed in the world of FIFA and he started to realize he was extremely good at the game, so much so that in 2021, Bianchi made FIFA history by being in the first team from South Africa to ever qualify and compete in the official FIFA eClub World Cup.

FORBESAFRICA.COM

hen Covid hit, Jacqui Luhlanga was just beginning the final year of her diploma at UJ. Forced to return home to Nkomazi, she spent the next five months juggling her academic and household responsibilities, studying online and writing her exams late at night when the house was quiet.

Moving home for lockdown wasn’t easy for the 26-year-old UJ student.

Initially, Jacqui found it difficult to focus on her studies and perform the household chores expected of her. And her family didn’t quite understand her academic commitments: “Whenever they saw me on my phone, they thought I was playing games,” she says. “They didn’t understand what studying online meant. And they were there all the time – I had to find my own secret place to study.”

UJ’s response to the pandemic was technical and financial, academic and practical, emotional and psychological. It included providing students with data and devices, running a live chat function, and being resourceful and innovative. “We were fortunate because UJ has been driving the 4IR narrative for years,” explains Hemali Joshi from UJ’s Academic Development Centre. “Many of our staff and students were already familiar with online learning.”

Student access to devices and data were two of the major challenges that UJ had to deal with at the start of lockdown. In response, its device and data distribution process was immense: over 5,000 laptops were made available to students in need and data was regularly dispensed.

“We were fortunate because UJ has been driving the 4IR narrative for years,” explains Hemali. “Many of our staff and students

were already familiar with online learning and with our learning management system, Blackboard. Our task during Covid was to make our communication about online learning easier to access and clearer, to answer any questions consistently and quickly, and to use the tools at our disposal to greater effect.”

In no time at all, modules and videos on online learning were created, a live chat function was set up, and students were informed about apps that would make their experience easier. One of the most important of these was also the simplest: WhatsApp. Class WhatsApp groups made it easy for learners to ask for help and to receive an instant response from their lecturers or peers on a platform that didn’t consume too much data.

The mental health implications of studying from home weren’t missed by the UJ team. UJ’s Centre for Psychological Services and Career Development was aware that some students were now working in environments that might not be conducive to learning or were battling with the shift online. The team made an emergency helpline available to support students and staff, and their colleagues at Academic Development Innovation created resources to help students cope with stress.

These efforts helped Jacqui and others to succeed despite overwhelming odds.

Jacqui passed all her subjects, received several distinctions and was placed on the Dean’s List for Academic Merit. As Covid disrupts education the world over, it’s the consistency of students’ success that matters most.

Read more about Jacqui’s story – and other 4IR in action stories : uj.ac.za/4IR

FORBES AFRICA

THABO MOLOI, 19, SOUTH AFRICA E-GAMER, FIFA PLAYER TEAM: eBAFANA BAFANA 2020 was a busy year for Thabo Moloi.

He became the first e-sports athlete on the African continent to be signed on by Red Bull and has become a part of Goliath Gaming, a competitive multi-gaming organization.

Africa has fallen behind in joining the global e-sports arena but it is the likes of gamers such as Moloi who are slowly and resolutely working to change that narrative.

From playing the EA Sports soccer game

LUKHANYO AM, 27, SOUTH AFRICA RUGBY PLAYER TEAM: SOUTH AFRICAN NATIONAL TEAM, CELL C SHARKS Featured in six of the seven matches played

by South Africa in the Rugby World Cup in 2019, Lukhanyo Am is a force to reckon with.

Playing an integral role throughout the rugby series, Am was part of the assist for South Africa’s first try in a Rugby World Cup final.

“My biggest highlight was making it to the World Cup squad, so when we won the [2019] World Cup, it was something else,” he tells FORBES AFRICA. Coming from the Gladiators Rugby Academy in Margate, Am has gone from strength to strength. Am played in the minor leagues before playing for the English team, Saracens, as part of an exchange program that was done in conjunction with the British High Commission.

FIFA at home on his couch in South Africa, he is now one of the members of the eBafana Bafana team who played at the FIFA eNations Stay and Play Cup. This saw him play alongside the likes of cricketer Kagiso Rabada and musician Cassper Nyovest and cemented his reputation as a player to be reckoned with in the FIFA arena.

Moloi began his professional career at the age of 16 after causing an upset at the VS Gaming FIFA Festival in 2018. Beating out 512 other players for the title, Moloi took home the prize money and the awe of the gaming community at large.

Despite his success and accolades, Moloi continues to hone his craft and ready himself for the next big challenge.

He was also called upon to join the Southern Kings Super Rugby squad for a trial period before finding his home in KwaZuluNatal as part of the Sharks squad.

Already a veteran in the field, Am has 15 Springbok test caps to call his own and has become a regular in Super Rugby games with over 58 appearances to date.

Being seen as one of the players to watch, Am continues to inspire admiration and respect in colleagues and competitors alike.

“One of the best rugby players I have been privileged to play alongside at both the Sharks and the Springboks,” says Tendai ‘Beast’ Mtawarira, this year’s 30 Under 30

Mybiggesthighlight was making it to the World Cup squad.

judge, about Am to FORBES AFRICA. “A highly intelligent and gifted young man but yet so humble and respectful. I hold him in high regard, and he will achieve even greater things in the future.”

CHESLIN KOLBE, 27, SOUTH AFRICA RUGBY PLAYER TEAM: SOUTH AFRICAN NATIONAL TEAM South African rugby player Cheslin Kolbe has made a name for himself locally and abroad.

Before his ambitions went international, however, Kolbe made waves as part of the South African national rugby team. He started to gain recognition as a member of the South African Sevens team and won bronze at the 2016 Summer Olympics.

It was this performance and a string of successful stints for South

44 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

Africa’s Western Cape province that gained the interest of French rugby team Toulouse where he was signed on and played for the team during their 2017-2018 season.

Being called by the South African national rugby team, however, brought Kolbe home as he joined the team playing at the 2019 Rugby World Cup. In his debut match, South Africa lost to Australia. Rallying with the team, however, saw Kolbe as an instrumental player in securing South Africa’s win in the finals and saw the team crowned as the 2019 rugby world champions.

Nominated for the 2019 Rugby World Player of the Year, with a bright future ahead of him, Kolbe has only just begun his journey as a legend within South African rugby.

FORBESAFRICA.COM

Photo by Motlabana Monnakgotla; Photo by Ezra Shaw - World Rugby/World Rugby via Getty Images; photo by Simon Hofmann/Getty Images for Laureus

COVER STORY • 30 UNDER 30

ANTONIO DEPINA, 26, CAPE VERDE

FOUNDER, OVERSEAS BASKETBALL CONNECTION AND PRAIA LEAGUE INDUSTRY: SPORTS TECH It’s not often that a former professional basketball player can still have an impact beyond the court.

But Antonio Depina, from Cape Verde, is an exception.

From shooting hoops in Portugal and Spain as a professional, he traded the ball for a business suit, founding Overseas Basketball Connection, a mobile app for basketball players to connect with pro basketball teams worldwide without the use of an agent.

“It is a job marketplace for basketball players. Players create a profile and search the app for basketball openings worldwide and can send their profile to a team with the push of a button,” he tells FORBES AFRICA. The app is a top 200 sports app on Apple and rates 4.3 out of 5 on Android.

Depina comes from humble beginnings.

With a Liberian mother and a Cape Verdean father, he watched his parents live through poverty which prompted them to look for a new game plan pursuing the American dream.

“Growing up, I was always aware of my African heritage and embraced my African culture. I used basketball as an outlet to stay out of trouble and stay focused,” he says.

With an entrepreneurial spirit even at the tender age of seven, Depina would sell his video games and old toys and by the age of 11, would sell candy bars to raise money to help pay for his travel to basketball tournaments.

After receiving a scholarship to Lincoln University in Pennsylvania, he played for four years and earned his bachelor’s degree in criminal justice.

This led him to secure a basketball contract in Europe playing in Portugal and Spain.

“During my time playing basketball, I learned a lot and noticed a few things which had been the status quo with overseas basketball recruiting, therefore, I was able to create a solution,” he says.

As a result, Overseas Basketball Connection was born with the aim of helping African players, who are often exploited, through technology. Depina expresses how he feels that any moment an African player enters a European team, there are payment gap discrepancies.

“They are given the bare minimum, whereas their pay is extremely low in comparison to other players on the team. This is a never-ending cycle which is an excessively big problem. African players are undervalued and underappreciated,” he says.

Depina also founded Cape Verde’s 1st Pro Basketball League called the Praia League, which encompasses six teams from the various islands.

In the future, Depina plans to transform the league into the Cape Verdean Basketball League (CBL) with a Summer League which will model the NBA Summer League.

If you’re a big fan of reality shows on Netflix, then you might be familiar with Depina’s face. In 2020, he starred in the Netflix show The Circle.

Growingup,Iwasalways awareofmyAfricanheritageand embracedmyAfricanculture. I used basketball as an outlet to stay out of trouble and stay focused.

FORBES AFRICA

COVER STORY • 30 UNDER 30

JAMES KANG’ARU MWANGI, 28, KENYA FOUNDER AND CEO, EPITOME SCHOOL OF CHESS SPORT: CHESS

They say that life is a game of chess, and for Kenyan-born James Kang’aru Mwangi, that phrase is an understatement.

At the age of 20, he started playing chess professionally and coaching juniors and locals of Ruai ward, the Mavoko area in Machakos, and the Mukuru Kwa Njenga slums.

The man from humble beginnings saw chess as an outlet to change his circumstances and community.

“I believe the future is brighter when the youth are empowered and my contribution is through sports. I am a chess and talent search coach; with these skills, I have been able to [bring] the benefits of chess to many youth as well as grow my individual capacity and titles in chess,” he tells FORBES AFRICA. He founded Epitome School of Chess, a sports academy growing and nurturing sports talent in East Africa and among locals in over 10 counties in Kenya and also Kampala in Uganda.

Mwangi has led Kenya's junior team to win Africa Zone 4.2 Teams Chess Championship and represented Africa in the World Youth Chess Olympiad.

This grandmaster has received numerous accolades including being accredited by the World Chess Federation (FIDE) as Africa’s youngest international arbiter and FIDE instructor and has been appointed to represent Africa in the World Olympiad in his capacity as International Arbiter.

Mwangi also became the first Kenyan to be appointed by the Africa Chess Confederation as a Chief Arbiter in continental chess events.

When he is not playing chess, Mwangi is an economist also currently pursuing an MBA. Last year, he received the top 35 Under 35 Awarding Youth Excellence in Kenya for Youth of the Year: Sports.

Currently, Mwangi is working with Nairobi county and soon will work with Nakuru county to empower youth. His goal is to ensure that sports funds and activities actually reach young people.

TILKA PALJK, 24, ZAMBIA TEAM: ZAMBIA NATIONAL TEAM SPORT: SWIMMING In March this year, News Diggers called Tilka Paljk an “outspoken swimmer” as she called out Zambian officials ahead of the Tokyo Olympics in July. This was on account of her coach not being able to travel with her because he is South African and not Zambian.

“It’s not even a policy, the national team coach for a sport doesn’t have to be Zambian, but everyone is fighting to get a spot on the Olympic team as an official because the allowance is more than what athletes get, it’s really all about the money,” she said.

Being a strong female voice in the sports industry is something that comes easily to Paljk. This is evident in her many accolades, including best female Zambian swimmer, the national record holder for the women's 50m, 100m, and 200m breaststroke, and Sportswoman of the Year 2018 and 2019 (to name a few).

The strength and perseverance is prevalent in the story of how she came to be successful.

Raised by a single mother in Zambia, when Paljk was 10 years old, her mother became ill with cancer. Unfortunately, this led to her losing her job and the family was forced into poverty.

“We were lucky to have a few family members support us during this time. And the swimming community used to sponsor my training and traveling.”

Her mother passed away when she was 17, and Paljk looked after her 12-year-old brother.

“Since then, I have been making ends meet for my brother and me.”

Her journey as a swimmer has been successful thus far which include a bronze medal at the Africa Games in 2019, a silver at the African Swimming Championships 2018, and also as a semi-finalist at the Commonwealth Games in 2018.

Paljk is also working with the Zambian department of education to start Montessori preschools in underprivileged communities.

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Photos supplied

The swimming community used to sponsor my training and traveling.

The challenges of tomorrow need a fresh perspective today From social to environmental. From governance to growth.

2020 changed the rules of engagement for business.

Our new perspective series - Take on Tomorrow, is the latest thinking from across our global network, delivering bold insights for bold leaders.

Now is the time to drive growth from new opportunities to take action, transform and move forward. Imagine a greater future for your business, customers and society.

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CONTRARIAN | CARL HANSEN

Small Ball Biotech Most drug-development outfits spend years chasing the elusive billion-dollar blockbuster. ABCELLERA BIOLOGICS concentrates on base hits — a focus that has made founder Carl Hansen an overnight Covid multibillionaire.

E

VERY TIME YOU’RE INFECTED BY BACTERIA OR a virus, your immune system works to create treatments to defeat it. Molecularly unique to each person, these tiny cells, or antibodies, either destroy these invaders or mark them for other killer cells to track down.

Carl Hansen, 46, is geeking out as he describes the process over Zoom. “We can make 100 trillion different antibodies,” he exclaims.

“The immune system is spectacular beyond description.”

If that sounds more like a college professor than the CEO of a $13 billion (market cap) biotech company, there’s a reason: Hansen was one — until 2019, when he left to focus on Vancouver-based AbCellera Biologics, cofounded with fellow researchers from the University of British Columbia in 2012. “Universities are very good at testing new ideas and looking for which road might be effective,” he says.

The team’s academic bent has played out in an even more important way. Nearly all biotech startups develop a handful of treatment targets, then spend the next eight to 12 years developing those drugs, hoping to bring at least one of them to market. It’s not a sure thing — fewer than 10% of new drugs make it all the way. But when they do, they tend to be blockbusters: Seven of the 10 top-selling drugs in 2018 were antibody treatments, including AbbVie’s $19 billion (net revenue) immunosuppressive drug Humira and Merck’s cancer drug Keytruda,

48 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

which generated $11.1 billion in 2019.

AbCellera takes a vastly different approach. Instead of trying to build a vertically integrated drug company, it is focused solely on the discovery process. That’s the portion of drug development that is earliest and most essential: It’s there that the most promising treatment prospects are selected, subjected to early laboratory tests and then moved through the pipeline.

But AbCellera, which raised $105 million from investors including Peter Thiel, the University of Minnesota and OrbiMed in May — at a valuation of $4.8 billion, according to PitchBook, just six months before going public — is not interested in seeing it through from beginning to end. Instead it offers what might be described as “drug discovery as a service.” It works with 90 outside businesses, including pharma giants Pfizer, Gilead and Novartis.

Those companies ask the biotech to find antibodies that meet certain criteria. AbCellera then uses its proprietary technology to find prospects.

In its highest-profile success to date, AbCellera examined thousands of antibodies derived from the blood of people who had recovered from Covid-19 in order to identify the antibodies that did the best job fighting the virus. It then turned over the most promising antibodies to drug company Eli Lilly.

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Photo by Jens Kristian Balle for Forbes

BY ALEX KNAPP

ADVOICE BY PPS

Clinical trials of one of those antibodies, bamlanivimab, began in May — just 90 days after the partnership started.

Tests found patients with mild or moderate cases had good results, and in November, the antibody received emergencyuse authorization from the FDA. The federal government has contracted to purchase 950,000 doses of the drug for $1.2 billion.

Eli Lilly issued guidance in mid-December expecting up to $2 billion in revenue from Covid-19 therapeutics in 2021, the bulk of which will come from bamlanivimab; AbCellera, which booked $25 million through the end of September 2020, will earn estimated royalties of $270 million on those sales, according to Credit Suisse.

AbCellera is also looking to speed up the time it takes to develop its antibody therapies.

The shorter time frame saves millions in development costs while enabling revenues to come in sooner than expected.

“From a financial perspective, every year that you save is a huge opportunity cost for investors,” says Gal Munda, an analyst at Berenberg Capital Markets.

Hansen is now worth $3 billion, thanks to the company’s white-hot December IPO. Asked about his meteoric rise into the three-comma club, Hansen is low-key: “It feels just a little bit surreal.”

He’s more articulate about the biotech’s success: “If this example of Covid shows one thing, to me, it’s the proof point of the business model and the technology.”

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PPS RESILIENCE PRODUCES SOUND PERFORMANCE IN UNPRECEDENTED YEAR

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ohannesburg, 14 April 2021 – Professional Provident Society (PPS), the financial services company focused solely on providing financial solutions for graduate professionals, produced a resilient 2020 performance. This was amid a year in which COVID-19 impacted lives and livelihoods.

“We entered 2020 with solid capital reserves and with good momentum. This meant that we could act swiftly to put relief measures in place, pay claims reliably, secure our adviser network and maintain our full staff complement throughout the lockdown. The unique situation presented by the pandemic also served as a catalyst to accelerate the process of expanding and implementing our digitalisation strategy,” says Izak Smit, PPS Group CEO. PPS is unique in the South African financial services industry, differentiated by its ethos of mutuality.

“This has proved its value as we mark 80 years since PPS was founded by a group of dentists who chose a methodology which is nowadays not so common in financial institutions.

“Our performance is significant against the backdrop of spending nine months of our 2020 financial year operating under lockdown,” says Smit.

“In 2020, the Group paid R4.84 billion in benefit pay-outs and valid claims to members. This is 29% up from R3.74 billion in 2019. Focusing on life claims in particular, this amounted to R3.12 billion in 2020, up 45% on the R2.16 billion in 2019. Of this, PPS paid more than 4,200 COVID-19related claims to the value of R389.8 million between March and December 2020. As expected, medical professionals were most

affected by the pandemic and accounted for 74% of these claims.”

“PPS has been able to provide a reliable financial safety net for its members.

Due to our strong balance sheet and inherent profitability of the risk pool and the businesses, PPS was able to allocate R2.2 billion in 2020 in total profit to our members with qualifying products,” adds Smit.

The Group’s life insurance gross earned premiums was R5.12 billion and were 7% up on the R4.77 billion in 2019. While many members’ finances were strained, and they remained cautious about spending, their awareness of the need to protect themselves and their families against unforeseen shocks increased. This, and assistance with premiums where members were struggling, helped to keep lapses low. PPS Investments had a strong year. Gross new investment flows to PPS Investments of R7.5 billion were 22% up on the prior year.

Looking ahead, Smit says that it is impossible to make firm predictions for 2021 as the pandemic continues to evolve, and the long-term impact thereof is not k yet known.

Sanlam is a Licensed Financial Services Provider.

KINGJAMES 52380

I

t’s more than just a new motto.

Or a few new words that sit underneath our logo.

It’s our promise to every man. Every woman.

And every child on this continent.

A promise to do everything in our power to help you live with the kind of confidence that we believe can make a real difference in your life.

Financial confidence.

Because when you have financial confidence you are prepared for the challenges that life may bring.

It’s a feeling of reassurance that what’s important to you is protected. It’s knowing you can look after your family.

And work towards your goals and a better future.

It’s the kind of confidence that opens doors to new possibilities and unlocks dreams. That’s why it’s a promise that we’ll never take lightly.

We’ll keep this promise top of mind and close to our hearts.

Everything we do, every decision we make will be guided by it.

So that you can live knowing that today is going to be a good day.

And tomorrow will be even better.

Neema Iyer

A DRIVING FEMINIST DATA FOR CHANGE East African techpreneur Neema Iyer works at the intersection of data, design and digital to eventually enable products, policies and programs that take into account the needs of African women.

BY INAARA GANGJI

52 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

RE GENDER DIFFERENCES AS RIFE on the world wide web as in the real world?

When technologist Neema Iyer returned home to Africa after graduating from Emory University in the United States with a degree in epidemiology and statistics, she was bent on addressing gender from a technology perspective.

Born to Tanzanian and Indian parents and raised in Nigeria, 34-year-old Iyer is today running Pollicy, a firm she founded in Kampala, Uganda, as a civic technology organization that works at the intersection of data design and technology and understanding how data can be used most effectively for improving service delivery through research, digital literacy, digital security and products.

When she first touched down, she took up a job in Uganda where she worked in the ICT sector, but under predominantly white, male founders from the West. There was also a lack of touch points in governments with the African context.

So Iyer decided she needed a fresh perspective using a gender lens.

“When you really look at it like a lot of technology, a lot of data, the systems are developed in Silicon Valley and I don’t feel that African women are particularly the end users when they design different technology,” says Iyer.

Pollicy, funded mostly by grants from big tech like Facebook and Mozilla, more broadly focuses on gendered data and feminist data, that takes into account power dynamics and the person researching.

“If you don’t have this kind of data, then it would be very difficult to make platforms or policies of programs that really take into account the needs of African women and what are the challenges and what are the gaps,” she says.

For instance, field research or product development would usually involve talking to the head of the household or people in authority, which would usually be men. There are many other situations where women may not be allowed to take part in research, and Iyer thinks challenging this status quo is more important now more than ever.

“Women in Africa are least likely to be connected to the internet, so there’s a very big digital gender gap. And they tend to have lower digital literacy, they tend to have lower ownership of mobile devices, they tend to have lower access to

Women in Africa are least likely to be connected to the internet, so there’s a very big digital gender gap.

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Photos supplied

ENTREPRENEURS | NEEMA IYER

information. So, when you take all of these things into account, you can’t just have a one-size-fits-all solution for everyone.”

Iyer notes cultural differences in even who can answer a phone call or who can own a phone. These restrict women’s voices and participation. And even those can be online, as substantiated by online violence and gender disinformation.

“It basically leads to the censorship of women, it leads to them leaving online spaces…if you don’t really think about these issues from the gender nuance, then you can replicate a lot of the discrimination that already exists in the physical world.”

For her, these aspects need attention to meet the different needs of people, and to build products accordingly.

Iyer is also interested in combining art and data.

“So, moving beyond just spreadsheets and trying to make data more accessible to people.”

For example, her team worked on a project in Uganda called ‘Create Your Kampala’, where they collected data from local communities on different social services, and then worked with them to create wall murals as a way to share back their data and get people involved in the conversation. “[We wanted to say] ‘you own this data; this is your data; how are you going to use it to improve your situation’?”

But the challenge is that a number of African countries are not moving as quickly as they should in using, supporting and protecting data. Data collection is expensive, there are many administrative hurdles, and it needs a lot of trustbuilding. Pollicy is about four years old and Iyer had hoped it would have made more headway in this time, thinking there would have been be so many competitors in the space by now.

“When I look back, I don’t feel like so much has changed, like we’re still very much lagging in the conversations. A lot of the artificial intelligence conversations are dominated way more by other countries, and even though funders are trying to do more in the African context, there is just not enough happening. So, I would love to see more organizations coming out and doing much, much more work on everything from collecting data, to analyzing it, to processing it, to getting value from it… with a feminist lens.”

Iyer asserts that data will really help drive innovation and improve services, because if people know where the gaps are, then they can improve business, creativity and products.

There is, of course, the fear that governments could use these systems to oppress dissenting voices.

“Everything we do is grounded in ethics and equity and inclusiveness, so that when you do build technology, it’s not used to harm marginalized people… we need to come together now to think about that and to come up with solutions… I feel like there’s this urgency that we need to come up with better laws that work for everyone.”

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Another challenge Iyer notes is the need to make data as intersectional as possible.

“You don’t want power to be concentrated… so really thinking about power dynamics when you use data, I think it’s that intersectionality of gender and class and tribe and ethnicity, so that you can really make equitable products from the data.”

Iyer also hopes to expand beyond Africa’s borders and continue working with government and civil society to create a better world.

“You know, crafting our futures together in a way that works for everyone; that’s equitable and that’s inclusive and we want to make our own decisions for ourselves; so I really want to push that narrative.”

JUNE | JULY 2021 FORBES AFRICA | 53

Palate Pleaser There is a spot of Thailand in a bustling Johannesburg suburb, and its owner, Chef Micky, is giving private dining a whole new meaning.

BY CHANEL RETIEF Chef Micky

F

AR, FAR FROM THE PADDY FIELDS OF HER hometown in Surin, a verdant province in northeastern Thailand also known for its temples and elephant festivals, young Thitiporn Liu flew into Johannesburg one bright promising day in 2004, with nothing more than a business plan in her head, her year-old daughter in her arms and some homegrown spices in her suitcases.

South Africa was a decade-old democracy, just waking up to the prospect of talent jetting in from the other side of the world.

But there she was, Liu, lonely in big bustling Berea, a suburb adjacent to the Johannesburg central business district (CBD), setting up a small roadside eatery with nothing but a cheap plastic chair.

She laughs at the memory now, when we meet her at her

54 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

five-table restaurant named Chef Micky’s Thai Dining, in Birnam, next to the swanky Melrose Arch precinct in Johannesburg.

“But people wanted my food so they still came. At that time, I didn’t have staff and [I was] doing everything myself,” says Liu, popularly known to her loyal patrons today as ‘Chef Micky’.

The moment you walk into her restaurant, you are immediately greeted by the heady scent of spices and incense, and a warm smile from Liu. “I don’t know how to not feed someone,” she says. “If I can feed you, I like you.”

Born in Surin, surrounded by lotus fields and rice granaries and regaled by ceremonial elephant processions, Liu grew up loving food.

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ENTREPRENEURS | THITIPORN LIU

Photos by Chanel Retief

I cooked one meal at a time... but my customers would not mind waiting.

They would always say ‘oh no, don’t worry, we just want your food, take your time’.

“To us, it is very normal. I would say about 70% of families in Thailand are in the cooking business.”

Having lost her mother at the age of three, her father, now late, influenced and cultivated her culinary skills.

“He would always take me to the best restaurants or take me places to try new things.”

Liu believes that her childhood played a prominent role in influencing her gastronomy which she showcases to her demanding clientele today.

She studied home economics in Bangkok, the commercial heart of Thailand, and her loved ones had intended that she would take over the family business, which was incidentally, a restaurant. But little did anyone know that she would go on to create one of her own on another continent.

She started with a loan.

“If I tell you how scared I was to even use the money because I didn’t know how anything works…” Liu recalls about the early days in Johannesburg in 2004.

“And I cooked one meal at a time... but my customers

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would not mind waiting. They would always say ‘oh no, don’t worry, we just want your food, take your time’.”

From a grimy corner of the CBD to Cyrildene, also a Johannesburg suburb, she worked as a chef at the Sai Thai Restaurant.

Her skills got her due attention, as she won multiple awards, including the 2008 Dine Award and 2011 RASA Rosetta Award, both of which now adorn the walls of her restaurant in Birnam.

“There was even a point when I served people in my home,” she says, swiping through her phone to show you fond photographs of the private dining experiences she set up for customers in the lounge of her home.

Today, she continues to bring the soothing scent of jasmine rice, the swish of raw silk and the smell of the Surin coast to her culinary repertoire in Africa, which she has perfected over 17 years.

It is this personal connection that brings discerning diners from near and far to her unpretentious restaurant, even during the pandemic. There are no recipe books here; everything is “made from the heart”.

“I don’t cook my crab curry without thinking of my father who loved crab curry,” she says. “I feel this connection with him and I think that’s what makes my curry a favorite... I know my father is very proud of me.”

Johannesburg boasts over a dozen different Thai restaurants, all of which serve the staple soups, stirfries and seafood. But how is Liu’s menu different?

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ENTREPRENEURS | THITIPORN LIU

First of all, you need to place the order from the menu a day in advance, which is a unique selling proposition by itself.

This is to ensure the food, especially the fish, is fresh, flavorful and authentic.

In a 2019 review, EAT OUT magazine noted that although Liu’s specialty fish dishes are “understandably pricier”, they are “worth it”.

Liu sits in her small restaurant surrounded by photographs, newspaper clippings and award certificates.

“There is more I have to put up. I just haven’t had the time,” she points out.

She stands up to walk out to the modest garden she has created in front of the restaurant.

“It’s also because I only serve fresh ingredients,” she says, deftly cutting stalks of lemongrass that she grows on the muddy patch. People stop by to stare.

It is a strange sight on the side of the road but their curiosity does not deter the resourceful chef.

“You can’t serve Thai cuisine without fresh ingredients,” she says, smiling at them.

A typical day for Liu begins at 6AM, when her 18-year-old daughter goes over the orders she has received on her phone the day before.

Her daughter sits in the corner of the restaurant multi-tasking, doing her school work on the one hand as well as organizing the WhatsApp orders for her mother.

Liu’s staff can be seen hovering discreetly in the background,

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chopping vegetables, fish and meat for the dishes that Liu rustles up herself.

“I know what I want to put in my food. And remember, I cook everything from my heart,” says Liu again, stirring yet another signature dish of hers, a sweet and spicy prawn soup.

A normal day ends at 10.30PM, but she admits weekends are generally busier as people order up to seven dishes per table.

The most sought-after items always are her crab curry and black pepper crab.

“People like coming to me for the seafood and I like making it more because it is fresher and that’s important to me.”

You can smell the spices and the fragrant lemongrass as she appears from the kitchen with a hot bowl of the soup she has been stirring up. The fresh prawn floating in the sumptuous broth is pink with perfection.

During the lockdown in Johannesburg, Liu says she missed the full-time action in the kitchen but pivoted to creating pre-packed recipes of some of her dishes for her customers to make at home.

‘This was fun because I got WhatsApp messages from people showing me what they cooked!”

Walking out of Chef Micky’s Thai Dining as the late afternoon African sun begins to dip and the din of Johannesburg’s traffic starts to ebb away, you ask if she misses the tranquility of her hometown in Thailand.

“No,” she says without blinking.

“And I will tell you why. I feel like I bring something different here to Africa and South Africa.”

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BrandComm by NOVARICK HOMES

Creating A Renewable And Sustainable Lifestyle The Novarick Way

I

n that famous line from the 1967 film “The Graduate,” an older man gives Benjamin Braddock that one word of advice. Now, the economic future belongs to “sustainable” because of consumer demand driven by an overwhelming desire to do right by society, economy and the environment.

This underscores a need for new models of housing, as the older ones will not hold their value by today’s Renewable Energy Standard. Meaning the next generation of home buyers, who are mostly urban with trendy lifestyles, will be quickly drawn to a more energy efficient model of living.

Considering the post-pandemic effect, many young and future buyers will want and are attracted to houses with smart functional spaces fit for work-from-home lifestyle, a central bar area and coffee nook, large windows for ample light, energy star appliances with large open table areas to encourage social interactions and family time.

The quest for modern solutions led 28-year-old Noah Ibrahim, a graduate of Mechanical Engineering from Obafemi Awolowo University (OAU) in Osun State, Nigeria to setup Novarick Homes and Properties in 2018. The company was selected twice (2019 & 2020) among the Top 100 fastest-growing SMEs by Businessday Nigeria and inducted as a Member of the Green Building Council of South Africa (GBCSA) on July 23, 2020.

As described by Wikipedia, sustainable living is a lifestyle that attempts to reduce an individual’s or society’s use of the Earth’s natural resources and one’s personal resources.

This means prioritizing the use of natural and renewable resources instead of creating excess waste and depleting the resources for future generations.

So in 2020, the real estate firm commenced the development of a green building with IFC Edge Certification at Ruby Apartments after

Noah Ibrahim, Chief Executive Officer of Novarick Homes and Properties Ltd

initiating the Nova Gardens, WAZOBIA Court and Earl’s Court in the heart of Ibeju-Lekki.

The premium private green project when completed will run on renewable energy supply with fantastic architecture, interlocked roads, underground electrification backed by very good drainage system.

During an interview, CEO of Novarick Homes, Noah Ibrahim shared the company’s plan to deliver 300 units of 1, 2 and 3 bedroom bungalows by the end of 2022, using a newly acquired 3D House Printing Technology which has the capacity to produce a single unit within 48 hours.

Ibrahim elaborated on the plan to revolutionize the real estate industry using an advanced construction technology. The new 3D House Printing will not only reduce construction time, but also save the cost of construction by over 45% per unit without compromising quality and standards.

Novarick Homes and Property is driven by the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals - to provide affordable and clean energy,

innovation and infrastructure, funds for industries, build sustainable cities and communities.

By 2025, the company aspires to have become truly Pan-African, with well-grounded investments in commercial and industrial real estate across different African Countries.

Novarick plans to provide eco-friendly houses for over 1000 homeowners and partner with the Lagos State Parks and Gardens Agency (LASPARK) in Nigeria to plant 5000 trees in the next 5 years.

Finally, research has shown that the homes of the future will offer a combination of renewable energy solutions with the ability to harness electricity especially in remote locations which are not connected to a national grid. Innovation has also shown that solar panels can be installed on rooftops to eliminate the challenge of finding space around the house for equipment.

Novarick Homes and Properties was established in 2018 as a real estate development firm, providing housing and investment solutions in Lagos, Nigeria. The company offers joint ventures, property procurement and advisory sessions via www.novarickhomes.com with facility management for a wellrounded investment decision.

For further information, kindly contact Novarick Homes inquiries@novarickhomes.com +234 810 780 9979

Oil Vulture Even if demand never recovers from Covid-19, billionaire John Goff sees the pandemic as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to invest in distressed frackers willing to follow Big Tobacco’s declining-business playbook.

BY CHRIS HELMAN

60 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

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CONTRARIAN | JOHN GOFF

Photo by Tim Pannell for Forbes

Texas Style John Goff in the lobby of the glass-faced, 20-story McKinney & Olive office tower in Dallas, which his Crescent Real Estate built and still manages. The lipshaped sofa is by Cassina.

J

OHN GOFF MADE HIS FIRST fortune more than a decade ago, teaming up with his mentor, legendary investor Richard Rain water, to buy up empty “see-through” office buildings for pennies on the dollar in the wake of the S&L crisis that began in the late 1980s. They went on to sell Crescent Real Estate for $6.5 billion at the 2007 peak and then scooped it up again a few years later at a discount amid the wreckage of the financial crisis. Goff, based in Fort Worth, Texas, is now chairman of $3.4 billion (assets) Crescent, and personally owns the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Dallas and the Canyon Ranch spa chain founded in Tucson, Arizona. He still loves high-end real estate, but today he’s focused on what he calls “the single biggest opportunity of my business career”— oil.

It’s a contrarian move, all right. Watch the financial headlines and you’d think the end of oil was nigh. Last April, oil prices went to less than zero for a day as crude in storage reached “tank tops.” America’s frackers have mothballed 60% of their drilling rigs in the past 18 months, while more than 100,000 have lost their jobs amid the bankruptcies of 46 producing companies—including the one-time shale champion of them all, Oklahoma City-based Chesapeake Energy. The plight of the American oil patch, Goff says, “is like real estate in the early ’90s. They had overbuilt, doubled the office space and were woefully overleveraged.”

Back in 2008, when oil hit a record high of $147 a barrel (and Big Oil made up 15% of the S&P 500), all the talk was of Peak Oil supply. Today oil trades at $53 and makes up just 2% of the index— and market watchers are pushing the idea that we’ve already passed Peak Oil demand. Goff, 65, laughs at such forecasts.

“Before the world does not need any more oil, we will suffer a shortage,” he predicts. The world may be burning nearly 10% less oil than the prepandemic 101 million barrels per day, but, he says, “don’t mistake Covid-related weakness for a secular shift.”

Goff reasons that electric vehicles are still just a blip. “I think there’s tremendous pent-up [consumer] demand. People are really tired,” he says, adding that workers want to get back

to their offices. “Oil and gas is going to come back with a vengeance.” Already, in Brazil, petroleum demand is above pre-coronavirus levels.

So this vulture has been circling, fully convinced that with the right assets, capital structures and incentive plans, oil companies can thrive. “We’re buying reserves in the ground at a big discount,” Goff boasts.

His primary platform is publicly traded Contango Oil & Gas, of which he owns 24%.

Goff oversees the holding company as chairman; acolyte Wilkie Colyer Jr., 36, serves as CEO. In October 2019 they snapped up 160,000 acres of prime fracking land in Oklahoma and the Texas Panhandle for $23 million. About the same time, on the steps of an Oklahoma courthouse, they grabbed 315,000 acres from bankrupt White Star Petroleum (founded by the late wildcatter billionaire Aubrey McClendon) for $130 million.

In November, they paid $58 million for 180,000 acres in Wyoming, Montana and Texas.

Goff followed that up by merging Contango with another small oil company he controlled, Mid-Con Energy Partners.

Assuming a conservative $45 per barrel, Contango is on track to generate in the neighborhood of $75 million in earnings (after capital spending and interest payments) in 2021, pumping roughly 25,000 barrels per day. So far, Wall Street hasn’t credited Goff’s bargain buying.

Over the last 12 months Contango’s stock is down 34%, while the S&P oil-and-gas index is off only 20% and the broader market has surged 20%.

Goff intends for Contango to keep growing.

But unlike during the heyday of the shale boom a decade ago, when companies seemed to be drilling and fracking nearly every cow pasture in oil country, this growth will come from continuing to buy already developed cashproducing assets at what he calls “very, very attractive” prices.

Indeed, Shale 2.0 has gotten religion about needing to “live within cash flow,” says Ben Dell, managing director at New York–based private equity outfit Kimmeridge Energy. He shares Goff’s enthusiasm for restrained growth.

Before the world does not need any more oil, we will suffer a shortage.

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CONTRARIAN | JOHN GOFF

How to Play It

OIL AIN’T OVER

These frackers will have staying power, and payout potential, even as the world goes green.

Name

EV/Ebidta1

Dividend Yield

Recent Price

Canadian Natural Resources (CNQ)

9.6

5.4

$25

Chevron (CVX)

13

5.4

$92

ConocoPhillips (COP)

10.9

3.7

$43

PDC Energy (PDCE)

6.2

0

$24

Pioneer Natural Resources (PXD)

12.3

1.7

$130

Source: FactSet. 1Total enterprise value (market cap plus net debt) divided by earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization.

A Brit and former oil analyst at AllianceBernstein, Dell sees a “path to relevance” for America’s beleaguered shale frackers if they would just act more like the tobacco giants did a decade ago: Accept life in a declining industry, slash costs and ramp up returns of capital to shareholders. His favorite example is Altria Group, owner of the Marlboro brand, which despite cigarette smoking’s global peak in 2012, returned 250%, double that of the S&P 500, between 2010 and 2017.

Key to Altria’s stock performance during that period was the return of more than $50 billion to shareholders via dividends and buybacks— an amount that exceeded the company’s entire enterprise value in 2010.

“It was not a high-growth strategy that drove the outperformance,” Dell says. “Rather, it was the dramatic return of capital that forced investors to pay attention.”

Which publicly traded frackers have the potential to follow suit?

Valuation is important. The preferred metric in the oil patch is EV/ Ebitda—a company’s enterprise value, consisting of market cap plus net debt, divided by earnings from operations before interest, taxes and non-cash expenses (such as ExxonMobil’s $20 billion writedown of reserve values in 2020). But no fracking operation is worth buying these days if it doesn’t own prime assets that can generate profits even at $45 a barrel. Among the best places to find such operations has been the Permian Basin of west Texas and southeastern New Mexico, where, thanks to the one-two combo of directional drilling and hydraulic fracturing, oil production exploded from 1 million barrels per day a decade ago to about 4 million today—more than that of most OPEC countries.

Goff’s current Permian favorites include Chevron, which sits on some 2 million prime acres in the region and has a sterling balance sheet. The next best Permian portfolio, he says, is the newly merged powerhouse of ConocoPhillips and Concho Resources. He has also been a buyer in recent years of Texas Pacific Land Trust, which collects royalty payments from oil and gas produced from under its 900,000 Permian acres.

Outside the Permian, Goff is an admirer of Canadian Natural Resources, a low-cost oil sands producer. And both he and Dell are fans of PDC Energy, which holds a dominant low-cost position in Colorado’s Wattenberg basin.

Although Goff likes buying private deals via Contango, he insists that “the best opportunity is in the public market” (see table). He learned that lesson early from his years working with Rainwater, who, starting in the 1970s, helped Fort Worth’s Bass brothers turn a

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modest oil inheritance into a multibillion-dollar portfolio that at one point included 10% of Texaco, 5% of Marathon Oil and a controlling stake in the Walt Disney Company.

Goff joined Rainwater Inc. in 1987 at age 31, fresh from a public accounting job with Peat Marwick. He describes the Fort Worth investment firm as a dealmaking hothouse where Rainwater would spend half the day with phones in each hand negotiating with multiple counterparties simultaneously.

Soon Goff was building Rainwater’s real estate business and looking on as he bought T. Boone Pickens out of Mesa Petroleum in 1996, recapitalizing it as Pioneer Natural Resources. At the time, no one imagined that Pioneer, with 800,000 acres in the Permian, would become a champion of American frackers.

Big Tobacco not only serves as a template for what oil companies can do right, but what they can do wrong. In 2018 Altria abandoned its focus on returning capital and spent $12.8 billion to acquire a third of vaping giant Juul Labs.

Over the next two years, Altria wrote down that stake by twothirds as federal investigations into Juul’s marketing to children ramped up. Meanwhile, Juul’s founders awarded a $2 billion special dividend to themselves and other pre-Altria employees.

(Juul’s founders deny any wrongdoing.)

Goff cautions that Big Oil could easily make a similar mistake. He points to BP, whose stock has declined by 35% since last February, when it declared its intention to reinvest into renewables rather than oil. Want to invest in renewable energy?

Goff suggests Florida-based NextEra Energy, which operates America’s largest fleet of wind turbines and solar panels.

Lest you think this real estate maven turned oilman is an old fogey, Goff marvels that his most successful investments in the past year (by percentage gain) have been in cryptocurrencies, especially bitcoin.

But he can’t shake his preference for storing wealth in the ground and thinks the geology two miles under the Permian tumbleweeds is so rich with frackable layers of oil-bearing rock that owning acreage there (as well as in prime parts of Oklahoma and Wyoming) will be a solid hedge against the increasing likelihood of inflation, prompted by the Fed’s 72% expansion of the U.S. money supply over the past year.

“This can go on for a prolonged period—printing money at a breakneck pace,” he says. “It’s frightening to me.”

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ADVERTORIAL BY SNG GRANT THORNTON

Business Success Lessons From A Fund Administrator

I

s there a single formula to being successful in business? Many business people, including some social media celebrities, would say ‘yes, work hard, be positive, dream of abundance’!

Then again, many people would say ‘if that worked, I would be a billionaire’!

If the question was asked differently, what do you need to achieve success in your business? It almost always comes down to funding and market access. In my experience as a fund administrator as well as having walked the journey of mentoring and assisting many businesses from startups to large, listed corporates, yes, this much is true and is often seen as the doom and gloom of becoming successful.

Normally, a small- or medium-size business’s very first approach would be to apply at financial institutions, and it may feel like they are looking for a reason to not fund your business rather than assisting. However, do not lose hope as there many ways to skin a cat!

Did you know that there over 200 grants and incentives for manufacturing – and many people have no idea that they exist. This goes for many other industries too. In South Africa, large companies are incentivized for assisting small businesses in their supply chains.

This assistance comes in the form of Non-financial (training etc.) and Financial (loan funding, grants and even guarantees).

There are Special Economic Zones (SEZs), which are geographically designated areas of a country set aside for specifically targeted economic activities, supported through special arrangements (that may include laws) and systems that are often different from those that apply in the rest of the country.

When it comes to market access, our first thought is normally ‘whom can I sell to’? But the question should maybe be, ‘who will buy from me’? And the answer

just may be in your competitor…

When incubating business, we often do an exercise whereby we ask the entrepreneur to list their competitors. Once listed, we then look at ‘what does my competitor have that I do not have and what do I have that they do not have’? The results could reveal some interesting insights. You might find a competitor that you could collaborate with and offer a stronger value proposition than if each of you operated separate entities offering same products or services to the same clients. The pot with a joint value proposition might be significantly larger too. Joining efforts and value propositions firstly eliminates one competitor but also narrows the client’s choices thus giving you a better advantage to sealing the deal!

Progressive businesses are continuously searching for sustainability and leveraging the best value and if all this can be done digitally then you may just be on the money. However, to achieve their strategies, they need a supply chain that can keep up with them and it is in their best “interest” to protect their “interest” by supporting their suppliers.

My advice is to understand your business value proposition extremely well, find the right customer to whom you would be the most valuable supplier. Build rapport at every opportunity. Find ways of engaging with your next customer e.g., social media platforms, their contact details on their website, read up on their share price and annual reports. Be so customer-centric that you are aware of any changes at the client.

So can we answer the question ‘is there a single formula to being successful in business’? Possibly not!

But hey, is that not what being an entrepreneur is all about?

Having a purpose, being a visionary, pushing the boundaries, breaking the mould, and you might just be changing the world along the way!

Yugen Pillay is the Director and Head of Business Consulting at SNG Grant Thornton. He has an undeniable passion for developing small businesses.

He has worked with various organizations and has played an instrumental role in the development of small businesses, from incubation to large enterprises. He has worked with major industry leaders in Telecommunications, Energy and natural resources, FMCG, Automobile and various other industries providing Fund Administrator services, Enterprise and Supplier Development strategy and other key services. He shares his knowledge on various platforms including participating as a guest speaker or panel member at various events. He holds Masterclasses and has been invited to be a guest lecturer at some of South Africa’s renowned institutions.

The Other‘C’That Has Dominated News From Last Year

In the midst of the pandemic, cryptocurrencies also made surging headlines, with news about it changing faster than you could say Bitcoin, Ether and Dogecoin.

BY PETER ENGELBRECHT

E

VEN AT THE HEIGHT OF THE GREATEST lockdown in human history, there was one industry that did not break a sweat. One that did not buckle even a little under the crushing economic downturn.

The cryptocurrency industry.

With assets like Bitcoin sitting at a price per coin just shy of $6,000 and Ether sitting at a price per coin shy of $130 at the start of April 2020. With Bitcoin being the market leader and Ether being the most widely-used crypto, both assets showed unbelievable growth over the year. Bitcoin broke the $64,000 mark and Ether broke the

64 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

$2,400 mark.

In May, hardly a month later, illustrating the volatility inherent in cryptos, Bitcoin plummeted to just over $40,000, while Ether gained somewhat to $2,700. A lot of Bitcoin’s recent volatility has had a lot to do with pronouncements by South African-born billionaire tech entrepreneur Elon Musk, founder of the electric car company Tesla. More about this later.

“If we look at Bitcoin, it was created as a brand-new technology; not only is it a new technology but it is unlike anything that has happened in the past in that what you’ve done is created a decentralized money system. In other words, a money system that is digital, peer-to-peer and not controlled by any government or central body ever,” says Ran Neuner, a South African cryptocurrency investor and co-founder and CEO of Onchain Capital, a Blockchain investment fund and advisory service.

“That is a brand-new concept in the world because up until now money has been something that has been issued by governments whose value is something that has been controlled by governments. You know, if you look at stores of value, the first store of value was of course gold but in the 1930s, the US issued a law that said people weren’t allowed to hold gold anymore

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TECH | CRYPTOCURRENCIES

and they had to turn in all their gold and that is because the US dollar was backed by gold.

“So what you can see is that up until now in the history of mankind, governments and centralized bodies have controlled money or value and the issue of money. What Bitcoin does, and how Bitcoin does that, is by creating a decentralized ledger.

That takes the power away from anyone and everyone. So there is basically no more ability to control from a centralized place.”

With Bitcoin making headlines again in 2021, one might be inclined to say that the volatile nature of this 12-year-old social experiment is not that volatile in the long run.

During 2017 and 2018, there was a lot of speculation, leading to a boom and bust cycle, says Ian Ferrao, a telecoms executive currently serving as the Regional Director for East Africa at Airtel Africa.

Ferrao is a cryptocurrency fan and spends his spare time researching and investing in various crypto tokens, liquidity mining projects and NFTs (non-fungible tokens).

“What I’m seeing this time is it feels a little bit different.

Certainly, the rand looks a lot stronger. If I look at Bitcoin today, we just have much stronger governance and regulation than I guess we had back in 2017 or 2018, and we’re seeing a lot wider support for it now.

“Large banks like JP Morgan are now supporting and creating their own crypto funds. You’ve got big companies like Tesla and Square (an American financial services and digital payments company based in San Francisco) now using Bitcoin as an investment mechanism for their spare cash and I think it’s just that we’re starting to see stronger use cases for cryptos all round. So I guess this is all fueling it. The latest forecast I saw from JP Morgan was that it could be heading towards $1,130 to $140,000.”

It’s not just the two top dogs (Bitcoin and Ether) that are making the market move.

Startups from the African continent are also making news.

Revix, for example, a Cape – Marius Reitz Town-based cryptocurrency investment platform launched during the cryptocurrency crash of 2018, has since raised over $4 million in off-shore funding by the start of 2021.

Coinbase (founded in June 2012), one of the largest cryptocurrency exchanges, went public in April this year, boosting the company’s market capitalization to around $105 billion.

Coinbase is now in the top 100 most valuable stocks in the

Bitcoin will continue to be an appealing option for investors who consider it a hedge against inflation.

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CRYPTOMANIA

• Over the past year, the crypto market has skyrocketed in value about 920%.

• Mark Zuckerberg has a goat named Bitcoin.

• Ethereum, Dogecoin and other surging cryptocurrencies are propelling the market to $2.5 trillion.

(Source: forbes.com) • Self-proclaimed ‘Dogefather’ Elon Musk called dogecoin a “hustle” in his recent ‘Saturday Night Live’ debut.

• Vitalik Buterin, who spearheaded the launch of the Ethereum blockchain in 2015, has become the world’s youngest crypto billionaire at age 27. (Source: forbes.com)

US. This means that Coinbase has a greater market cap than the International Exchange and Nasdaq, Inc. combined.

“We are now seeing more institutional investment come into play, with greater investments and interest in crypto from some of the biggest names in the business – Visa, Facebook, PayPal, Square, JP Morgan. This is going some way to allaying the doubts that have previously undermined Bitcoin,” says Marius Reitz, General Manager for Africa of Luno, the global cryptocurrency exchange that added almost a million new South African customers during 2020, and recorded $8.3 billion in transactions worldwide and processed nearly $3 billion in volumes in South Africa last year.

“Bitcoin operates on a model of deflation, meaning gradually fewer and fewer Bitcoin will be released until supply stops completely when we reach 21 million. There are currently around 18.6 million Bitcoin in circulation. This is different from FIAT currencies which use an inflationary model where central banks can print extra units of currency at will. We are seeing more economies around the world doing this and weakening the value of their own currencies, so Bitcoin will continue to be an

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TECH | CRYPTOCURRENCIES

appealing option for investors who consider it a hedge against inflation,” says Reitz.

In February, Musk announced a $1.5 billion investment into the cryptocurrency.

One of the reasons behind this considerable investment was to enable the company to have the right kind of liquidity when it starts accepting payments in Bitcoin.

WILL IT ECLIPSE GOLD’S MARKET CAP IN THE YEARS TO COME? Bitcoin was created with the objective to be a new type of currency, a replacement for traditional FIAT currencies (governmentissued currency not backed by a physical commodity such as gold), however, it has become a store of value, over being a currency.

Bitcoin is now considered to be the new gold. Gold has been a store of value for centuries now and currently has a market cap of $11 trillion. Since Bitcoin’s conception, its market share has grown to $1.1 trillion over the past 11 years.

“Gold has traditionally been considered a hedge against speculative investments and has been top-dog when it comes to storing value. But Bitcoin has proven itself a worthy contender. It is dramatically outperforming gold so far in 2021,” says Reitz.

“Many big hedge funds and some conventional asset managers have adopted Bitcoin as a core hedge against inflation, citing its finite supply, as opposed to the ability of central banks to print more FIAT currency.

There aren’t many alternative gold-like assets currently, and in a world of rising debt and aggressive money printing by central banks, there will be a growing need for assets that can be privately held. Institutional investment flows into Bitcoin during 2021 have seen increased interest and allegiance with Bitcoin.

The jury is still out as to whether Bitcoin can compete with gold as a safe asset for the largest investors,” Reitz continues.

Compared to 2017 or 2018, we are starting greater adoption and usage of the cryptocurrency market as a whole, with Bitcoin driving the market. The larger

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IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN BUYING BITCOIN, BUT DO NOT KNOW HOW TO DO IT SAFELY, HERE IS A STEP-BY-STEP GUIDE ON HOW YOU MAY GO ABOUT IT. STEP 1: Get a Bitcoin wallet. This can be downloaded onto either a PC or smartphone. The wallet is there to store your Bitcoin in the same way you would keep cash in the wallet in your back pocket.

STEP 2: Buy Bitcoin. You’ll need to go to a cryptocurrency exchange in order for you to turn your FIAT into Bitcoin. The best exchange to use would be dependent on the country you live in. If you are based in Africa, the option could be Luno, the registered exchange on the bitcoin.org website. A list of exchanges can be found in the same place.

STEP 3: Move your Bitcoin from the exchange to your wallet. The exchange should give you a temporary wallet to store your crypto from which you can send the crypto to your personal wallet. This is the most important step as it is highly advisable not to keep your crypto in an exchange due to the potential possibility of the exchange getting hacked and all your crypto is gone with the wind.

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Photo supplied; Photos via Getty Images

companies like JP Morgan or Tesla take on assets like Bitcoin to their portfolio, the greater its adoption by the greater public and with some investors making claims that Bitcoin will rise to $140,000 per coin.

“My feeling is that within the next three to five years, Bitcoin [will] take over gold’s market cap,” adds Neuner. “The question is what is gold’s market cap going to be then?

The answer will depend on how many US dollars are printed and if the US keeps printing US dollars, then gold’s market cap could be $20 trillion, but my opinion is that Bitcoin will eclipse gold within the next three to five years.”

“I really do think whilst others are talking about Bitcoin, there’s a lot of other cryptos and decentralized finance networks that are doing spectacular things, if you just look at Ethereum as the second crypto, there are more use cases for that ecosystem, and that ecosystem is growing at a phenomenal pace,” says Ferrao.

But there are a number of scams surrounding the cryptocurrency space so investors need to be careful.

Says Reitz.: “We encourage responsible investing which includes never investing in

My feeling is that within the next three to five years, Bitcoin [will] take over gold’s market cap.

– Ran Neuner

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something you don’t understand, and never spending more on speculative technologies like Bitcoin than you can afford to lose. We also recommend making a small investment initially if you are unsure so that you can familiarize yourself with the Luno platform and the cryptocurrencies on offer. We do expect further volatility in the crypto space, so we advise care and encourage people to learn more about cryptos.”

With stability becoming a bigger part of Bitcoin, it is clear that this asset is an investment that shouldn’t be overlooked even if it’s not understood. Bitcoin’s profit potential is speculated to continue to soar and now is a great time if there were any to buy some Bitcoin (see box).

“There’s more support for it. You’re starting to see regulators accept it. You’re starting to see larger banks accept it as here to stay, rather than just a fad. And I still think there’s more to go when you think about what Bitcoin is, and holding virtual currency as an investment you’re talking about equating it to gold and I think it needs to reach $120,000 to have the same market cap as gold so there’s still more in it,” adds Ferrao.

“Then you see other cryptos solving real-life problems. There’s Ripple which really helps to deliver on the speed of transaction. There’s another crypto called Stellar which is making it a lot cheaper to exchange between crypto and hard currencies and there’s a lot of different ecosystems building up. I was looking the other day at something called Decentraland which is a virtual world where you can use crypto to buy land, to buy property and to buy collectable items, which I think is going to become bigger and bigger and drive the use cases for crypto rather than just holding it as a static investment.”

In May this year, Musk announced that Tesla will no longer accept Bitcoin due to the vast energy consumption of fossil fuels for the mining operations for Bitcoin. Musk’s first announcement regarding Tesla adopting Bitcoin raised the price per coin to just shy of $65,000. His second announcement dropped Bitcoin’s price back down to the $50,000 mark.

This move by Musk not only shows his power when it comes to the crypto market but also shows just how volatile this industry still is. Musk’s tweets are not just making Bitcoin move.

The more Musk also makes jokes about the cryptocurrency Dogecoin, the more the market reacts. Whether it’s Bitcoin or Ether or even Dogecoin, the more big players like Musk talk and show interest in cryptocurrencies, the more the market grows in its own hyper-volatile manner.

The future of cryptocurrency is surely looking strong. Mass adoption is not quite on the cards right now but the user case is growing. As a matter of fact, it’s almost surprising when you think of the numbers associated with a market that hasn’t even finished high school yet. With adoption and usage being the driving factor, who’s to say we won’t be paying for groceries with cryptocurrency someday soon?

JUNE | JULY 2021 FORBES AFRICA | 67

Why NFTs Are Having An Arty Moment

ART’S VALUABLE DIGITAL FUTURE, A RECENT BOOM IN NFT SALES AND BLOCKCHAIN WITH AN IMPORTANT ROLE IN PRESERVING AN ARTIST’S LEGACY.

BY TIANA CLINE

68 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

“T

HE FIRST THING I TELL PEOPLE when I’m talking to them about NFTs and cryptoart is ‘don’t overthink it’.

When I first entered the space, I didn’t fully understand what I was doing. I had to learn by doing,” says Nigerian-born Prince Jacon Osinachi, a self-taught digital artist who found his voice using Microsoft Word.

Years before NFTs became a thing, Osinachi entered the cryptoart space in 2017 when he discovered the R.A.R.E Art platform.

“As an artist, I wanted to show my work beyond Instagram. I wanted to reach a wider audience,” he explains. “They were talking

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TECH | NFTs

DEFINITION OF NFT (NON-FUNGIBLE TOKEN) IN THE MERRIAM-WEBSTER DICTIONARY: A unique digital identifier that cannot be copied, substituted, or subdivided, that is recorded in a blockchain, and that is used to certify authenticity and ownership (as of a specific digital asset and specific rights relating to it).

Photos supplied; Photo via Getty Images

art, but for artists like myself, it is something that has changed digital arts. People can now collect digital art, as opposed to copying and pasting it and then claiming that they own it,” he adds.

“The metadata on the ownership is on the blockchain – this means there’s provable scarcity which makes it a valuable. For digital artists, it’s a big leap.”

Using digital art marketplaces like SuperRare, Osinachi has managed to sell his work to global collectors, many of whom are anonymous. The beauty of blockchain is that when Osinachi’s art moves from one buyer to another, as a

about something called cryptoart which means you put your art on the blockchain.

A lot of people get to see it and you also get the chance to sell it.”

NFTs, or non-fungible tokens, are a way of buying or selling anything digital – like art – using cryptocurrency. As little as four years ago, people were not collecting art on the blockchain but Osinachi saw its potential and the following year, his work was taken to Ethereal Summit (where Edward Snowden was a key speaker this May).

“The current hype we’ve seen in the NFT space started around late 2019 when people started paying attention to, and collecting cryptoart. The pandemic helped to boost this because people weren’t going to physical galleries. The blockchain became a space where people could converge and look at good art.”

Osinachi is currently hosting virtual workshops to help onboard African artists into the cryptoart space. He believes that while the NFT space will co-exist with traditional art going forward, blockchain has an important role in preserving an artist’s legacy.

“The space is growing. I wouldn’t say that in its entirety it is going to be the future of

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The current hype we’ve seen in the NFT space started around late 2019 when people started paying attention to, and collecting cryptoart.

– Prince Jacon Osinachi, digital artist

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TECH | NFTs

surrounding post-colonial Africa, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Afghanistan.

Amin’s son, Salim Amin, has been working tirelessly to categorize and digitize this collection and ultimately bring it into a format that is presentable to the world – onto Ethereum.

“When this whole NFT craze started, a lot of artists saw it as a way to make money. What it really is, is a new technology that will unlock many new monetization models, not just for artists. It’s a way to craft a story,” says Andrew Berkowitz, the project lead for $Afrofuture, an Ethereum-based social currency looking to unlock new funding for African creatives.

“Blockchain is a whole new model for how we can take these archives and start to really roll them out into the world in a way that catalyses conversations and creates a community.”

Working closely with Camerapix and The Mohammed Amin Foundation, Berkowitz is exploring new ways for historical archives to be presented to the world (and monetized). He’s created something called the Genesis NFT Drop where five, rare images from Amin’s archive will be up for auction every quarter as NFTs. The proceeds from each sale will be used to commission African artists, provide grants to museums to help them preserve their content digitally and train local archivists. (Currently, The Mohamed Amin Foundation flies in archivists from Europe, the United States and the United Kingdom to Nairobi to store content and retrieve metadata.)

“We’ve digitized whatever we can with the resources that we have, but we’ve only scratched the surface,” says Amin’s son Salim, the chairman of Camerapix and The Mohamed Amin Foundation.

“NFTs are a new platform but for us, it’s another opportunity to be able to showcase the work, hopefully raise some money, train young Africans across the continent into being good archivists and preserving our content, our storytelling, and not lose this very precious history that we have.”

“And we want this to serve as a new model because there’s plenty of these historical archives all over the world… it’s a way to use this new technology and it’s not just about making money. Our aim to change the way African history is taught and appreciated across the world,” adds Berkowitz.

From Momint, a new South African social media marketplace where creators can sell their works as NFTs, to the Worldart gallery in Cape Town launching its first NFT gallery auction by local artist Norman O’Flynn, the local NFT scene is only getting bigger.

Says Osinachi: “We’re only just scratching the surface in terms of what the blockchain can do for us. Whatever you can think of, the blockchain is there to help and as time goes on, we’re going to be seeing some interesting use cases arise.”

From Momint, a new South African social media marketplace where creators can sell their works as NFTs, to the Worldart gallery in Cape Town launching its first NFT gallery auction by local artist Norman O’Flynn, the local NFT scene is only getting bigger.

creator, he is always aware of this exchange and his royalty fee of 10% is ensured for life, no matter how much a piece sells for. For a collector, an NFT doesn’t necessarily mean owning the art, rather the payment is for the metadata and this opens up the possibility of reselling the NFT at a later stage for more money.

“Whoever gets to buy the art doesn’t get to lock it up like they do in the traditional art world. Anybody can see it and know that this wallet address owns this work. And in terms of teaching African history, anybody can have access to it,” explains Osinachi.

NOT JUST MAKING MONEY, BUT DIGITIZING ART HISTORY For Osinachi, there is far more to the blockchain than the world of finance, cryptocurrency. While the recent boom in NFT sales has seen many artists considering minting their creations, it has also led to social change – the ability to preserve art history previously stored in physical archives.

Mohamed Amin’s historical Camerapix collection, for example, contains 2.5 million still photographs and 6,000 hours of raw video footage capturing African history. Considered one of the world’s greatest unexplored historical archives, it contains images of the events

What blockchain really is, is a new technology that will unlock many new monetization models, not just for artists.

– Andrew Berkowitz, the project lead for $Afrofuture, an Ethereum-based social currency looking to unlock new funding for African creatives

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ENTREPRENEURS

Education: What We Can Do Better Tom Bennett, Director and Founder of researchEd in the United Kingdom, on what evidence tells us about the future and purpose of education.

BY JILL DE VILLIERS

Photo supplied

A

S COVID-19 SWEPT THROUGH THE WORLD, SOME AREAS OF OUR lives were more deeply affected than others, one of them being education. Before the pandemic, technology had started taking a more prominent place in education, and online learning was being integrated into the system. When Covid-19 struck, schools and tertiary institutions were forced to change their models rapidly, migrating to digital options. Soon, the talk pivoted to blended learning and hybrid solutions, combining in-person and virtual classrooms and teaching methods.

How likely are we to return to old teaching methods and classroom settings, we ask educationist, author and speaker Tom Bennett, who hails from the United Kingdom (UK) and is the Director and Founder of researchED. “After Covid, I see education 95% snapping back to where it was before, because the face-toface model of education simply cannot be beaten in most circumstances. The one benefit of the Covid experience has been that people the world over have seen how hard it is to home school children, how much blended learning often lacks compared to face-to-face… but also we have learned remote learning is not something impossible to manage and that where it is useful, we have lost our fear of trying it. For example, in the UK, whenever it snows, schools often shut and nothing gets done. But now, no more snow days, although I’m not sure that children and staff are as happy about that!” Bennett says.

He was a teacher in the East End of London for 13 years before founding researchED, which he describes as “an international non-profit that asks simple questions that can change the world”. The organization brings together everyone within the educational ecosystem – “not just the privileged priest class of education, but teaching assistants, administrators, teachers, as well as academics, leaders and researchers – to share their thoughts about what they do, and what evidence informs what they do.”

They travel the world, presenting low-cost, inclusive and accessible events, which are particularly popular among teaching staff, who are hungry for answers to questions like: ‘How can I achieve what I want, without struggling blindly in the dark? What does the evidence tell me? When do things work, and when do they not work?’

Bennett has written four books on classroom behavior and evidence-informed education.

“Ideas about how we manage behavior are still stuck in the 19th century, and too many teachers and schools are forced to reinvent the wheel every generation instead of building upon what we have found to work and improving upon it,” he explains.

“Teachers rarely get an evidence-informed training as they begin their careers, and many schools still make decisions based on intuition, gut feeling and hunches. But children – and teachers – deserve much better than that. We can do much better than that.”

Lately, we have seen a burgeoning of technology solutions to a myriad of questions that Bennett says teachers aren’t asking. “Tech companies are often guilty of selling solutions to problems no one has, and ignoring the lack of evidence to back up the boldest of their claims.

That’s not to say that tech doesn’t offer enormous opportunities to supplement and support education, but also to say that schools and countries have poured billions into tech promises that have rarely materialized.

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“Evidence tells us many things that teachers can incorporate into their classrooms with only a little effort and with huge dividends: low-stakes retrieval practise (frequent testing) secures lesson retention enormously; being aware of cognitive load theory teaches us the students need information presented in manageable chunks, and that teachers should favour direct instruction with novice learners before allowing them too much freedom to drive their own studies. This is especially relevant with blended forms of learning, where beginning learners often drown in what they don’t know, and might lack the motivation and the foundational knowledge how to drive their own learning at home.”

And finally, how does Bennett see the purpose of education?

“The beauty of education is it has no intrinsic purpose. We have purposes for education. So when we ask ‘How should we educate?’ Then we have to first ask, ‘What do we think the aim of this education is for?’

Only once we have answered that can we rationally begin to decide what we need to do, whether we’re trying to teach the best of what has been thought and said, prepare citizens for the future, or help children become fully-rounded human beings.”

– Tom Bennett will deliver a talk during the 2021 Future of Education Virtual Summit, with the theme ‘Redefining the Purpose of Education’ on July 29, held in partnership with FORBES AFRICA and CNBC Africa

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Elizabeth Isiorho is ramping up her modeling business to provide more young people international opportunities and put African beauty on the map.

OVID-19 MAY HAVE SHAKEN the very foundation of global fashion, but the one thing that has stayed is the focus on Africa as the world’s resource hub for the creative industry, with its surging youth dividend and gifted talent pool.

Nigerian entrepreneur and former beauty queen Elizabeth Isiorho knows this only too well, as she takes her business to the next stage, now launching Future Face Africa, which she hopes will be a pan-African talent search to discover more African faces to showcase to the rest of the world.

Her modeling agency, Beth Model Management Africa, has been at the forefront of this quest, since 2004, to provide a platform for African models abroad.

“Models will be given a chance to win a two-year international modeling contract with a top modeling agency, offering hopefuls not just a launchpad but a career on the world stage,” she says in an interview with FORBES AFRICA over Zoom from London in May. Isiorho herself had her breakthrough in the industry with international agency, Elite Model Management. But first, a look back at how it all began.

Growing up, Isiorho was influenced by her mother, a veteran in the Nigerian entertainment industry and die-hard fashion lover who always told her daughter she resembled supermodel Naomi Campbell.

Who knew then that Isiorho would become friends with Campbell several years later and follow in her role model’s footsteps?

While African fashion and beauty is now celebrated abroad, this was not the case when Isiorho first started.

Modeling had several negative perceptions in Africa that

Photo by Adebayo Jolaoso

BY PEACE HYDE

FORBES AFRICA

CONTRARIAN | ELIZABETH ISIORHO

she needed to break.

Born in Nigeria and relocating to the United Kingdom (UK) by age 16, Isiorho studied Business and Information Technology at the London Guildhall University.

With a passion for the modeling industry instilled in her from an early age, she began her career doing a few shows in London until a serendipitous encounter with a friend put her firmly on her destined path.

“A friend of mine showed me some magazines that had Miss Nigeria UK and she said I should go for it. I was extremely shy but I went for the 10-day boot camp and on the ninth day, I said ‘this is not for me, I’m not walking that stage in a bikini’ and I said to my mum ‘I am not doing it anymore’. My mum said she had bought her ticket to London to come and surprise me on stage so I should stick it out. I did and I won the competition, to my surprise,” recalls Isiorho.

After winning the pageant, Isiorho returned to Nigeria in 2003 to continue to build her career in the modeling industry. And that is where she noticed a glaring gap in the market.

“Because I won Miss Nigeria UK, I was very popular when I came back to Nigeria and I said to myself ‘let me get a proper agency to manage me’.

But there was none back then. I did my research and I went to companies and one company told me to just drop my CD. So, there was no modeling agency in Nigeria. I tried going to the big agencies in London that work with me today but I didn’t get far.”

Instead of giving up, she decided to set up her own agency instead and Beth Model Management Africa was born.

Over the years, Isiorho has grown the brand from only 10 models to over 200 with 48 of them placed worldwide across various agencies, making Beth one of the largest modeling agencies in Africa.

Not one to give up, she used grit and tenacity to pioneer the model management model in Africa.

“When I started, I thought it would be easy but the Nigerian market was very difficult. I am talking about 2004 when parents are thinking a certain way and parents don’t want their kids to model. I found a few faces and the issue I had was trying to convince the parents that it was not about prostitution. That was the negative stereotype because they felt they exposed their bodies etc.

“The other issue was trying to sign contracts with models when we find the right faces. People were scared to sign in Nigeria whereas in

I thought it would be easy but the Nigerian market was very difficult.

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London, people were excited to sign with an agency,” says Isiorho.

Due to the lack of demand for African models at the time, Isiorho decided to start a model convention.

Her thinking was simple. If the international fashion industry would not accept African models, she would bring them to Africa to see the untapped potential for themselves.

“So, I sent them emails and out of 11 agencies, nine of them replied to say they were coming and one of the agencies, which was Elite Models, said ‘we have a model search and would like you to be a part of it’.”

Founded in 1983, Elite Model Look is a prestigious international modeling contest credited with discovering supermodels such as Cindy Crawford, Gisele Bundchen, Lara Stone and Alessandra Ambrosia.

This was the big break Isiorho needed for her agency. In 2007, she exclusively secured the rights to organize the Elite Model Look Nigeria/Africa contest.

“That was my biggest breakthrough because as an agency, for you to partner with one of the biggest modeling agencies in the world is a big deal and we worked together for 13 years. We discovered many stars like Mayowa Nicholas, Davidson Obennebo, Chika Emmanuella, Victor Ndigwe, Tobi Momoh, who are all on global campaigns,” says Isiorho.

Over the years, Isiorho has placed indigenous African beauty in global campaigns such as Victoria’s Secret and New York Fashion Week to name a few.

Her resilience has not gone unnoticed amongst her peers.

“I have worked with Beth Models since the company’s inception and I’m filled with pride. The investment Elizabeth has made in the modeling industry across Africa is beyond glamorizing fashion; it’s the wider role the agency plays in changing stereotypes about working with Africans, giving African creatives a voice and ensuring African youth are empowered socio-economically,” says Omoyemi Akerele, the founder of Lagos Fashion Week.

Isiorho’s relationship with Elite continues to flourish even as she charts her own path.

“Beth Models is a trusted collaborator of Elite Model Management, having organized Elite Model Look contest in Nigeria for over 10 years… In recent years, Beth Models expanded the search to Ethiopia, Ghana, Kenya and Rwanda and used their experienced scouting skills to find fresh new talent with the potential for international modeling careers,” says Vick Mihaci, President, Elite Management Worldwide.

With the cross-over of Africa’s rich talent repository, through incoming interest as well as the efforts of cultural emissaries such as Isiorho, it’s not long before the continent becomes the true face of the future.

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DADDY COOL In recent years, surrogacy has become increasingly popular among single women and gay couples. For heterosexual single men, it’s still a rather unusual path to follow but that is changing.

BY PAULA SLIER

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OUTH AFRICAN MEN ARE MAKING HISTORY, choosing to become single fathers by choice.

In March, Wesley Hayes, a 35-year-old divorce attorney won a year-long battle to legally register his daughter, Justine Filly – her second name reflects Hayes’ love of horses.

Andrew Martin, a fertility lawyer who heads his own firm in Cape Town, has successfully registered a number of babies for single fathers through surrogacy over the past decade.

One of Martin’s clients is a 46-year-old Johannesburg business consultant, Gavin Phillips*. Since November 2019, Phillips has undergone three unsuccessful IVF journeys and is now about to begin his fourth.

“I’ve always wanted children and after I lost my father to Alzheimer’s in 2017, the need to extend my family, and have a legacy, became more intense,” he says.

Phillips was married and unfortunately despite efforts to have a child, those efforts did not bear fruits.

“After we got divorced, I considered adopting a child, and then I started to research surrogacy.”

Traditionally, it’s heterosexual couples who go this route. Globally, one in six such couples struggle to conceive, regardless of whether they come from low-, middle- or highincome countries. But in recent years, surrogacy has become increasingly popular among single women and gay couples. For heterosexual single men, it is still a rather unusual path to follow.

Dr Tasneem Mohamed, an obstetrician gynecologist

Wesley Hayes and his daughter Justine Filly

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It’s exciting and I hope it’s something we see more of. We have the technology to do these things and there are definitely men who would make good parents and if we can help them, it’s a lovely thing for us to be able to do.

– Dr Tasneem Mohamed

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practising at the BioART Fertility Centre in Johannesburg, has dealt with only two requests in the last two years from single men wanting to have babies.

“I think maybe a lot of men out there don’t know it’s an option for them,” she says. “And probably a lot of them who’ve thought about it just get shut down by their families. It’s a lot of responsibility raising a child on your own, but maybe once single men know it’s possible, we could see more of them coming forward.

“It’s exciting and I hope it’s something we see more of. We have the technology to do these things and there are definitely men who would make good parents and if we can help them, it’s a lovely thing for us to be able to do.”

South African law stipulates that those seeking surrogacy as well as the surrogate herself must be South African or resident in South Africa.

“This is to protect local South Africans from being taken advantage of by foreigners coming and using them as surrogates,” explains Dr Yossi Unterslak, a gynecologist and reproductive medicine specialist at Vitalab Fertility Clinic in Johannesburg.

“There’s no restriction on the egg or sperm donor. But if it’s a single man seeking surrogacy, it has to be his sperm.”

As much as 40% of patients seeking fertility treatments at Vitalab come from abroad – the vast majority from countries in Africa where such treatments are inferior in quality.

“Shop around and find a clinic that is close, affordable and offers treatment but also be careful,” warns Dr Unterslak.

“There are countries that allow cross-border surrogacy like Ukraine and India, which are quite popular.

“Look at the law to make sure you are not going to go through the expensive process of generating embryos and then after the baby’s born, there’s an issue getting the child back into your country.”

Surrogacy does not come cheap. Success rate the first time around is around 67% which means the bills can add up. Phillips estimates he’s already spent nearly a quarter of a million rands (about $17,000).

“There’s the buying of eggs, the fertility clinic, lawyer fees and treatment cycles. Legally, the surrogate can’t earn money from doing this and so I also contribute towards costs of her pregnancy, her medical aid and life insurance. There is a provision in the agreement that says that she is required to try at least three times. The fact that we are on our fourth shows you that these surrogates care and commit to these surrogacy journeys with deep empathy and altruism.”

But the process can be laborious. The first step is choosing a donor.

“You get to see their health records, family history, whether they smoke, take meds, drink, how much they exercise,” says Phillips.

“You get to find out their eye color, hair color, height. You get an idea of their academic ability, their sporting ability, whether they’re introverted or not and you get pictures of them up until the age of 11 because of anonymity concerns.”

Out of 27 possibilities, Phillips eventually found a donor he was happy with. He donated his sperm to fertilize her eggs. Once the fertilization had taken place, mature embryos (blastocysts) were

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Shop around and find a clinic that is close, affordable and offers treatment but also be careful.

– Dr Yossi Unterslak

then frozen until the surrogate had been prepared through various stimulation treatments to receive a blastocyst transfer (IVF). Unfortunately, after three attempts, and although the surrogate fell pregnant each time, the pregnancies did not progress, resulting in miscarriages.

Phllips, then, in an effort to give the surrogacy route another try, decided to change donors and also underwent personal genetic testing to determine if there were any chromosomal abnormalities (of which there were none).

“I’m hopeful, my new donor has got good qualities in terms of what I would like for a child, but genetics can go back six generations. So, you might see something from your great, great, great, great grandfather come out in your child. Not everything is a guarantee but what you want is really healthy eggs from a successful donor (a donor that has donated eggs in the past that has resulted in a pregnancy).”

Phillips has also sent the embryos he has available from this fertilization cycle for additional genetic testing called Preimplantation Genetic Testing for Aneuploidy (PGT-A).

This helps mitigate any risks around implanting embryos that could present with chromosomal abnormalities, prior to commencing with the next round of IVF. If all is normal in the results, a fourth round of IVF will proceed.

Says Phillips: “I feel I have given myself the best chance available for success. I know that 50% of the success is in the hands of science and the rest is in the hands of a higher power – if the stars align, I could be a father in 10 months’ time. Sadly, there’s still a stigma attached to single men having children on their own and the argument that a child allegedly needs a mom. I’ll be the mom and the dad, and I’ll protect and nurture my child with everything I have. I also won’t give up until I have completed this beautiful journey. My child/children will know how much love went into conceiving them,” he says.

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ADVOICE BY SAMSUNG

Third Consecutive Level 1 B-BBEE Rating For Samsung South Africa Both Phillips and Hayes feel that the concept of a nuclear family is changing. No longer does it mean two point four children and a husband and wife.

Families today come in all shapes and sizes – single mom, two moms, two dads, single dad.

“Relationships are not my forte,” admits Hayes. “I’m very independent and I don’t necessarily find myself best suited to living with somebody and having to make joint decisions about a child. I’ve done enough divorces to know that it’s an unpleasant business and in a number of cases, the children are used as a pawn in the divorce proceedings. As a single parent, I don’t have to concede to anyone. It sounds very selfish, but I don’t have to take anybody else’s opinion into consideration.”

But the process can be quite invasive.

“I had to undergo psychometric testing and a psychological evaluation. The social worker looked into my circumstances and interviewed my family and friends to see what my environment was. I also had to prove that financially I am able to look after a child. I’m not saying it’s a bad thing, but it is invasive.”

But it was all worth it the moment he saw Justine for the first time.

“I wasn’t there for the actual birth itself and arrived moments after she was born. I found her in a little incubator and I just recognized her. I immediately saw small bits of myself looking back at me,” he smiles.

“Africa is by and large a patriarchal society so I can’t see why being seen as the head of a family and being seen as the father of a child without a mother is an issue. There are many single fathers who’ve lost their wives for various reasons.

“Nobody can say that my daughter is unwanted. She was absolutely 110% planned and a 150% wanted and is unimaginably loved. Just as thousands of children don’t have fathers, I think it’s going to become more commonplace that children don’t have mothers.” *Name has been changed

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S

amsung continues to play an active role in the government’s vision for a more inclusive society. The electronics giant has achieved a remarkable third successive Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment (B-BBEE) Level 1 Contribution Status. It is aligned with Samsung’s belief that companies must remain firmly committed to empowering people and nation-building.

“As Samsung, we’re committed to building on our long-ranging transformational vision. This is already reflected internally as our people are representative of the country’s demographics, race and gender. We will continue to build on our own vision to empower South Africans by harnessing the power of technology to effect lasting change,” says Hlubi Shivanda, Director: Business Innovation Group and Corporate Affairs at Samsung South Africa.

In 2019, Samsung launched a R280 million Equity Equivalent Investment Programme, aimed at stimulating job creation. It is estimated that it will contribute nearly R1 billion to the South African economy at large. This investment is supplemented by initiatives focused on the upskilling of South African youth with initiatives like the Samsung Engineering Academy, technology-based facilities in schools and universities, as well as student bursary programmes. Samsung has also become an integral partner in the creation and support of black-owned businesses in the e-waste sector, that can manage Waste Electronic and Electrical Equipment.

Additionally, Samsung appointed two black women-owned businesses to become part of the black industrialist

programme through the EEIP programme.

Importantly, at a time when many South Africans experienced devastating job losses, Samsung’s learnership and skills development initiatives provided much-needed jobs for unemployed youth and people living with disabilities.

2020 brought unexpected challenges, which forced many businesses to cut spending. Samsung, however, did not change their targets and commitment to transformation. The company improved their employment equity score by attracting and retaining employees who reflect the demographics of South Africa, and was named Top Employer for the sixth consecutive year. In this time, Samsung provided much-needed relief to SMMEs by not recalling unsecured loans provided to emerging businesses. Small businesses in the supply chain were paid on shorter payment terms to help sustain their businesses, while there was growth in the spending towards SMMEs - black-owned and black women-owned.

Clearly, Samsung’s transformation agenda continues unabated. Its enterprise development programme helped the beneficiaries of the programme adapt their businesses to cope with the pandemic and invest in the communities in which they operate. This was achieved by supporting Innovation Hubs in disadvantaged communities, and by providing students in the various skills development initiatives with Galaxy tablets to enable them to continue learning remotely.

Ultimately, Samsung’s B-BBEE objectives remain firm, and in doing so, it can uplift marginalised communities throughout the country.

Fashion On The Coast Move over Lagos and Cape Town. It’s Durban’s turn to dazzle the continent’s fashion fraternity.

BY SIMONE UMRAW

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FORBES LIFE | DURBAN FASHION

D

URBAN, IN THE KwaZulu-Natal (KZN) province of South Africa, is known for many things – the sun, the sea and the food, but certainly not for its fashion. But that landscape seems to be changing now, and the coastal town seems to be making a splash on fashion runways.

Notwithstanding that the four-day Durban Fashion Fair is becoming an item on the country’s annual social itinerary, the city’s small but growing fashion industry is getting a fresh makeover.

The South African Sports Confederation and Olympic Committee has also now found a team in Durban to design athletic apparel for the upcoming Tokyo Olympics (if it happens as planned).

“I think at the moment [Durban is] also [in] the fashion race and we’re also getting there in terms of other parts of the country with a bigger fashion scene,” says model Khwezi Ngwenya Ntombela.

“The programs here are helping our designers-intraining get better and step up their game, so each crop gets better with each year.

So, as the fashion changes, they change along with it and enhance their skills, which will eventually make Durban a fashion capital.”

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Ntombela has been modeling since 2006, and is now the owner of Mold Models, a school training young aspirants to sashay down the ramp.

“I love the idea of training, teaching and transferring my knowledge. Even when I watch a [fashion] show, I enjoy watching models who know what they are doing and are confident, and knowing that I [had] a part [to play] in that...”

I think at the moment [Durban is] also [in] the fashion race and we’re also getting there in terms of other parts of the country with a bigger fashion scene.

– Khwezi Ngwenya Ntombela

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Left: Swastika Maney and Sanyukta Singh Below: Designs from House of S

she gushes.

Mother and daughter, Swastika Maney and Sanyukta Singh, both designers and joint owners of House of S and S the Label in KZN, have been in the business long enough to agree.

We meet them at a café in Pietermaritzburg in KZN, where they are seated, dressed in blue and red and with a pink handbag perched on the table.

The cheerful colors belong to the world they come from – the world of design and dress-making.

At their boutique, they curate and

We have our own little fashion world [in Durban].

– Neil Ramautar

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retail Indo-Western clothing with pieces imported from India, as Maney explains: “Every piece has been personally selected by me on my travels to India; the textures, colors and styles have all been chosen to make sure I am catering to the taste of all my clients.”

Since its inception in 2011, the brands have grown and the duo say they have styled the likes of South African celebrities such as Shashi Naidoo and Carishma Basday.

“I initially started out with 10 pieces on a table in my living room and here we are, 10 years later, in our boutique in Durban selling to clients in-store and shipping to the rest of the world,” adds Maney.

Having initially begun as House of S, and catering to a mature, more conservative demographic, the brand has since expanded its offerings. S the Label, which Singh has been working on since the age of 17, has its own youthful stamp.

Prior to the pandemic, the pair had begun to export their clothes across Africa and have since resumed this with the easing of the lockdown. Now at the cusp of launching their own designs and label, they have no intention of slowing down.

No stranger to the fashion business, Durban-based Neil Ramautar has also styled celebrities and the well-heeled in the city.

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FORBES LIFE | DURBAN FASHION

Photos supplied; Photos by Shezaad Ally; Photos by Simon Deiner / SDR Photo / Group of Creatives

Shezaad Ally says his photography embodies Durban’s culture

“When I was younger, my biggest fear was being homeless. I did not have a good childhood and I knew I had to do something… This career happened by accident and I took it and ran with it and here we are today,” says Ramautar, who rose from a “promotional spray boy” for a beauty brand to star stylist.

Having done makeup for the likes of names such as Khanyi Mbau and Kajal Bagwandeen locally, he attests to also having made up international singer Miguel and Bollywood star, Bipasha Basu.

When discussing the fashion scene in Durban, he believes it is the blended culture that makes it unique.

“We are happy being in our little world here. We’re not really concerned about the rest of the country, but the rest of the country doesn’t have anything on our culture down here, we have our own little fashion

There are so many different cultural backgrounds in Durban. Within each culture, you will find that they all have their own unique style to them.

– Shezaad Ally

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One of Zulu’s designs from last year’s Durban Fashion Fair

My design signature is inspired by Africa and my culture mixed with a hint of Indian fusion. I love the bold colors from both cultures, the beautiful embroidery on the Indian garment and the stunning Africa beads from the Zulu traditional garment.

– Mbali Zulu

world,” he reflects.

With a number of projects in the pipeline, a makeup line to his name and a waiting list that could stretch from one end of the Durban coastline to the other, Ramautar is clearly in vogue.

Also a part of the Durban fashion industry is Shezaad Ally, in demand for his slick bridal shoots and fashion photography.

Having started out with photography as a hobby during a gap year from law school, six years later, his pastime has become his profession and the gap year has become a permanent mode of existence for Ally who also sees photography as a way to relieve the pressures of life.

His photoshoots embody Durban’s unique culture as he explains: “There are so many different cultural backgrounds in Durban. Within each culture, you will find that they all have their own unique style to them. And that’s what I love. I

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love working on new ideas, trying new concepts within people’s different styles.”

The Durban Fashion Fair is a platform for upcoming designers as well, some of who are making waves in the sunny beach town. We speak to Mbali Zulu, who is part of the team that has developed athletic apparel for the Olympics and Paralympics.

Having studied fashion design at the Durban University of Technology, she previously worked for some big retailers in South Africa as a fashion buyer.

Currently, she is one of the eight rising star designers to showcase at this year’s Vodacom Durban July.

“My favorite so far has been being part of the Durban Fashion Fair mentorship program which opened doors to be a part of this amazing opportunity to design the opening ceremony outfits for the South African athletic team,” says Zulu.

And on being inspired by Durban?

“Durban fashion has its own unique handwriting. It’s inspired by the mixture of culture… My design signature is inspired by Africa and my culture mixed with a hint of Indian fusion. I love the bold colors from both cultures, the beautiful embroidery on the Indian garment and the stunning Africa beads from the Zulu traditional garment.”

For the Tokyo Games, the team has designed ready-

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FORBES LIFE | DURBAN FASHION

to-wear outfits for the athletes.

“We designed a stunning print which represents South Africa. We used natural fabrics. We wanted the design to represent every South African… The designs were inspired by the athletes. When they briefed us, they told us about their dream from a young age to represent their country in the Olympics. Nelson Mandela also had a dream to unite South Africa through sport. The design embodies unity and the love we have for our country,” says Zulu.

Ruth Unwin, who began as a graphic designer before she was drawn in by the allure and appeal of the fashion industry, is also a part of the team designing for the Olympics and Paralympics, working at Mr Price Sport and together with Gavin Maxwell, the head designer of men’s apparel at the brand.

“It has been a fantastic and exciting journey for us as a team and brand…,” they exude.

“Durban is unique for the climate, coastal weather and sea, sun and sand. These elements served as inspiration for the warm colors, lightweight textured fabric in easy wearing silhouettes that also suggest the ease of the lifestyle we have here.”

Designer Nompumelelo Mimi Mjadu also concurs: “Durban’s history and the surroundings… there’s so many stories to tell. Durban has developed a lot of innovative designers through the years… Durban has more undiscovered talent.”

And with that, the city is also developing a new and evolving breed of fashionistas and style mavens capturing the imagination and interest of Africa’s growing creative economy.

ADVERTORIAL BY THE CONVERSATION STRATEGISTS

How To Get Through The Hardest Conversations In Your Life

T

he hardest conversations of my life have all been with myself and about who I’m becoming as I shed one identity for another.

With a new title as conversation strategist, a businesswoman in an emerging sector, and a newlywed, all of these life milestones confronted me with the question of who I am becoming. These conversations don’t get easier with each confrontation, but I think I have found my formula to getting through them.

I have to learn to be open to reflection.

We do not naturally lean into reflection when all is well. It’s a place that, if we are brave enough, we go to when the ground has shifted beneath us and things don’t feel like they should. Reflective conversations can be brutal, but if we stay in that reflective space despite the discomfort, and engage with what we’re hearing and seeing, we would

have taken the first and most important step.

From there, the next step is release.

We struggle with letting go of parts of our identity that may have served us up until they no longer do. Letting go of the security of a job is difficult. However, if we are able to see the opportunity of the new identity on the horizon, we feel ready to renegotiate our emerging identity into our external environment.

We don’t exist in isolation and so trying on our new identity is done in negotiation with the outside world, our family, our friends, our colleagues, or even our children.

As I took on the identity of being a conversation strategist, I had to negotiate the meaning of this new identity with a client base that has never heard of such a term before and already had fixed ideas of what it means to be any sort of strategist. The more I shared my new identity, the more empowered I

Nozipho Tshabalala, CEO

felt to rename myself.

Renaming is not just about going back into the world with a new name, it is also performative. We have to learn how this new identity behaves and connects with others. We have to learn what it means to be an entrepreneur and not an employee as much as we have to learn what it means to be a wife or a partner. As you shed your old identities for new ones, remember to reflect, release, renegotiate, and rename. The formula works. Try it!

HOLLYWOOD. HUSTLE. Former NFL wide receiver Matthew A. Cherry made it in the mecca of gigs and glamor with an Oscarwinning film marking diversity in the world of animation. We ask him how he did it.

BY PEACE HYDE

W

HEN MATTHEW A. CHERRY decided to make the transition from m being a wide receiver for the National Football League (NFL) to pursue a career in the t entertainment industry, he had no id dea he would become “one of only 39 peoplle of color to ever win the most prestigious award in Hollywood”. Lastt year, he won the Oscar for Best Animated Short Film for Hair Love, a sstory he had written and directed about an African-American father attem mpting to do his daughter’s hair for the first time.

Born in Chicago in the United States (US), Cherry began his early childhood playing sports and had big dreams of becoming a profeessional sportsman. He fell in love with football by the age of six after a briief stint with baseball. At the time, he had no idea how much the sport wo ould change his life. Football got Cherry a full scholarship to study at th he University of Akron in Ohio, and through that, he got his first big break; being drafted to the prestigious NFL, where he would spend the n next couple of years playing for the Jacksonville Jaguars, Cincinnati Beengals, Carolina Panthers and Baltimore Ravens.

“I was always interested in film, in entertainment in general an nd music and I knew really early on that I wasn’t going to have a longg career in the NFL and decided to retire probably a lot earlier becaause I got tired of moving and traveling the world in that way. I ended up

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retiring in 2006 and then moving to Los Angeles in 2007 to pursue a career in film and TV,” says Cherry in an interview with FORBES AFRICA from the US over Zoom in March.

His hope at the time was to become a TV director but like many chasing the dream in Hollywood, Cherry had to earn his stripes. He had the opportunity to cut his teeth as a production assistant after meeting an alumnus of a program called Streetlights, a non-profit organization in Los Angeles (LA) that helps men and women of color find jobs as production assistants behind the scenes.

“The inclusion efforts were nowhere near where they [are] today.

I would often work on jobs, be it TV shows or whatever, and there would be 150 people in the crew and I would be the only one, two or three people of color in that crew. It was hard for people of color to break into the industry unless you went into film school or had industry connects and I had none,” says Cherry.

Slowly but surely, he began to make a name for himself through shooting music videos for the likes of Beyoncé, Kelly Rowland, Michelle Williams and many others before transitioning to live action short films.

“In 2011, I did 11 music videos and directed my first feature and then a couple of years later, like 2013 and 2014, it was really dry and you try and figure out what your next move is. The thing about LA is if you put your effort in a project and that project doesn’t hit a certain way, you are back to the drawing board. Just because I did a music video for Beyoncé doesn’t mean the next job is going to be as well-paying or fruitful and so it is a constant struggle.”

In a city famed for its glitz, glamor and garish mansions where ordinary people can morph into celebrities with millions in their Louis Vuitton suitcases, there is an illusion that you strike it big and rich instantly.

Cherry is quick to correct this notion.

“You are always on the grind and the hustle for the next gig and I have never been in a position where I don’t know how much money I am going to make this year. Just because you work in January, it doesn’t mean that you are guaranteed a job in February and there are times where I was like ‘I don’t even know if I am going to be able to make rent’ and that is very stressful in that regard. Everyone in Hollywood is hustling, trying to make it to the top and sometimes to the detriment of others and it is a very cut-throat world,” says Cherry.

Throughout his 14-year “hustle” to break through in Hollywood, the accomplished sportsman in him pushed him forward in those dark days. And he was not wrong to bet on himself.

According to sports site, leagueside.com, “only 8% of the top 1% of the top 1% of high school football players will make it to NFL”. And Cherry was one of them and all he needed was that breakthrough project to convey this to Hollywood.

That eureka moment happened while he was watching the Oscars one particular year.

“I’ve always watched the Oscars and that’s the biggest thing in Hollywood and I am always trying to see which black people are winning and in 2015, I was paying attention to every category and I am seeing awards being handed out for categories I didn’t even know existed, like sound mixing and sound editing, documentary short etc.

“So, I remember seeing animated short category and they won an Oscar. They got up, they gave a speech and they got the same Oscar as the one that won Best Director or Best Actor.”

It just so happened at the time that Cherry had an idea floating around in his head about a dad and his daughter.

“I hadn’t told anybody yet. After the Oscar [ceremony], I called my manager and I said ‘I have an idea and if we do it right, I think we can mess around and win an Oscar’ and that is how I felt and she said ‘ok, let’s figure it out’.”

A viral tweet about an Afro-Latino dad and his daughter was all the proof Cherry needed to know he had a potentially amazing idea.

“I realized that a big reason why the numbers were higher was that people didn’t look at this like it’s a normal thing. We always assume that mums will be the ones doing this and mainstream media always assumes that black dads don’t support their kids. And that is because you don’t get a lot of great depictions of dads.”

With that information, Cherry got connected with a great illustrator and developed a really strong campaign and took to Kickstarter to raise the funds to produce his first animated short.

“I have used Kickstarter to raise money for both of my previous shoots and with both previous ideas, we barely reached $15,000. Hair Love raised $3,000 within an hour and I hadn’t even shared it with everybody yet. Then we raised $15,000 the first day and we hit our goal of $75,000 in five days and $300,000 in total when we ended the campaign and we became the highest-funded project in Kickstarter at the time,” says Cherry.

And the rest as they say is history.

The film gave Cherry the much-needed credibility and pedigree one needs to make it in Hollywood.

“I felt a lot freer because I knew after struggling for 13 or 14 years, things will get a lot easier in terms of half the battle, like trying to get into the rooms and trying to get people to take you seriously.

Something like that happens to you and you are in the next meeting and it’s a totally different energy and instead of people wondering ‘are you capable of doing it’, people are now giving you the benefit of the doubt.”

Cherry has now signed an exclusive first-look deal with Warner Bros TV and is currently in the process of developing another animated series, Young Love, based on the characters from Hair Love, making him one of the most sought-after black directors in global entertainment today.

Photo by Jon Kopaloff/WireImage

Everyone in Hollywood is hustling, trying to make it to the top and sometimes to the detriment of others and it’s a very cut-throat world.

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FORBES AFRICA

FORBES LIFE | GHANA PHOTOGRAPHERS

Whatever Clicks For Business The scene is not picture perfect yet, but ace photographers are slowly capturing the creative market in Ghana.

HEN THE iconic Ghanaian photographer Emmanuel Bobbie, known widely by the moniker ‘Bob Pixel’, tragically passed away in February this year, the news sent shockwaves through the creative industry in Ghana.

Bobbie had become a hero to a battery of young and upcoming Ghanaian photographers steadily following in his footsteps to build their own brands and enterprises, hoping to make it in the sector, a move exacerbated by the growing youth unemployment in the West African country. Bobbie was one of the pioneers and enablers of this transformation with his work celebrated both in Ghana and the world.

His death, reportedly attributed to Covid-19, turns the spotlight on the creative economy in Ghana. Whilst the pandemic has seen a renaissance of all things digital, it has also applied to the photography industry that now seems to be rapidly attracting a retinue of talented young men and women finding their feet in the once not-so-lucrative and unattractive sector.

One such beneficiary of this growth is Gilbert Asante, who has been making an impression on social media and the corporate world with his photography.

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Spotting a gap in the market for quality images when he began his career many years ago as a web designer, many of Asante’s photos have gone viral and been trend-setting in Ghana.

Some of the biggest celebrities and corporate brands have queued up to the doorsteps of Laceup Media, the bespoke production house offering services covering every sphere of advertising, from graphic design to billboards, videography and commercials. Asante moonlights as a creative director for the company as well as being his own photography brand.

“When I started, photography wasn’t a big thing as it is now. So, I would design a website with my team for a restaurant and the images [will be] terrible so it [would end] up making the website [look] very tacky. So that is what pushed me to investing in a camera. I just needed some decent photos.

“At that time, there were no top photographers. So, I said ‘why don’t I take a camera and take a picture and add this to the website’. So, after that, things became curious in terms of ‘how do I make these pictures look like what I see in international publications’,” says Asante.

His inspiration to delve deeper into the world of conceptual photography came about after a brief visit to the art centers of Japan. When he returned to Ghana, Asante knew he had found his calling. A self-taught photographer, he is now a name in the industry for his glamorous fashion shoots and out-of-the-box creative direction.

But his success has been no walk in the park.

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Photos supplied

BY PEACE HYDE

It becomes very difficult for a startup because unlike developed countries, where you get funding and co-funding, in Ghana, that did not exist and the systems are not right to enable you to set up.

– Gilbert Asante

“The biggest issue I have is not based on photography but based on setting up a business in Ghana generally and that really cuts across all the sectors. It becomes very difficult for a startup because unlike developed countries, where you get funding and co-funding, in Ghana, that did not exist and the systems are not right to enable you to set up,” says Asante.

While he was busy contending with these institutional issues, elsewhere, Elorm Ayayee was pursuing a career as a multilingual translator.

Fluent in French and Spanish, today, the founder of Elorm Ayayee Portraiture, a legacy portrait photography business in Ghana, was desperately searching for a career where she could make the most impact in the lives of people.

“I was at a point in my career that I wasn’t making a contribution and I had worked myself into a system and at the core I was against that. I don’t like being in a box or a cog in the wheel,” recalls Ayayee.

Being a creative at heart, Ayayee went into publishing and amongst many other things, worked as a ghost writer for clients.

“Photography was never on the horizon and never something I had considered... I came back to Ghana and was working with a company that did medical and surgical systems and I got married and had kids and then I realized that I had to make the call and I couldn’t have it all. I had to make the decision between my career and who I wanted to be as a family woman.”

She made the tough decision to quit her career.

“At that point, I had not been idle or jobless for over 20 years. I was always on the go and handling multiple things. I suddenly found myself with nothing to do. So, I took a trip to see my mum. One day, she had a program she had to go to and needed a photo of herself. It was the weekend and no one could do it and so she gave me my dad’s camera and I took a photo of her and until today, she says it is one of the best photos of her life.”

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FORBES AFRICA

FORBES LIFE | GHANA PHOTOGRAPHERS

I only took images of women above 50. And that kept me busy because I was offering a service that at the time didn’t really exist.

– Elorm Ayayee

And just like that, Ayayee got hooked to photography. The Elorm Ayayee brand has been able to emerge as one of the top photography outlets in Ghana. Her popularity grew with time due to her ability to take captivating images of women, especially older women.

“I immediately hooked on to what I thought my personal contribution would be. And that was birthed [by] seeing how my mother’s photo of herself impacted her and the other people and I said ‘this is my motivating factor’; seeing the way a woman sees herself when she looks at a photograph was amazing.”

Both Ayayee and Asante are living proof of how lucrative the photography industry can be.

But there is still a long way to go for upcoming talent.

“A lot of people don’t see the business aspect of photography. There is so much big business from it and a lot of people don’t understand that and that is why they see photography as some job that is not going to give you so much security,” says Asante.

For Ayayee, she knew the key to winning was to zone in on a specific demographic.

“I was very clear about what I wanted to do. My niche was established when I started. I started out photographing women and I only took images of women above 50. And that kept me busy because I was offering a service that at the time didn’t really exist. I was very resolute about what type of images I wanted and my target audience,” says Ayayee.

For Asante, on the other hand, the lack of any institutional investment meant he had to find other means to launch his business.

“Laceup was started with about $4,000 which was money my partner and I put in at that time to purchase a few things. This was money I had saved

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from my previous work as a web designer. And my partner fielded the other half of it. It wasn’t that much in the beginning and we decided to build on that and make a lot of sacrifices in terms of the income coming in and how we could put it back in the business and make the company bigger. That is what helped us grow to the level we are now,” says Asante.

Both Ayayee and Asante charge anywhere from $1,000 upwards depending on the packages they offer.

“I didn’t start out to be priced affordably because I was a mother of three and I had a limited amount of time. I felt like I had a very unparalled skill-set which I translated into the cost I wished to receive for my work,” says Ayayee.

The biggest hurdle in the photography business, according to Asante, is access to quality equipment.

“All the equipment we use is imported. Every single one of it; even the backdrop paper we use for photography and that is difficult. We don’t even have servicing companies here so if cameras or equipment break down, you have to send it back to the UK and that was one of the biggest challenges we had in the beginning.”

These are just some of the early-stage lessons they are able to impart younger aspirants in the country.

Zion Market Research estimated the global demand for digital photography at around $77.6 billion in 2015, projected to reach $110.8 billion by this year, and with so many young starryeyed hopefuls still looking to make ends meet in Ghana, at least they have emerging role models who have looked through a more creative lens and proven that clicks can convert to cash.

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FORBES AFRICA

CORPORATE SPEAK

ON THE BALL

Female CEOs in African football are rare, but Goabaone Taylor is hoping to bring her almost two decades-worth of experience from the corporate world to revitalize the sport in Botswana.

BY NICK SAID

T

Photo supplied

HE BOTSWANA FOOTBALL ASSOCIATION (BFA) recently took the historic step of appointing Goabaone Taylor as Chief Executive Officer of the organization, the first woman to hold the position in what is a critical time for the governing body of the sport in the country.

Female CEOs in African football are rare, but there is growing evidence that times are changing and that business experience and competence trump gender for decision-makers in the sport.

South Africa’s Lamontville Golden Arrows have for decades been led by owner/chairperson Mato Madlala, while Tanzania’s leading side Simba SC recently appointed Barbara Gonzalez as CEO at the start of the 2020-21 season.

Taylor’s move to BFA comes at a difficult time for the organization as they battle the financial fall-out from Covid-19 on the country, which has seen no domestic football since March 2020.

Added to that, they have received bad publicity of late, after the country was disqualified from the regional COSAFA Men’s Under-17 Championship for fielding over-age players.

It has all led to an erosion of public confidence that Taylor says needs to be restored under her leadership, a process she has already started as she brings her almost two decades-worth of experience from the corporate world.

“I began in telecommunications (at the Botswana Telecommunications Corporation), on the wholesale part of the company,” Taylor tells FORBES AFRICA. “I ended up being roaming manager when the operator opened up a mobile section of the business.

“Over time, I moved into broadcasting, where I worked for Econet Media, who were trying to set up a pay TV and free-to-air channel in Botswana. I was the country manager there. Unfortunately that business was wound down.

“When I looked at the BFA, the opportunity was that to some extent, it is an association rather than a corporate entity, but their needs

South Africa’s Lamontville Golden Arrows have for decades been led by owner/ chairperson Mato Madlala, while Tanzania’s leading side Simba SC recently appointed Barbara Gonzalez as CEO at the start of the 2020-21 season.

FORBESAFRICA.COM

are more or less the same.

“Botswana football is looking to commercialize and apply best practices in operating the association. I want to support the BFA in being an organization of excellence.”

The response to Taylor’s appointment has been generally favorable in Botswana but she admits that there may inevitably be some opposition in what is still a maledominated sector.

“Traditionally we look at football as a sport for men, but you can see that a lot has been done to bring on board women in terms of promoting the game for them,” she says.

“I am hoping that people will now look at it differently, and that we can have women playing a role in the promotion and development of football.”

Taylor was appointed in early April, so is still developing a strategic plan for the long-term future of BFA, but says some issues were immediately clear – a loss in trust from stakeholders and low morale of staff.

“I am still engaging with all the stakeholders in terms of trying to identify the issues that need work and the opportunities for growth,” she says.

“The focus for me firstly is the people management aspect, because for us to execute any strategy, the staff will have to be involved. We need their buy-in and their desire to want to take on the challenges we have.

“We have started some counseling, or group therapy, for the staff as we are going through change as an organization. That is to prepare them for the changes that we will need to put in place.”

Taylor is hoping her ‘new broom’ that will sweep through the organization restores its public image and puts football back in the local media for the right reasons.

“We need to rebuild the reputation of the association, so that in the medium-term we can drive revenue. We need to restore the trust and motivation of the team.”

Goabaone Taylor

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Fully On Board

South African professional surfer Jordy Smith is gearing up for Olympic gold and also making waves in the business world.

BY NICK SAID

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S

OUTH AFRICAN JORDY SMITH has an eye on a gold medal in the inaugural surfing event at the Olympic Games in Tokyo later this year (if the event happens), but he has also been riding a wave of a different kind having extensively branched out into the business world.

Smith was the first male surfer in the world to qualify for the Olympics and will be among the leading contenders at Tsurigasaki Beach, which is around 100km from the Olympic Stadium in Tokyo.

“When I was a kid, I never actually thought

I would get to a point in my career where I would be a part of it. I just didn’t see surfing being a part of the Olympic Games at that point,” Smith tells FORBES AFRICA. “So it was never a goal, never something I dreamed about. But when they announced that surfing would be at the Olympics for the first time, I couldn’t have been more excited.

Especially when I realized that as the only South African on the [World Surfing] tour, I would have a real shot at going.

“From that moment, it all became about, ‘how am I going to qualify, how will I make sure I am

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FORBES AFRICA

SPORT I SURFING

Photos supplied by Red Bull Content Pool

Last year was difficult, we were just trying to navigate through as best we could. But I just took it as a positive in terms of it giving me more time to prepare for the Olympics.

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there?’ This is something that not many people get to do.”

The 33-year-old, like all athletes hoping to go to the Games, was disappointed when the Olympics were postponed from 2020 to this year due to the Covid-19 pandemic, but says he has turned that in his favor.

“Last year was difficult, we were just trying to navigate through as best we could. But I just took it as a positive in terms of it giving me more time to prepare for the Olympics,” he says.

“But things are looking up. You just have to wake up every day and not look too far ahead. Just try and work out what can I do today to make myself better.

“In South Africa, we had it pretty hard, pretty tough, especially on the sporting front. We weren’t able to surf until Level 2 (lockdown). I speak to (Springbok rugby captain) Siya Kolisi a lot and it was the same for him, very frustrating.

“There is only so much running or cycling that I can do on the road to benefit my surfing, you really want to spend hours in the water.

“I was lucky that I have some friends up the (Western Cape) West Coast who own private property on the beach, so I was able to go train during those times. Stay there and self-isolate at the same time.

“We just had to bob and weave, and try to figure out the best way to continue doing what we had to do.”

Smith’s father, Graham, has been making

surfboards for over 50 years and they are now in partnership with a burgeoning business, one of many that the Olympic hopeful is involved in, dispelling the myth that surfers are lowly beach bums thinking only about the next wave.

“Early in my career I was offered really big financial endorsements to ride for other surfboard companies,” he says. “My dad, coming from very humble beginnings and not having a lot, he wanted what was best for me to be able to go and make as much money as I could.

“I think it is now our time to take over. I really feel like I get a lot out of my equipment and this type of relationship is not something that a lot of competitors have.”

Smith is also involved in a non-alcoholic beer company, luggage supplier, Muzik headphones, bars and nightclubs, water purification and housing developments, among many other interests.

“But the one I am most proud of is SMTH Shapes, the surfboard company I started with my dad. It has been amazing, we are shipping to the United States and Europe, but at the same time keeping it homemade in South Africa. We feel passionate about that and it means we can have great quality control.

“It all keeps me busy and I think that is why surfing is so intriguing to me, because it is always something new. Every single wave is different. Every time I look at it, I see something new and think, ‘oh wow, that is really cool’. And then I can’t wait for the next one.”

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FORBES AFRICA

OPINION • ENTREPRENEURSHIP

‘Where Not Given A Seat At The Table, Women Have Always Brought A Folding Chair Just To Be Heard’

BY IBADA AHMED

The writer is a venture capitalist, philanthropist and Director at Iron Capital.

D

ESPITE THE Covid-19 pandemic, there has never been a more exciting time to be an entrepreneur in Africa, the planet’s youngest continent and one must believe it has its best years ahead. However, this depends on much more.

African entrepreneurs have always faced more red tape and “come back tomorrow” groups than their counterparts elsewhere. A majority of people in Africa and across the world depend on Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) for survival, GDP contribution, profitability, sustainability and poverty reduction. This segment of entrepreneurs have predominantly driven integral development in economies by creating the majority of jobs.

Therefore, they must be at the nucleus of any post-pandemic recovery efforts.

Since the pandemic began, businesses have either been forced to shut down or are operating at threatened marginal capacity, with the full impact of the pandemic yet to run its course. MSMEs are facing liquidity crisis while managing

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both personal and business expenses that include the pressure to service existing loans. The crisis is catastrophic and showcases economic natural selection as it plays out in the modern world.

For centuries, agriculture has been the world’s darling of economic growth and a leading catalyst in the global fight to end extreme poverty. The sector today accounts for close to 4% of the global GDP and continues to play a significant role in the growth of developing economies, while remaining the largest employer in the world. The pandemic is threatening food security and has forced countries to shed off years of development progress with food prices rising. It’s a fact that more than a quarter of the world’s population live under the poverty line and with 75% relying on farming for their livelihood, one must acknowledge the dangers of such an affliction; no one is safe from the ripple effects.

With a new pandemic in play, women are perhaps the biggest losers in the equation, having lost their traditional marketing networks for agriculture. Prior to the pandemic, these businesses run by women were already grappling with challenges of gender inequality, inadequate support systems stemming from cultural barriers, unfavorable business conditions, challenges of family-work balance and it has not gotten easy for them. Where they were not given a seat at the table, women have always brought a folding chair just to be heard. Who is paying attention to them now?

MSME growth must be regarded as a national asset. No government has been able to create jobs for its population directly or entirely and they would never have the capacity to do so.

While we await fast and equitable distribution of vaccines, global poverty continues to rise. What’s crucial is careful evaluation of measures that can halt further deterioration of the reality. How can developing nations protect their key industries, everyone asks. The answer lies in exploiting existing opportunities not discussed frequently in the

corridors of social chatter. The continent’s MSMEs must capitalize on the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) whose key agenda is free movement of goods and services, reduced levies. increased investment, skilled labor border transfer, and free movement of people across the 54 countries on the continent.

Entrepreneurs, and especially those in the agricultural space, have a chance to revamp mechanized farming, create value, increase output and sales while creating jobs without fearing the prospects of global competition. Intra-trade in the agricultural sector alone would guarantee that households in the lower income capitalize on reduced prices of goods from other countries, improving their standards of living.

The elephant in the room has been the dependence on raw material export and raw undervalued produce cost that has plunged most African nations into poverty. With AfCFTA, producers would no longer need to export raw materials globally but have a new advantage to manufacture and process end products for the continent. With a unified economic front, existing determinants of global commodity prices will reshape naturally as the continent reevaluates its traditional methods of trade. This move would not only improve inter-nation cooperation but provide capital from financial houses, both continental and global, that would boost industries. The greater benefit of integration far outweighs the fear of losing trade control individually. Governments must ensure the smooth and swift integration of AfCFTA, if they are to cushion their nations from the economic devastation of the pandemic.

Developing nations do not need excuses.

We need, demand and deserve a strategic postpandemic stimulus plan, transparent leadership, policies that cushion against the economic downturn and the creation of a free market environment for private entrepreneurs to flourish.

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THE ART OF THE EXPERIENCE

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OPINION • TECH

Why Science Is Essential, Especially Now, For The Development Of Nations

BY TSHILIDZI MARWALA

The writer is the ViceChancellor and Principal of the University of Johannesburg, and author of the book: Rational Machines and Artificial Intelligence.

O

NE OF THE MOST important aspects of development is industrialization.

For industrialization to happen, it is important for us to understand the principles of scientific advancements.

Scientific advancements have been instrumental in the advancement of human society.

When they change the way we view the world, then these advancements are considered revolutions. For more than 200 years, the accepted model of the universe was that the Earth was the center of the universe.

Nicolaus Copernicus, a Polish scientist, proposed an alternative model where the sun was the center of the universe. After Copernicus proposed this model, it ushered in the Scientific Revolution which led to England becoming the first industrialized country in the world.

The book that helps explain how this happened is The Structure of Scientific Revolutions

by Thomas Kuhn. This book introduced into our lexicon a now common phrase, the ‘paradigm shift’. It identifies the

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structure of scientific revolutions and by extension, technological revolutions.

The mechanism of the scientific revolution, according to Kuhn, involves the following five steps. In the first phase, there are multiple theories, and there is no consensus on which model is the correct one. The second phase involves normal science where puzzles are solved. In the third phase, there is a crisis because puzzles have been solved, but there are still contradictions. In the fourth phase, a new paradigm is proposed to resolve the contradictions. In the fifth phase, new normal science occurs until the next paradigm is identified.

This framework can also be extended to technological revolution. Thus, in the first phase, there are multiple technological solutions, and there is no consensus on which one is the appropriate one.

The second phase involves slowly improving the developed technology and solving the nagging issues. In the third phase, there is a crisis leading to a new technological paradigm and a new technological revolution.

In the scientific revolution, Copernicus shook scientific thinking and ushered the scientific revolution of Isaac Newton and industrialization.

This led to another revolutionary idea of Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity.

British scientist James Clerk Maxwell observed the experiments performed by another British scientist, Michael Faraday, in which he observed that if you move an object that conducts electricity (e.g., copper) that is located next to a magnet, then electricity is generated. This is called electromagnetism.

This is how we generate the bulk of our electricity today. If the object is moved using waterfall energy, then this is hydropower generation.

This revolution led to the second industrial revolution and the massification of production through the assembly. Einstein used the electromagnetic concept to develop the theory of

relativity. Max Planck introduced the quantum revolution that ushered quantum computing.

The significant successes that we see today in the Artificial Intelligence (AI) realm are the results of over 70 years of piecing together puzzles. The perceptron, which is the basic unit of the most successful AI technology, deep learning, was discovered in the 1950s. In the 1970s, it disappeared from use because it was challenging to train.

In the 1980s, Geoffrey Hinton and his coworkers created the backpropagation algorithm that uses calculus to train intelligent machines.

In the 1990s, when I was a Cambridge University Ph.D. student researching the use of the perceptron in engineering, the perceptron’s difficulties were availability of data and computational power.

The developments of the internet and the developments due to Moore’s Law (the theory that computational capability doubles every two years) ushered in deep learning and success.

What are the leadership lessons we can draw from the book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions?

The first lesson is that a scientific outlook is essential for industrialization and the development of nations. The scientific outlook is not an event and involves long-term planning. So as our leaders deliberate in parliament, both short- and longterm perspectives must feature prominently in their consciousness. The second lesson is that we should never doubt science and that it is a basis for development.

We can question its conclusions based on the underlying assumptions, but we should not question it as a framework for development.

As we witnessed during the Covid-19 pandemic in recent months, countries that questioned science lost people, and their economies were severely impacted. Countries with a limited number of scientists in their leadership core (the US) suffered more than countries with more scientists in their leadership (China). Thus, as history certainly teaches us, we must create a culture of leadership that is predicated on science.

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FORBES AFRICA

PARTING SHOT

The Lone Soldier On A Mission Far Away Ruth Wasserman Lande made history this year – albeit briefly – after becoming the second-ever, and only female, South African to be elected to Israel’s top legislative.

W

HEN YOU SIT DOWN FOR COFFEE WITH Ruth Wasserman Lande, her warm brown eyes lock onto yours and before we even start the interview, she’s interested in learning more about me. It’s heart-warming and not every day a diplomat asks the questions she does and is so genuinely interested in the answers.

But then again Lande is not your everyday politician. She made history this year after becoming the second-ever, and only female, South African to be elected to Israel’s top legislative. The last time a South African served in the Israeli parliament (Knesset) was in the 1960s. Lande went on to narrowly lose her seat during elections held at the end of March. Israeli politics are currently in disarray and because no party has been able to form a majority coalition, there’s likely to be another parliamentary election later this year.

She has a good chance of being re-elected.

Born in Israel, Lande was nine when her family moved halfway across the world to Cape Town in South Africa. After growing up in a poor Israeli neighborhood where children from all backgrounds – Morocco, Georgia, Russia, Lithuania – played together, she found the “huge houses with huge fences and swimming pools” of South Africa startling. It was 1985 – five years before Nelson Mandela would be released from prison and apartheid begin to be dismantled.

“I saw people locking their fridges and locking their houses.

It was shocking for me because in Israel everything was open.

Everything was sort of simple there. So the Moroccans were a little more black and the Russians were a little more light and everybody was all sorts of colors. We just didn’t care. We didn’t see it. So it impacted me in a very big way as a child that the color a person was could mean he’d be better off economically than another.”

That impact followed her into adulthood. “I’m very involved in

96 | FORBES AFRICA JUNE | JULY 2021

working with minority groups in Israel, with the less privileged, not only Arabs, but also Jews of lower socio-economic income, people with disabilities, people who are on the autistic spectrum. I think I have a kind of affinity to those who have a more difficult starting point.”

She believes the eight years she spent in South Africa – “a lifetime at that age” - increased her sense of calling to be active in society. She attributes her excellent English to her South African schooling and also her ability to feel comfortable in very different situations, again useful qualities for women in leadership.

Returning to Israel at the age of 17 to join the Israel Defense Forces as a “lone soldier” – she had no immediate family in Israel – she waitressed on weekends to make ends meet. She served in the intelligence division and rose to captain.

Later, she joined the Foreign Ministry, volunteering to work in Egypt where she became the deputy Israeli ambassador, a post she held for three years. She studied Arabic for eight hours a day and is today fluent. “I think that Israel is a magnificent nucleus for countries in Africa because there’s such a pluralism of societies, communities and cultures in Israel that, despite the difficulties and imperfections, everybody can find their place here. Also, the knowledge and expertise that is being exported from Israel in the fields of water, technology and farming to many countries in Africa is something that I am very proud of. It’s important to help, to give, to contribute.”

Lande has two masters’ degrees, one from Harvard University, and has also worked as an advisor to former Israeli President Shimon Peres.

“I really believe that what you give, the universe gives back. It doesn’t have to be financial but it has a lot to do with energy. As a member of Knesset, I feel I can be heard more. I care about this country and I want to make the society in it more viable, more equal, better, and maybe that sounds very presumptuous, but I try in my own way.”

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BY PAULA SLIER

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