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APRIL/MAY 2017 | ISSUE <strong>13</strong> | www.inbusiness.co.bw<br />
APRIL/MAY 2017 | ISSUE <strong>13</strong> Inspiring the Entreprenuer Botswana InBusiness Magazine<br />
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www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
B SE<br />
STOCK<br />
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EXCHANGE<br />
At Botswana Stock Exchange, our mission is to<br />
“To drive sustainable economic growth by<br />
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accessing investment opportunities.”<br />
Our Vision<br />
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delivering innovative products and services.”<br />
Our Core Values<br />
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Botswana Stock Exchange • @TheOfficialBSE • Botswana Stock Exchange<br />
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www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 3
CONTENTS<br />
IN THIS ISSUE<br />
05 | EDITORIAL COMMENT<br />
• Trump is singularly outrageous<br />
16<br />
06 | NEWS<br />
• Towards An Inclusive Approach To Climate Change<br />
• Kenewendo Listed Among Most Influential People of African Descent (MIPAD)<br />
- 2017 Global List<br />
• ‘EmPowered’ Motswana just Misses Prestigious African Award<br />
• The Woman of the Moment: Rose Kaggwa<br />
10 | INTERNATIONAL NEWS<br />
• Zimbabwe Schools Accept Goats for Tuition Fees<br />
• Djibouti Opens Most Advanced Port In Africa<br />
14 | THE GLOBAL COLUMN<br />
• ‘Botswana and Kenya are in a Good Place’<br />
16 | COVER STORY<br />
• THEBE MODIKWA: It’s Teamwork All The Way<br />
• racheril Matthew<br />
20 | EXECUTIVE PROFILES<br />
• Labour ‘Suffragette’ Calls for Equal Pay<br />
24 | IN CAREER<br />
• Stanbic Stalwarts Rewarded<br />
16 20<br />
26 | ENGAGE WOMEN<br />
• Coco Chanel Features Big in WIBA Programme<br />
28 | YOUTH IN BUSINESS<br />
• Rosewell Chauffeurs: When Etiquette is of the Essence<br />
30 | ENTREPRISE<br />
• Of Sacred Cows and Holy Men: the Story of PK Leathergoods<br />
32 | TOURISM<br />
• Room50Two: an Astral Experience on Terra Firma<br />
• Stop or Gently Pass -This is the World Tourism Destination No. 1<br />
• SKL: From Germany with Tourists<br />
38 32<br />
38 | LIFESTYLE<br />
• FOOD<br />
• SHOWBIZ<br />
• FASHION<br />
44 | MOTORING<br />
• The Audi RS6 Avant:<br />
46 | SPORTS<br />
• An Atlantic Mind Aided By A Pacific Outlook<br />
50 | COMMUNITY<br />
• MABU: She Takes Them from Callow to Confident to Broadway<br />
52 | EVENT<br />
• BTO Events IN PICTURES<br />
DISCLAIMER:Many contributing writers to inBusiness are experts from various fields serving and providing advice to our readers in their individual capacities.<br />
That advice is the expert’s own and he/she is solely responsible for the information and opinions that he/she expresses. These experts may have interests in particular<br />
products, services or business entities that may influence the advice that they give. However, inBusiness is not responsible for any loss or damage, including - but not<br />
limited to - claims for defamation, error, loss of data or interruption in its availability arising from use of such advice.<br />
4<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
APRIL/MAY 2017<br />
EDITORIAL<br />
EDITOR<br />
Douglas B. Tsiako<br />
NEWS EDITOR<br />
Tuduetso Tebape<br />
WRITERS<br />
Malebogo Ratladi<br />
Raymond Moremi<br />
Ononofile Lonkokile<br />
MARKETING & ADVERTISING<br />
Bone Letlole<br />
Loatile Leteane<br />
Disoso J. Pheto<br />
Mbakisano Tjiyapo<br />
DESIGN & LAYOUT<br />
Nkagisang T. Molefhe<br />
PHOTOGRAPHY<br />
Baagedi Setlhora<br />
CONTRIBUTORS<br />
Natasha Selato<br />
CONTACTS<br />
Plot 22148, Unit 12A, Gaborone West<br />
Industrial, P O Box AD9ACJ, Gaborone,<br />
T +267 3191 401 F +267 3191 400<br />
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Trump is singularly<br />
outrageous<br />
EDITORIAL<br />
Botswana is a signatory to the Paris Agreement, which is an agreement within<br />
the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change dealing with<br />
greenhouse gas emissions mitigation, adaptation and finance starting in the<br />
Year 2020. The language of the agreement was negotiated by representatives<br />
of 196 parties and adopted by consensus in Paris on 12 December 2015.<br />
Botswana being a signatory means parting ways with the United States whose<br />
president Donald Trump has turned his back on a matter that defines responsibility<br />
more than any other in the 21st Century, climate change. The only other countries<br />
that are at variance with the world in the most commanding global issue of our times<br />
are Syria and Nicaragua. Climate change deniers like Trump have parodied the facts<br />
by dismissing global warming as a hoax, but science is pointing out the reality.<br />
Global warming or climate change occurs when carbon dioxide (CO2) and other<br />
air pollutants and greenhouse gasses collect in the atmosphere and absorb sunlight<br />
and solar radiation that have bounced off the earth’s surface. Normally, this radiation<br />
would escape into space—but these pollutants, which can last for years to centuries<br />
in the atmosphere, trap the heat and cause the planet to get hotter. This is as the<br />
greenhouse effect that we at inBusiness wrote about in our February 2017 edition.<br />
Trump’s behaviour compels us to return to the subject.<br />
Global warming is a reality because the entire globe is progressively coming<br />
under the grip of extreme weather. For southern Africa, this means prolonged spells<br />
of drought that are rudely interrupted by outbursts of destructive winds, gales,<br />
hailstorms, thunderstorms and rainstorms. This calls for a constant eye on disaster<br />
management with reliable early warning systems, as well as preparedness and swift<br />
responses.<br />
But the ‘Apocalypse’ goes beyond the region because Botswana is a part of One<br />
World. Hence we make it our responsibility at inBusiness to drive the point home that<br />
no matter how different the peoples of Planet Earth may seem on the surface, we are<br />
one human race with a common destiny in disaster or redemption. Our daily conduct<br />
is what is determining which way the pendulum will swing.<br />
We may be reeling from a deluge last March the scale of which was unprecedented<br />
at least for as generation. However, for our country, nothing illustrates global<br />
warming better than the El Nino phenomenon that raises sea temperatures in the<br />
distant Pacific Ocean and withholds precipitation in the sky above us even when the<br />
vault of heaven is universally laden with a thick overcast.<br />
Hence do we consider it our duty at inBusiness to teach without preaching and lead<br />
without let a discourse on how cfos will have an increasingly deleterious effect on lives<br />
across species if we do not stop burning things haphazardly, especially fossil fuels, and<br />
disposing of things carelessly.<br />
It is precisely because we do not take heed of warnings from the Green Agenda that<br />
the state of the world is already quite deplorable, with 92% of the human population<br />
breathing polluted air, 300 million of which are children, while bottletops are being<br />
found inside the bodies of dead fish and birds as plastic bags strangle the bowels of<br />
beef cattle.<br />
But the Green Agenda would be meaningless if it did not address the marginalised<br />
constituencies of Women, Children and the Youth. We call attention to it here. An<br />
unspeakable crime was recently perpetrated at Gaborone Station when a horde of<br />
men attacked a young woman who was also stripped naked apparently as an object<br />
lesson for daring to step abroad in the most minimal brevity of dress.<br />
This type of behaviour is hard to understand because all cultures and religions<br />
teach that the primary responsibility of men and boys is to protect and defend women<br />
and children. The behaviour is difficult to explain even in terms of mass hysteria<br />
because the young woman cannot be said to have presented a threat to the men who<br />
hounded and tormented her.<br />
And it flies in the face of credulity that the young woman – who was admittedly<br />
scantily dressed – should have to be taught a lesson in modesty of dress by rendering<br />
her stark-naked. This type of behaviour, which is vicious in every sense, is a return to<br />
the 1980s when it was the order of the day at Gaborone Station. If smacks of snooty<br />
puritanism but is infact a form of barbarism that has no place in any society. Even<br />
so, at the risk of sounding like Trump, it has to be said that there was a link between<br />
the unacceptable behavior of those men and the brevity of the young woman’s dress.<br />
Therefore, without being sanctimonious, we appeal to our womenfolk not to give<br />
anyone any excuse to turn on them. Afterall, modesty is not travesty.<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 5
NEWS<br />
Kenewendo Listed Among Most<br />
Influential People of African<br />
Descent (MIPAD) - 2017 Global List<br />
Words: Raymond Moremi<br />
Botswana youngest Member of<br />
Parliament, economist Bogolo<br />
Kenewendo, is under a major<br />
spotlight after making the United<br />
Nations Top 100 list of Most<br />
Influential People of African Descent<br />
(MIPAD) for 2017.<br />
Established in recognition of the<br />
International Decade for People of African<br />
Descent as proclaimed by the United<br />
Nations’ General Assembly, MIPAD<br />
identifies 200 high achievers of African<br />
descent under the age of 40, 100 inside<br />
Africa and 100 in the African Diaspora.<br />
MIPAD’s list comprises important<br />
influencers and leaders from around the<br />
world and across four distinct categories:<br />
Politics & Governance, Business &<br />
Entrepreneurship, Media & Culture, and<br />
Religion & Humanitarian.<br />
The ever-ebullient Kenewendo is featured<br />
under the Politics & Governance category<br />
alongside 19 other movers and shakers,<br />
including the National Spokesperson for<br />
South Africa’s Economic Freedom Fighters<br />
Towards An Inclusive Approach To Climate Change<br />
Key pillars that were of main focus at the 2016 United Nations Climate Change Conference<br />
(UNCCC) in Marrakech, Morocco last November (7th and 8th) entailed an important<br />
transitional moment from negotiations to implementations.<br />
Words: Ononofile Lonkokile<br />
(EFF) Mbuyiseni Quintin Ndlozi and<br />
Equatorial Guinea’s Minister of Culture<br />
and Craft Promotion Guillermina-Mekuy<br />
Mba Obono.<br />
Kenewendo’s nomination does not<br />
come as a surprise, given her rich career<br />
catalogue. Over the years, the 30-year<br />
old internationally trained economist and<br />
policy analyst has successfully juggled<br />
several roles at a time. She is an. Her<br />
previous posts include a stint as a trade<br />
economist for the Ministry of Trade and<br />
Industry in Ghana as well as an economic<br />
consultant at Econsult in Botswana.<br />
She holds an MSc in International<br />
Economics from the University of Sussex<br />
in the UK. She completed her BA in<br />
Economics at the University of Botswana.<br />
She has successfully tackled studies in<br />
European Integration at Tor Vergata at<br />
the Jean Monnet international Summer<br />
School in Rome, Italy and studies in<br />
Economic Freedom Philosophy at the<br />
Foundation for Economic Education.<br />
Above these commendable feats,<br />
Bogolo Kenewendo<br />
Kenewendo is a trendsetter and a cultural<br />
pioneer. She has set the stage for the next<br />
wave of aspiring young female leaders.<br />
As a MIPAD 2017 nominee, she joins a<br />
long list of influential people recognised<br />
in other categories, among them Trevor<br />
Noah, Usain Bolt and Lewis Hamilton.<br />
The awards dinner in honour of the ‘MIPAD<br />
Class of 2017’ is slated for September 26,<br />
2017 in New York after the opening of the<br />
72nd Session of the UN General Assembly.<br />
Former US President Barack Obama and<br />
current UN Secretary General António<br />
Guterres are invited as keynote speakers.<br />
The Coordinator at Botswana<br />
Climate Change, Tracy Sonny, said<br />
this at a workshop to give feedback<br />
on the outcomes of the Marrakech<br />
conference in Gaborone recently.<br />
Sonny said it was agreed that all countries<br />
would play their part in accordance with<br />
their capabilities and contributions to global<br />
warming. It was also agreed that global<br />
warming must be limited to 1.5 degrees<br />
and that all parties must practically commit<br />
beyond their current level of emission target<br />
in their Nationally Determined Contributions<br />
(NDCs).<br />
Developed countries were urged to<br />
drastically cut domestic greenhouse gas (GHG)<br />
emissions beyond what is proposed in their<br />
NDCs. It was also agreed that the government<br />
6<br />
should place priority on development of a<br />
national climate change policy to pave way for<br />
implementation of Vision 2036.<br />
UNCCC Marrakech took place under<br />
the auspices of The Paris Agreement, an<br />
arrangement of 195 countries that adopted<br />
the first-ever universal legally binding global<br />
climate deal. Some part of the agreed deal was<br />
that there should be mitigation, which means<br />
reducing emissions, and adaptation, which<br />
means strengthening society’s ability to deal<br />
with the impact of climate change. “Botswana<br />
is also to expedite the process of ratifying the<br />
Paris Agreement,” said Sonny.<br />
Civil Society Organisations (CSOs), including<br />
the Botswana Climate Change Network, are to<br />
advocate for timeous ratification, acceptance<br />
and approval of the Multilateral Environment<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017<br />
Agreement to facilitate climate change issues<br />
being approached from bottom up vis-àvis<br />
the current top down approach used by<br />
governments. This should allow CSOs to<br />
play a meaningful role in the climate change<br />
dialogue process in Botswana. CSOs are also<br />
to underline climate change vulnerability<br />
not only by exposure to climate events, but<br />
by social or institutional assets within a<br />
determined society as well.<br />
CSOs and regional bodies like SADC<br />
should advocate for capacity building in the<br />
region by information sharing and ensure<br />
capacity building at the grassroots level. CSOs<br />
must be the voice of the voiceless and ensure<br />
inclusivity by closing the gap between research<br />
institutions and ordinary citizenry. They must<br />
also promote accountability and transparency.
‘EmPowered’ Motswana<br />
just misses prestigious<br />
African Award<br />
•Ntobedzi was nominated for innovative IT solutions to<br />
Botswana’s power deficiency<br />
Words: Raymond Moremi<br />
Uganda’s Rose Kaggwa<br />
(PhD) is this year’s Africa’s<br />
‘Outstanding Woman of the<br />
Year,’ beating Botswana’s<br />
Eunice Ntobedzi who had<br />
been shortlisted alongside seven others,<br />
including Kaggwa, for the African Utility<br />
Week Power Industry Awards for 2017,<br />
inBusiness has established.<br />
Kanggwa is the Director of Business<br />
and Scientific Services at Uganda’s Water<br />
and Sewerage Corporation. The award<br />
was conferred on her at the 4th Annual<br />
African Utility Week on May 17 in Cape<br />
Town, South Africa at an occasion that<br />
brought together 800 most distinguished<br />
power and water industry professionals.<br />
The awards represent a benchmark<br />
of excellence and recognise, reward and<br />
celebrate success in Africa’s power and<br />
water sectors. It is therefore significant<br />
of Ntobedzi that she was nominated<br />
alongside the best of the continent’s<br />
female powerhouses in energy ranging<br />
from Nigeria, Ethiopia and Uganda to<br />
Côte d’Ivoire and South Africa.<br />
With an overwhelming number of<br />
entries this year, a jury group reportedly<br />
had the extremely difficult task of<br />
whittling the great and good of the<br />
innovators down to the very best. In the<br />
end, after a rigorous adjudication process,<br />
they narrowed the numbers down to just<br />
eight finalists, with Ntobedzi cited as one<br />
of the strongest contenders for her startup<br />
company that is called EmPowered.<br />
Botswana’s trailblazer has been<br />
recognised for her innovative solution to<br />
shortage of electricity in her country. She<br />
devised a mobile-enabled community<br />
energy management platform that<br />
takes advantage of Africa long hours of<br />
sunlight. EmPowered uses renewable<br />
solar photovoltaic panels which convert<br />
the sun’s energy into electricity. It enables<br />
those living without electricity to purchase<br />
solar equipment and power via a Pay-As-<br />
You-Go mobile phone application.<br />
Ntobedzi is no stranger to being<br />
nominated for and winning awards. Her<br />
tireless drive and passion in addressing<br />
energy poverty and bringing the<br />
underserved market, the unbanked and<br />
the off-grid population robust, affordable<br />
solar energy solutions have seen her come<br />
under the spotlight.<br />
She was shortlisted by Global<br />
Innovation through Science and<br />
Technology (GIST Tech-I) as one of only<br />
76 candidates for the Global Innovation<br />
Award with a focus on energy poverty.<br />
She was also nominated for the 2016<br />
Momentum for Change Awards. The<br />
awards, spearheaded by the United<br />
Nations Climate Change Secretariat,<br />
recognised innovative projects that are<br />
already addressing and transforming<br />
climate change and wider economic,<br />
social and environmental challenges with<br />
solutions that achieve lasting results and<br />
inspire others to act.<br />
Ntobedzi has been staunch and<br />
innovative in her determination to<br />
make a difference in Botswana and<br />
her community-centred approach in<br />
achieving this has been described as aweinspiring.<br />
The Woman of the Moment: Rose Kaggwa<br />
“A woman is the greatest mutli-tasker,”<br />
said Dr. Rose Kaggwa, the winner of the<br />
Outstanding Woman of the Year: Power/<br />
Water 2017. She believes that a woman<br />
can shine given any opportunity.<br />
Dr. Kaggwa received the award at<br />
the fourth African Utility Week Power<br />
Industry Awards on Wednesday, May<br />
17, 2017 during the 17th annual African<br />
Utility Week in Cape Town, South Africa.<br />
These awards brought together 800<br />
of Africa’s most renowned power and<br />
water industry professionals. She has<br />
worked in various management levels<br />
within the National Water and Sewerage<br />
Corporation in Uganda, and is currently<br />
the Director for Business and Scientific<br />
Services. She is responsible for Capacity<br />
Development and Training, Research and<br />
Development, and External Services, the<br />
NWSC Consultancy arm. She has led the<br />
Consultancy unit for the past 10 years. Dr.<br />
Kaggwa has also been essential to many<br />
performance improvement approaches<br />
applied in NWSC at both the managerial<br />
and supervisory level.<br />
Dr. Kaggwa has 24 years of experience<br />
in the water sector and has interfaced<br />
with various players in the sector. She<br />
has spearheaded partnerships in several<br />
countries, including Bangladesh, Kenya,<br />
Tanzania, Ethiopia, Nigeria, Rwanda,<br />
South Sudan, Trinidad and Tobago,<br />
India, and Zambia. She is also the current<br />
Second President of the African Water<br />
Association Scientific and Technical<br />
Committee and the Vice President of the<br />
UNESCO-IHP Advisory Committee for<br />
Human Settlement, Water and Sanitation.<br />
Her passion is capacity development and<br />
raising the profile of women in the water<br />
and sanitation sector.<br />
This is the second award that Dr. Kaggwa<br />
received in the span of one year. The<br />
first being the 2016 IWA Women in<br />
Water Award during the International<br />
Water Association Congress in Brisbane,<br />
Australia.<br />
The Outstanding Woman of the Year<br />
award celebrates a woman in the power<br />
or water industries for their outstanding<br />
achievements, contribution or impact on<br />
the sector whether from utility, public or<br />
private company.<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 7
MIND OVER MATTER<br />
Become the CEO of Your Life<br />
You are the master being a leader in your organisation and community,<br />
yet you are struggling to truly acknowledge that you are<br />
the CEO of your own life. Maybe it is time to change the way you<br />
approach the other aspects of your life and to establish yourself<br />
as the CEO of your life, writes KOZIBA MALIBALA<br />
Being the head of any company,<br />
no matter how successful, can<br />
be demanding and emotionally<br />
taxing as the primary decisions<br />
and direction of where a company<br />
is going rest squarely on the CEO’s shoulders.<br />
Take successful companies like Apple, OWN<br />
or Berkshire Hathaway. At their helm, one<br />
person has manned the rudder, but all<br />
three of these CEOs started from nothing.<br />
All three had tumultuous times, but all<br />
three, due to their tenacity, clear vision and<br />
work ethic of doggedness, have been very<br />
successful.<br />
There is perhaps no other quality that can<br />
accelerate your career or create success in<br />
your life as quickly as accepting that you<br />
are a leader in everything that you do. And<br />
you become a leader by demonstrating<br />
the qualities of leadership whenever those<br />
qualities are required by the situation.<br />
You already know that you become what<br />
you think about most of the time. And what<br />
you think determines what you do. If you<br />
think the way leaders think, you will say and<br />
do the things that leaders say and do and<br />
make things possible.<br />
It is also true that you become what you do.<br />
Infact, you are what you do. Your actions are<br />
the only true measure of your character and<br />
your personality. When you act like a leader,<br />
you begin to think and feel like a leader as<br />
well. This is why leaders are made, not born.<br />
Everyone has within them the qualities of<br />
leadership. If you practise these qualities<br />
regularly and systematically, you soon<br />
realise that you are a leader in everything<br />
that you do.<br />
LEADER OF OWN COMPANY<br />
The basic rule for success in your life,<br />
your work and your career is that you to<br />
see yourself as the president of your own<br />
personal service corporation. See yourself<br />
as an independent contractor selling your<br />
services back to your company at an hourly<br />
rate.<br />
See your current employer as your best<br />
client. See yourself on the same level as any<br />
other person who owns his or her company.<br />
You are the CEO. You are in charge of the<br />
success in your life. You make the decisions<br />
and determine the direction of your own<br />
personal services firm.<br />
What do the top people do in each<br />
organization? What are the key<br />
responsibilities of managers and senior<br />
executives? Of all the things that you could<br />
do each day, what are the things that you do<br />
that are the most important? Managers and<br />
executives have been studied for many years.<br />
We now know exactly the qualities that most<br />
differentiate a leader from a non-leader.<br />
We also know those activities that leaders<br />
in business are responsible for. When<br />
you begin to practise these qualities and<br />
behaviours, you step on the accelerator of<br />
your own career and move quickly to the<br />
front in whatever you are doing.<br />
Much like predicting the stock market’s<br />
flows and ebbs, life too is unpredictable.<br />
But if you choose to incorporate these<br />
components into your life’s mission<br />
statement as CEO, you are more likely to<br />
soar with the eagles than to remain on the<br />
ground. These are the major things which I<br />
believe you should do in order to become the<br />
CEO of your life.<br />
1. LOOK BEYOND OTHERS’ APPROVAL<br />
A truly fulfilling life can only materialise if<br />
we choose the life we are living for ourselves.<br />
So rather than seek others’ approval, seek<br />
first your own approval and have the courage<br />
to follow through. Whether one chooses to<br />
have a child or not, to marry or not marry, or<br />
to pursue a particular career or not should<br />
only be because it is in alignment with their<br />
path, their talents and their passions instead<br />
of simply following the crowd. If your path<br />
isn’t the one society is used to seeing, you<br />
may have to muster up your gumption, but<br />
it could be difficult sometimes. But rest<br />
assured, if you know it to be the best path<br />
for you, the approval from others will be the<br />
furthest thing from your mind.<br />
2. CARE FOR YOUR TEMPLE REGULARLY<br />
In order to do your best, be productive and<br />
be able to evolve into the person you are<br />
confident you can become, you must care<br />
for your body - internally, externally and<br />
mentally - on a regular basis. Adhering to a<br />
regular workout routine, practising regular<br />
mind mastery techniques and attending<br />
to your beauty regimen is not an effort in<br />
vanity. It is an approach that will allow you<br />
to perform and feel your best so that you can<br />
forget about the state of your body, mind<br />
and physical appearance and simply go<br />
about your job.<br />
3. PURSUE YOUR PATH WITH<br />
DETERMINATION<br />
It has been my experience that very few<br />
things worth having, experiencing or being<br />
involved with happen within the snap of<br />
the fingers. Life often wants to assess how<br />
badly we desire something - be it a job or<br />
a new relationship. And while it may seem<br />
that life is shutting the door on our dreams,<br />
I’ve never found the door to be locked. Life<br />
merely wants to know if you indeed want it<br />
as much as you say you do in other words,<br />
continue to knock.<br />
Ultimately, you have to know what<br />
you want in order to pursue and attain<br />
it. And once you know what you want,<br />
pursue it without relenting. Showing such<br />
determination will eventually be rewarded.<br />
4. MASTER YOUR MIND<br />
The reality you create in your mind is often<br />
what will materialise in the world you live<br />
in. So what do you want to see in the near<br />
future? Have the strength and the tenacity<br />
to boot out the bad and usher in the good.<br />
“You have to kick people out of your head as<br />
forcefully as you’d kick someone out of your<br />
house if you didn’t want them to be there,”<br />
said Sophia Amoruso.<br />
I would like to conclude by saying<br />
sometimes life might seem to be without<br />
options for you. This happens when<br />
you experience a kind of paralysis and<br />
unconscious willingness to follow societal<br />
dictates rather than becoming the CEO of<br />
our own life. When you mindlessly follow<br />
the dots, you smother your innate gifts<br />
and miss opportunities to fulfil your true<br />
potential.<br />
Kindly take note of this: Winners don’t do<br />
different things, they do things differently!<br />
For comments, kindly email me at: koziba@<br />
kozibamalibala.com<br />
Online Profile:<br />
Website: www.kozibamalibala.com<br />
Facebook: @kozibacatherinemalibala<br />
LinkedIn: @kozibam<br />
8<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
SIDILEGA:<br />
Just What The Doctor Ordered<br />
Words: Natasha Selato<br />
People of Gaborone and<br />
surrounding areas are looking<br />
forward to next year when a<br />
new private hospital that is<br />
under construction at Block 7<br />
will begin to receive patients,<br />
easing congestion at existing health facilities in<br />
and around the capital, especially at Princess<br />
Marina Referral Hospital.<br />
The facility, which will be known as Sidilega<br />
Private Hospital, will be a multi-specialty<br />
facility with 103 beds. The project is a<br />
consortium of Tahir Investment Property and<br />
a group of doctors and other investors. It is<br />
envisaged that Sidilega will create jobs for 300<br />
people.<br />
Says Dr. Motsholathebe Phuthego, acting<br />
as the spokesman of the consortium: “The<br />
decision to build the facility in Block 7 was<br />
made after looking at the population density of<br />
the neighbourhood and huge scope for future<br />
expansion of the site.<br />
“The Western Bypass provides easy access<br />
for people coming from surrounding areas<br />
and villages within a radius of 80 kilometres.<br />
The Sir Seretse Khama International Airport is<br />
around 10 kilometres from the project.”<br />
According to Dr. Phuthego, the consortium<br />
that is building Sidilega Private Hospital<br />
is made up of people who have substantial<br />
experience working in government and<br />
private hospitals locally and internationally.<br />
The opening of the hospital is scheduled to be<br />
mid-2018.<br />
“When fully operational,<br />
the facility will employ<br />
around 300 people,” he says.<br />
“Our preference will be young<br />
Batswana as we strongly<br />
believe our country has the<br />
skill and manpower for a<br />
project of this magnitude.”<br />
At a recent groundbreaking ceremony,<br />
journalists heard that health services at the<br />
hospital would include urology, maxillofacial<br />
surgery, neurology, obstetrics, gynecology<br />
and pediatrics. In addition, highly specialised<br />
services that are not easily available in<br />
Botswana such as ophthalmology, surgical<br />
oncology, digestive and liver disease treatment,<br />
interventional radiology, pain management,<br />
laproscopic surgeries will also be on offer.<br />
A 24-hour burns unit, as well as a 24-hour<br />
pharmacy, both on site and online, will be<br />
available. A dedicated pediatric Emergency<br />
Room (ER), a first in Botswana, CT Scan and<br />
MRI services, as well as day care facilities are<br />
plans for the future soon after opening.<br />
“We at Sidilega Private Hospital have<br />
identified services that are currently not<br />
available in the country both at private and<br />
public facilities,” Dr Phuthego notes. “We are<br />
here to augment existing facilities to improve<br />
the health care of Batswana.”<br />
The project founders intend to incorporate<br />
unprecedented efficiency in the patient care<br />
delivery process through an IT support system<br />
that will address patients both during visits to<br />
the hospital and at home. The IT support will<br />
also facilitate access to chronic rehabilitation<br />
needs at home. These will include nursing<br />
services, wound care, physiotherapy, blood<br />
collection and pharmacy management.<br />
Dr. Phuthego says qualified youths<br />
are encouraged to apply as soon as the<br />
recruitment process begins. “We encourage<br />
all young Batswana with various health<br />
care qualifications to apply when our HR<br />
recruitment process begins. We do have a<br />
Facebook page and encourage all to Like and<br />
Follow the page for updates.”<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 9
INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS<br />
Zimbabwe Schools Accept Goats for<br />
Tuition Fees<br />
Parents in Zimbabwe who<br />
cannot afford school<br />
fees can offer livestock<br />
such as goats or sheep as<br />
payment, a government minister<br />
has said.<br />
The country's education<br />
minister Lazarus Dokora told the<br />
pro-government Sunday Mail<br />
newspaper that schools will have<br />
to show flexibility when it comes<br />
to demanding tuition fees from<br />
parents, and that they should<br />
accept not only livestock, but also<br />
services and skills. "If there is a<br />
builder in the community, he/she<br />
must be given that opportunity<br />
to work as a form of payment of<br />
tuition fees," the paper quoted<br />
him as saying.<br />
Some schools are already accepting livestock<br />
as payments, the Sunday Mail reported.<br />
A ministry official clarified Dr Dokora's<br />
comments: "Parents of the concerned children<br />
can pay the fees using livestock. That is mostly<br />
for rural areas, but parents in towns and cities<br />
can pay through other means; for instance,<br />
doing certain work for the school."<br />
It follows a move last week where Zimbabwe<br />
allowed people to use their livestock such<br />
as goats, cows and sheep to back bank loans.<br />
Under legislation introduced in parliament this<br />
week, borrowers would be allowed to register<br />
"movable" assets, including motor vehicles and<br />
machinery, as collateral, the BBC's<br />
World Business Report said.<br />
According to the Bulawayo24<br />
news portal, Zimbabwe's<br />
worsening cash crisis means that<br />
people frequently spend hours<br />
queueing at banks to withdraw<br />
cash. The government says<br />
the shortage is due to people<br />
taking hard currency out of the<br />
country, but critics say it is due<br />
to lack of investment and rising<br />
unemployment, Bulawayo24 says.<br />
Social media has met the goatsfor-fees<br />
idea with a mixture of<br />
scorn and gallows humour.<br />
Zimbabwean novelist Tsitsi<br />
Dangarembga tweeted "If we had<br />
been told in 1970 'We are fighting<br />
to introduce cattle and goats as<br />
currency. Please help & die for this' what<br />
would we have said?"; while another Twitter<br />
user - recognising the fact that not all farm<br />
animals are born equal - asked: "Can I get a job<br />
as a goat evaluator?"<br />
(BBC Monitoring)<br />
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10<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
Djibouti Opens Most Advanced Port In Africa<br />
Doraleh Multipurpose Port is set to Transform Shipping<br />
in the Horn of Africa<br />
ARTIST EXPRESSION OF DORALEH MULTIPURPOSE PORT. The State of Djibouti in East Africa has officially opened<br />
the Doraleh Multipurpose Port, adding capacity for 8.2 million tonnes of non-containerized goods.<br />
Djibouti has opened the<br />
country’s latest mega project<br />
– the Doraleh Multipurpose<br />
Port (DMP) on May 24. The<br />
official opening ceremony<br />
was held under the auspices<br />
of Djibouti’s President Ismail Omar Guelleh,<br />
together with Hailemariam Desalegn, the<br />
Prime Minister of Ethiopia.<br />
ULTRA-MODERN PORT FACILITIES<br />
The new 690 hectare facility is equipped<br />
with ultra-modern facilities that can<br />
accommodate 100,000 dwt vessels. The<br />
USD$590m project was started in 2015<br />
and jointly financed by Djibouti Ports and<br />
Free Zones Authority (DPFZA) and China<br />
Merchant Holding (CMHC). The state-of-theart<br />
port equipment was all manufactured by<br />
the Chinese firm ZPMC. Vessels have already<br />
begun using the facility.<br />
The port provides a world-class logistics<br />
platform for shipping. The new facilities<br />
will vastly improve the efficiency and ease<br />
of doing business in the Horn of Africa. The<br />
project cements Djibouti’s position as a critical<br />
junction on the “Maritime Silk Road”.<br />
At the opening ceremony, Aboubaker Omar<br />
Hadi, Chairman of DPFZA remarked: “With<br />
this new world-class infrastructure, Djibouti<br />
confirms its position as a major trading hub<br />
for the continent. We are proud to show<br />
the world our capacity to deliver major<br />
infrastructure projects – some of the most<br />
technologically advanced on this continent.”<br />
EMERGING AS A MULTI-MODAL<br />
TRADE HUB<br />
DMP is the latest in a series of mega<br />
projects in Djibouti. These projects include<br />
four new ports, a Liquefied Natural Gas<br />
facility, an oil terminal and two brand new<br />
airports. Together they will dramatically<br />
expand Djibouti’s ability to serve as a platform<br />
and trade hub for the region.<br />
The projects follow the completion of the<br />
Addis Ababa-Djibouti Railway, a new 752km<br />
track linking Ethiopia’s capital with the Port<br />
of Djibouti.<br />
Djibouti sits at the centre of world trade<br />
routes, connecting Asia, Africa and Europe.<br />
The port is a gateway to one of the fastest<br />
growing regions of the world with 30,000<br />
ships transiting the port each year. Goods<br />
from Asia represent 59%, with 21% coming<br />
from Europe and 16% from elsewhere in<br />
Africa.<br />
FACTS ABOUT DPFZA<br />
DPFZA is the government body overseeing<br />
ports in the country. The organisation also<br />
oversees the national free trade zones, serving<br />
as a liaison between companies working<br />
therein and other government agencies.<br />
DPFZA is the sole authority in charge of<br />
the administration and control of all the free<br />
zones and ports in Djibouti. The entity also<br />
plays an instrumental role as the sole interface<br />
between the free zone companies and any<br />
other governmental bodies and comes<br />
under the direct authority of the Djibouti<br />
Presidential Office.<br />
The DPFZA holds several mandates, among<br />
them:<br />
• Promotion of the Djibouti Ports & Free<br />
Zones as a commercial and logistic<br />
platform;<br />
• Establishment of a business-friendly<br />
environment with a business oriented<br />
legal framework<br />
• Regulation of the ports through its Board<br />
of Directors.<br />
• Creation of new Ports and Free Zones<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 11
World Pledges to Save ‘Mother Earth’…<br />
in the Aftermath of Trump’s snub on Climate Change<br />
By THOMAS ESCRITT and PHILIP<br />
BLEKISOP<br />
BERLIN: China and Europe have pledged<br />
to unite to save what German Chancellor<br />
Angela Merkel called "our Mother Earth",<br />
standing firmly against President Donald<br />
Trump's decision to take the United States<br />
out of the Paris climate change pact.<br />
Others, including India, signaled their<br />
commitment to the accord, but Russian<br />
President Vladimir Putin said that while the<br />
United States should have remained in the<br />
Donald Trump<br />
2015 deal, he would not judge Trump, and<br />
warned about the accord's impact on jobs<br />
and poverty.<br />
Tapping into the "America First" message<br />
he used on the election trail, Trump<br />
announced the withdrawal on June1,<br />
saying that participating would undermine<br />
the U.S. economy, wipe out U.S. jobs,<br />
weaken American national sovereignty<br />
and put the country at a permanent<br />
disadvantage to others.<br />
There was a mix of dismay and anger<br />
across the world.<br />
France said it would work with U.S. states<br />
and cities -- some of which, notably<br />
California, have broken with Trump's<br />
decision -- to keep up the fight against<br />
climate change. A number of business<br />
and industry figures criticized Trump's<br />
decision, while others focused on what it<br />
might mean to their trade.<br />
Germany's powerful car industry said<br />
Europe would need to reassess its<br />
environmental standards to remain<br />
competitive after the "regrettable" U.S.<br />
decision.<br />
The World Meteorological Organisation<br />
estimated that U.S. withdrawal from the<br />
emissions-cutting accord could add 0.3<br />
degrees Celsius to global temperatures<br />
by the end of the century in a worst-case<br />
scenario.<br />
Germany's Merkel, a pastor's daughter<br />
who is usually intensely private about her<br />
faith, said the accord was needed "to<br />
preserve our Creation"<br />
"To everyone for whom the future of our<br />
planet is important, I say let's continue<br />
going down this path so we're successful<br />
for our Mother Earth," she said to<br />
applause from lawmakers.<br />
In Paris, French President Emmanuel<br />
Macron turned Trump's "Make America<br />
Great Again" campaign slogan on its<br />
head, saying in a rare English-language<br />
statement that it was time to "make the<br />
planet great again".<br />
CHINA AND EUROPE TOGETHER<br />
A long-scheduled meeting on June 2<br />
between Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and<br />
top European Union officials in Brussels<br />
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12<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
was dominated by Trump's decision.<br />
The meeting was expected to end<br />
with a joint statement pledging full<br />
implementation of the Paris deal,<br />
committing China and the EU to cutting<br />
back on fossil fuels, developing more<br />
green technology and helping raise $100<br />
billion a year by 2020 to help poorer<br />
countries reduce their emissions.<br />
China, now the world's largest polluter, has<br />
emerged as Europe's unlikely partner in<br />
this and other areas - underlining Trump's<br />
isolation on many issues. "There is no<br />
reverse gear to energy transition. There is<br />
Angela Merkel<br />
no backsliding on the Paris Agreement,"<br />
European Commission President Jean-<br />
Claude Juncker said.<br />
China said it was a responsible country<br />
that had been working hard on tackling<br />
climate change.<br />
WARM WORDS<br />
The vast majority of scientists believe that<br />
global warming - bringing with it sharp<br />
changes in climate patterns - is mainly the<br />
result of human activities including power<br />
generation, transport, agriculture and<br />
industry.<br />
A small group of skeptics - some of whom<br />
are in the Trump White House - believe<br />
this is a hoax that could damage business.<br />
A number of figures from U.S. industry<br />
expressed their dismay at Trump's move.<br />
Jeff Immelt, chief executive officer of U.S.<br />
conglomerate General Electric, tweeted:<br />
"Climate change is real. Industry must now<br />
lead and not depend on government."<br />
Tesla Inc CEO Elon Musk and Walt Disney<br />
CEO Robert Iger said they would leave<br />
White House advisory councils after<br />
Trump's move.<br />
German industry associations also<br />
criticised Trump's decision, warning that it<br />
would harm the global economy and lead<br />
to market distortions.<br />
Germany's DIHK Chambers of Commerce<br />
and VDMA engineering industry group<br />
warned that U.S. companies could<br />
gain short-term advantages by Trump's<br />
decision.<br />
"Climate protection can be pushed<br />
forward in an effective and competitionfriendly<br />
way only by all states," said DIHK<br />
President Eric Schweitzer.<br />
Environmental groups were scathing.<br />
The U.S. Sierra Club, citing Trump's<br />
endorsement of what he regards as<br />
clean coal, tweeted: "Clean coal, you<br />
can find that next to the unicorns and<br />
leprechauns."<br />
(Writing by Jeremy Gaunt; Editing by<br />
Robin Pomeroy, both of Reuters)<br />
Trump Misunderstood MIT Climate Research<br />
BY EMILY FLITTER<br />
NEW YORK: Massachusetts Institute of<br />
Technology officials said U.S. President<br />
Donald Trump badly misunderstood their<br />
research when he cited it on June 1 to<br />
justify withdrawing the United States from<br />
the Paris Climate Agreement.<br />
Trump announced during a speech at<br />
the White House Rose Garden that he<br />
had decided to pull out of the landmark<br />
climate deal, in part because it would not<br />
reduce global temperatures fast enough<br />
to have a significant impact.<br />
"Even if the Paris Agreement were<br />
implemented in full, with total compliance<br />
from all nations, it is estimated it would<br />
only produce a two-tenths of one degree<br />
Celsius reduction in global temperature<br />
by the year 2100," Trump said.<br />
"Tiny, tiny amount."<br />
That claim was attributed to research<br />
conducted by MIT, according to White<br />
House documents seen by Reuters.<br />
The Cambridge, Massaschusetts-based<br />
research university published a study in<br />
April 2016 titled "How much of a difference<br />
will the Paris Agreement make?" showing<br />
that if countries abided by their pledges<br />
in the deal, global warming would slow<br />
by between 0.6 degree and 1.1 degrees<br />
Celsius by 2100.<br />
"We certainly do not support the<br />
withdrawal of the U.S. from the Paris<br />
agreement," said Erwan Monier, a lead<br />
researcher at the MIT Joint Programme on<br />
the Science and Policy of Global Change,<br />
and one of the study's authors.<br />
"If we don't do anything, we might shoot<br />
over 5 degrees or more and that would<br />
be catastrophic," said John Reilly, the codirector<br />
of the programme, adding that<br />
MIT's scientists had had no contact with<br />
the White House and were not offered a<br />
chance to explain their work.<br />
The Paris accord, reached by nearly 200<br />
countries in 2015, was meant to limit<br />
global warming to 2 degrees or less by<br />
2100, mainly through country pledges to<br />
cut carbon dioxide and other emissions<br />
from the burning of fossil fuels.<br />
Under the pact, the United States - the<br />
world's second biggest carbon emitter<br />
behind China - had committed to reduce<br />
its emissions by 26% to 28%from 2005<br />
levels by 2025.<br />
A senior administration official defended<br />
Trump's use of the findings. "It's not just<br />
MIT. I think there is a consensus, not only<br />
in the environmental community, but<br />
elsewhere that the Paris agreement in and<br />
of itself will have a negligible impact on<br />
climate," the official told reporters at a<br />
briefing.<br />
The dispute is the latest round of a<br />
years-long battle between scientists and<br />
politicians over how to interpret facts<br />
about the effects of burning fossil fuels on<br />
the global climate and translate them into<br />
policy.<br />
Trump has repeatedly cast doubt on the<br />
science of climate change and once called<br />
it a hoax perpetrated by China to weaken<br />
U.S. business.<br />
(Reporting By Emily Flitter in New<br />
York; Additional reporting by Valerie<br />
Volcovici in Washington; Editing by<br />
Jonathan Oatis, all of Reuters)<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 <strong>13</strong>
THE GLOBAL COLUMN<br />
ON THE<br />
Diplomatic<br />
FRONT<br />
With TUDUETSO TEBAPE<br />
‘Botswana and Kenya are in a<br />
good place’<br />
Botswana’s celebrated weatherman, the eponymous Radithupa Radithupa, is<br />
perhaps the most outstanding symbol of the diplomatic relations between Kenya<br />
and Botswana that go back to 1966. But so are the locomotive drivers who<br />
ferry tonnes of goods from the SA side of Ramatlabama to the Zimbabwe side of<br />
Ramokgwebana, as well as passengers on the famous BR Express<br />
So keen to discuss the bilateral<br />
relations between Botswana and<br />
Kenya was High Commissioner<br />
Jean W. Kimani that arranging for<br />
the interview with the East African<br />
country’s envoy took less than two days. When<br />
we met at her office at Plot 2615, Zebra Way,<br />
Extension 9, Gaborone, it became obvious why<br />
Ambassador Kimani was so eager to share<br />
the Botswana/Kenya story with inBusiness<br />
Magazine.<br />
Although one country is near the African<br />
continent’s southernmost cape and the other is<br />
in the vicinage of the Horn of Africa, the two<br />
share close ties that are centred on extending<br />
knowledge and skills, as well as fostering<br />
trade and investment. And there is much<br />
to be said about Kenya and Botswana which<br />
have had diplomatic relations since 1966,<br />
although Kenya only established its mission in<br />
Gaborone in 2000.<br />
Says Ambassador Kimani, who began her<br />
assignment to Botswana in 20<strong>13</strong>: “Kenya and<br />
Botswana have excellent bilateral relations. The<br />
relations are founded on the historic bonds of<br />
friendship between the founding fathers of the<br />
two nations and have been nurtured over the<br />
years by shared values and interests.”<br />
The ambassador notes that these relations<br />
are equally important to both countries and<br />
cites the state visit to Botswana of President<br />
Uhuru Kenyatta last year to underline this<br />
point. The incumbent president is the son<br />
of Jomo Kenyatta, the founding leader of<br />
Kenya whose friendship with Seretse Khama,<br />
Botswana’s founding president, developed<br />
High Commissioner OF Kenya to Botswana, Jean Kimani<br />
a special bond that made Kenya a virtual<br />
member of the Frontline States when the<br />
country fell outside the geography of the<br />
region that formed a bulwark against apartheid<br />
South Africa.<br />
Another of Seretse’s most abiding friends,<br />
Zambia’s Kenneth Kaunda, was instrumental<br />
14<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
in encouraging this amity, as he was in<br />
bringing Tanzania’s Julius Nyerere in an<br />
embrace that fortified resistance to apartheid,<br />
giving solace to Lesotho and Sawziland, the<br />
smaller Frontline States whose territories were<br />
surrounded by the polecat country.<br />
Kenya is the dominant economy in the<br />
East African Community (EAC), contributing<br />
more than 50% of the Gross Domestic Product<br />
(GDP) of the whole economic bloc. At 43<br />
million and growing at a rate of 2.7% per<br />
annum, the country’s population is massive by<br />
any standards and is certainly so by Botswana’s.<br />
Its strategic location is another key factor<br />
contributing to Kenya’s dominance in the EAC,<br />
it being the transport and communications<br />
hub of the region as well.<br />
In addition to a strong IT infrastructure,<br />
the East African giant is abundantly endowed<br />
with natural resources, as well as a vibrant<br />
agriculture and agro-processing industries.<br />
The national carrier, Kenya Airways, flies<br />
to 54 destinations. Ambassador Kimani<br />
elaborates: “Kenya’s strategic location and<br />
membership of regional economic blocs make<br />
the country the gateway to the huge EAC and<br />
COMESA (Common Market for Eastern and<br />
Southern Africa) regional markets, as well<br />
as a beneficiary of several preferential trade<br />
arrangements that include the Africa Growth<br />
and Opportunity Act (AGOA) and the EAC-<br />
EU Trade Agreement.”<br />
But long before Kenya became the dominant<br />
economy in East African, Botswana looked to<br />
the country as a key development partner in<br />
several respects. Kenyans trained Batswana<br />
locomotive drivers and meteorologists,<br />
reducing complete reliance for both services on<br />
minority-ruled Rhodesia and apartheid South<br />
Africa. “Kenya had a well-established Railways<br />
Training School and the Meteorological<br />
Training Institute that was established in<br />
1964,” Ambassador Kimani explains.<br />
“The current Institute<br />
for Metrological Training<br />
and Research/Regional<br />
Training Centre is<br />
regarded as a centre<br />
of excellence that<br />
specialises in training in<br />
meteorology and related<br />
geosciences. Hence<br />
Botswana continues to<br />
send its meteorologists<br />
to Kenya for training.”<br />
With regard to trade and investment,<br />
two business forums were held in 2014<br />
and 2016. In this context, the Minister of<br />
Investment, Trade and Industry, Vincent<br />
Seretse, has led a trade mission comprising<br />
entrepreneurs from various sectors to Kenya.<br />
“The highlight of the trade mission was the<br />
signing of a Memorandum of Understanding<br />
on trade, industry and investment,” says the<br />
Ambassador. “The mission was successful also<br />
because it provided an excellent platform for<br />
business players in both countries to explore<br />
possible areas for collaboration.<br />
“The signing of the MOU during the<br />
second forum between KNCCI and Business<br />
Botswana will go a long way in promoting and<br />
facilitating mutual trade and investment. The<br />
mission has received numerous enquiries on<br />
Kenyan products and investment opportunities<br />
and has been able to link the interested parties<br />
with the relevant organisations in Kenya.”<br />
One such investment opportunity surfaced<br />
last month when Davis & Shirtliff, a leading<br />
Kenyan manufacturer and supplier of water,<br />
borehole and solar power products came to<br />
Botswana to explore the possibility of setting<br />
up in the country.<br />
Ambassador Kimani speaks with the<br />
confidence of one assured of an all-embracing<br />
growth in the diplomatic relations between<br />
her country and Botswana. The seasoned<br />
diplomat that she is holds a Bachelor of Arts<br />
degree in Sociology and Government (Political<br />
Science), a Masters in Diplomacy and an MBA.<br />
Understandably, she describes herself as a<br />
career diplomat, saying the foreign service is<br />
where she has spent most of her working life.<br />
She is exudes an aura of character that is<br />
accentuated by a gentle voice that brings forth<br />
the mother in her. This is clearly the kind of<br />
woman that young girls want to emulate in<br />
future. But with her country gearing up for<br />
national elections that will be held later this<br />
year, Ambassador Kimani is aware that her<br />
assignment to Botswana as Head of Mission<br />
may be drawing to a close. Even so, she takes<br />
solace in the knowledge that her leadership at<br />
the Kenya High Commission to Botswana is<br />
leaving a positive imprint on the diplomatic<br />
ties between the two countries.<br />
“I have been here for the past four years,<br />
and it has been an exciting time,” she says. “I<br />
have seen relations between our two countries<br />
grow from strength to strength. We have been<br />
busy working on these relations from political,<br />
social and economic angles. I can say we have<br />
been moving the relations from every side.<br />
A lot has happened since that time. But even<br />
now, I still think more can be done. I’m excited.<br />
We are in a good place as far as our diplomatic<br />
relations are concerned.”<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 15
COVER STORY<br />
Picture: Baagedi Setlhora<br />
16<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
THEBE MODIKWA:<br />
It’s Teamwork All The Way<br />
Once he overcame the anxiety of stepping inside a bus load of 80 miners<br />
whom he was to supervise, most of them old enough to be his father, the<br />
young man was on the threshold to a future as bright as his country’s<br />
diamonds and as secure as a life insured, writes TUDUETSO TEBAPE<br />
When someone veers off<br />
a plan to read law in<br />
Botswana in preference<br />
for mining engineering<br />
in the UK, it must be for<br />
a cogent reason. That is<br />
what Thebe Modikwa, the<br />
Managing Director of newly<br />
established Old Mutual Life, did. He was persuaded<br />
by a felt need to tap into latent talent. That critical<br />
decision set him on a path of rapid progress in a<br />
mining career that would ultimately lead him to<br />
where he is today – the captain of a subsidiary of<br />
one of South Africa’s leading insurance companies<br />
at a critical time when it was setting up in Botswana.<br />
A part of the cogent reason was a Debswana ad<br />
about the influential mining company – one of<br />
the best in the world - recruiting the best Form<br />
Fivers to pursue degrees in various disciplines<br />
including mining engineering overseas. “Go tewa<br />
ko mafatsheng a’ tsididi,” Modikwa says, harking<br />
back to how the newspaper advert had the allure<br />
of countries of the colder climes in the Northern<br />
Hemisphere that still hold a fascination for young<br />
Batswana. A distinct draw card was the assurance<br />
of a secure job at a Debswana mine and all the perks<br />
that went with it upon completion of his studies.<br />
What more could a fellow want?<br />
2001 “Mining Engineering meant working hands<br />
on in jeans and boots, and that appealed to<br />
me,” Modikwa continues, still in memory lane.<br />
“Thankfully, my application was successful and<br />
I went off to study mining engineering at the<br />
University of Nottingham. When I finished, I went<br />
to work at Jwaneng Mine.”<br />
Working at Jwaneng Mine honed his supervisory<br />
skills. But more importantly, it helped him develop<br />
a fundamental philosophy about teamwork that<br />
he values and still taps into to-date. “I learned<br />
a lot because mining is about team effort. It<br />
doesn’t matter how smart you are, you can’t<br />
achieve anything without the team.”<br />
He returns to the value of the supervisory skills<br />
that Jwaneng gave him: “I remember my first<br />
day at work,” he begins. “I was in my early 20s.<br />
I walked into a bus load of about 80 men, most<br />
of who were old enough to be my father, and I<br />
was to supervise them. These men have been<br />
working for all these years and you come along<br />
with a degree to super-vise them!?,” he says,<br />
enunciating the word one syllable at a time.<br />
“Anyway, you learn soft skills and how to motivate<br />
people very quickly. The environment there was<br />
also a very high performance environment. I<br />
remember that when I was going through the<br />
ranks as a supervisor, productivity was measured<br />
by the hour because you could count the tonnes.<br />
It was a very good foundation for me. When I<br />
left mining, I was able to adapt way ahead of my<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 17
peers because Jwaneng had given me<br />
the awareness of how a productive<br />
business is run.”<br />
While most CEOs hardly accommodate<br />
media interviews, especially in<br />
Botswana where transparency<br />
remains an issue 50 years after the<br />
country’s much-vaunted democratic<br />
rule, this one is different. We are 50<br />
minutes into the interview and his<br />
attitude is increasingly more abiding.<br />
As a matter of fact, the conversation is<br />
flowing like water because Modikwa<br />
needs little prodding.<br />
It took another newspaper advert<br />
in 2006 for Modikwa to leave the<br />
world’s richest diamond mine. This<br />
time, Aon, the American insurance<br />
multinational, was looking for a risk<br />
consultant with mining and/or heavy<br />
industry experience in Gaborone.<br />
He was a single man then, and had<br />
been brought up in Jwaneng since<br />
1983. “The opportunity to work in the<br />
big city appealed to me,” he says.<br />
“So I applied to become an Aon Risk<br />
Management risk consultant to the<br />
mining industry.”<br />
With his mining experience, Modikwa<br />
did not struggle to gain the trust of<br />
mining clients across Botswana mainly<br />
because the people with whom<br />
he interacted were his colleagues<br />
by profession. There was thus little<br />
resistance when he gave incisive<br />
advice regarding how to avoid risk at<br />
their mines.<br />
Two years later, Modikwa decided<br />
to add another feather on his cap by<br />
embarking on an MBA programme<br />
at the University of Cape Town<br />
on through the prestigious Festus<br />
G. Mogae Scholarship. Upon<br />
completion a year later, he returned<br />
to Aon Botswana where he now<br />
worked as an insurance broker. This is<br />
a position he held until 2011 when he<br />
felt he needed a break from full time<br />
employment.<br />
During a five-month hiatus, Modikwa<br />
started a for profit website, iRela.<br />
co.bw. “iRela provides legitimate<br />
and safe voluntary community<br />
service opportunities through its<br />
website, www.iRela.co.bw, and<br />
social media. It is a support network<br />
for its beneficiaries and is powerfully<br />
transformational and fulfilling for the<br />
person giving the service”, reads the<br />
website’s page: “The sum: a better<br />
society for all.”<br />
Modikwa’s ‘sabbatical’ as a social<br />
entrepreneur was broken by a call<br />
from Debswana asking him to join<br />
the company that had given him his<br />
education and critical first job. This<br />
time he successfully interviewed<br />
for the Risk and Insurance Manager<br />
position on a two-year contract, an<br />
offer that he gladly accepted because<br />
it gave him a sense of returning to his<br />
magnetic north.<br />
He names one John Heldsinger, who<br />
was then Claims Manager at then<br />
Mutual & Federal, as the man who<br />
aided his entry into the Old Mutual<br />
family, having seen great potential<br />
in Modikwa in professional circles a<br />
few years before. Two years after his<br />
arrival, he was assigned to Lagos, the<br />
commercial capital of Africa’s most<br />
populous country, Nigeria. While the<br />
West African giant can be a difficult<br />
place to live in, the ‘village boy’ from<br />
Ratholo says he found it so “exciting”<br />
that when he was suddenly called<br />
upon to return home, he was initially<br />
reluctant. He was hardly a year into a<br />
contract that was to end this year.<br />
“I wasn’t too keen on returning<br />
because I had blended well and was<br />
enjoying myself,” he says. “I however<br />
eventually saw it as an opportunity<br />
to play a major role in building<br />
something new. Moreover, my history<br />
had been in short-term insurance and<br />
the opportunity to switch to longterm<br />
or life insurance was a unique<br />
one that I felt I had to grasp.”<br />
Old Mutual Life is one of eight other<br />
life insurance companies in Botswana,<br />
which means Modikwa and his<br />
pioneering team have to tackle<br />
considerable competition. Yet he was<br />
not deterred. “There is still room for<br />
more,” he says, revealing the intrepid<br />
in him.<br />
“When you ask<br />
Batswana about life<br />
insurance, they will most<br />
likely mention one or two<br />
insurers. But because<br />
it’s about competition<br />
and the best for clients,<br />
we don’t believe only<br />
two companies can do<br />
everything.”<br />
Modikwa is indeed “building<br />
something new” and growing with it<br />
because he is only 38 years old and<br />
the MD of a company that was only<br />
officially launched in March this year,<br />
although operations began last year.<br />
And here the interview turns a corner<br />
to take a route of inclusivity, with the<br />
first-person pronoun “I” assuming its<br />
plural form “we.” It is a return to the<br />
team player at the beginning of the<br />
interview. Modikwa is a busy man, yet<br />
the boy from rural Ratholo enjoys a<br />
full family life because the warmth of<br />
hearth and home is the source of his<br />
ultimate joy and the mutual happiness<br />
of both his wife and himself.<br />
He and Tapiwa are looking forward<br />
to their fourth wedding anniversary<br />
in October. This is a couple whose<br />
compatibility must be complete<br />
because Modikwa’s better half is also<br />
an insurance professional. inBusiness<br />
takes the opportunity to wish them<br />
well.<br />
18<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 19
EXECUTIVE PROFILE<br />
20<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
Labour ‘Suffragette’ Calls for<br />
Equal Pay<br />
In labour law consultant Rethabile Konopo’s view, Equal Pay for Women is as Inevitable as<br />
Establishment of the Kingdom of God on Earth because the Future of Humanity points to Men<br />
and Women working in Harmony to Earn a Living and Raise Children without Rigid Gender<br />
Divisions<br />
Words: Ononofile Lonkokile Pictures: Baagedi Setlhora<br />
Her constituency consists of<br />
blue-collar workers who toil<br />
in harsh conditions but apply<br />
themselves fully nevertheless.<br />
These are people whom the<br />
world of capital regards as a class that shall<br />
never find respite from servitude because they<br />
are hewers of wood and drawers of water, and<br />
treats them accordingly.<br />
Trapped in a culture that makes them<br />
meek, they broil in the sun and slog it in the<br />
rain but fail to negotiate for better wages and<br />
conditions or the reason that they are largely<br />
ignorant and hold authority in awe. Inspite<br />
of their suffering, the employer belongs to<br />
this venerable ambit. They are the ultimate<br />
definition of servility in a hostile environment<br />
because capitalism is about taking labour out<br />
of the equation of factors of production so that<br />
it is minimised as a cost.<br />
But these are people for whom Konopo &<br />
Partner Labour Law Consultancy - a conduit<br />
that came as an answer to real frustration - is in<br />
existence. Founder Rethabile Konopo defines<br />
her outfit as a private bridge of arbitration<br />
that straddles the government, employers and<br />
employees in the interests of saving time and<br />
money. This is because overburdened state<br />
judicial dockets have often meant that years<br />
could pass before an aggrieved employee<br />
finally presented his or her claim before a<br />
court, resulting in employers, employee groups<br />
and lawmakers seeking alternatives.<br />
“Over the years, the Department of Labour<br />
came to be widely seen as a prevaricator that<br />
wasted time, money and memory,” Konopo<br />
explains. “This is still very much the case todate.<br />
We try to save all three.”<br />
But there is a sub-stratum in this class.<br />
Because there is a history of women being<br />
subjugated as a sub-species bereft of both voice<br />
and vote, the distaff section of society continues<br />
to bear the brunt of exploitation four centuries<br />
after the Industrial Revolution. And for as<br />
long as gender inequality prevails, women will<br />
suffer the fate of minorities everywhere - poor<br />
prospects of realising their full potential and<br />
self-actualisation, especially in the workplace.<br />
That is why, as Konopo explains, her<br />
consultancy tends to have a pronounced<br />
bias for women in the workplace. “We aim<br />
at continuous improvement of living and<br />
working conditions for all employees,” she<br />
says. “However, while we are not restricted<br />
to women, we recognise that women are<br />
particularly susceptible.”<br />
She regards sexual harassment as the most<br />
telling symptom of women as an underclass,<br />
saying how it can also be the most demeaning<br />
experience and yet difficult case to prove. This<br />
is because only two people – the perpetrator<br />
and the victim - are usually present when it<br />
occurs. This makes sexual harassment even<br />
more arduous than the most traumatising and<br />
scarring form of assault on women - rape.<br />
Another instance of gender discrimination<br />
in the workplace is unequal pay for<br />
equal work that cuts across classes, from<br />
professional to unskilled labour. Konopo<br />
notes that the condition of women in the<br />
workplace is not helped by their tendency<br />
to perceive themselves as inferior. “This<br />
insecurity results in the pathetically<br />
internecine situation in which women turn on<br />
one another,” Konopo points out. “And this<br />
is an aspect that is hardly ever addressed for<br />
reasons of the disgrace that this in-fighting<br />
springs from, but women do get quite abrasive<br />
and aggressive against one another in both<br />
speech and action. The struggle for equality<br />
suffers in the process while the lowly position<br />
of women continues. ”<br />
It is little wonder that Konopo is doing<br />
work that aims to lighten the labour of her<br />
fellow women while emphasising its value.<br />
Her solidarity with them being most original<br />
as a born woman, she cut her teeth in<br />
leadership early in her teens when she became<br />
the Head Girl at Lobatse Senior Secondary<br />
School for 2003 and 2004. And although she<br />
is modest about the feat, those close to her say<br />
she became an accomplished youth leader in<br />
2007 when she successfully ran for Minister of<br />
Finance on the SRC at UB where she pursued<br />
a degree in Business Administration.<br />
But ask her how she tackles the balancing<br />
act of being a mother and the driving force<br />
behind her consultancy, and the feminist<br />
in her comes to the fore to demolish any<br />
misperceptions of a chicken-livered female.<br />
At least for a moment: “Isn’t that a bit sexist?,”<br />
Konopo queries. “I think it is. In my view,<br />
we should start from the premise that both<br />
women and men are expected to be gainfully<br />
employed and to become parents. The future<br />
is about shared responsibilities in both<br />
earning a living and raising children.”<br />
Having made her point, she returns to<br />
the present reality. She acknowledges the<br />
relevance of the question as one that bears<br />
testimony to the heavy burden that women of<br />
the world - especially working women - carry.<br />
And here Konopo reveals something of the<br />
latent numerologist in her; not in the sense<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 21
of the ‘occult’ influence of numbers on human<br />
affairs but more in the manner of numbers and<br />
calculations as universal instruments of precision.<br />
In the estimation of this working mother of three,<br />
women carry out two-and-a-half times more<br />
household and care work than men, all of it highly<br />
invaluable but without monetary reward.<br />
This burden continues without relief when a<br />
woman engages in gainful employment or in selfemployment,<br />
placing restrictions on reaching her<br />
full potential and prospects of self-actualisation.<br />
Hence Konopo makes a call for an egalitarian<br />
approach: “Unpaid care work must be recognised,<br />
redistributed and modified towards harmonisation<br />
between work and family life,” she says.<br />
The reality of Botswana workers as an exploited<br />
lot and women as an underclass first hit her hard<br />
when she worked as an HR executive for a retail<br />
chain store whose merchandise was mainly fast<br />
moving goods. According to her, the plight of<br />
the workers at what is Botswana’s fastest growing<br />
grocery chain store was exacerbated by widespread<br />
ignorance of the law and rights among them,<br />
inspite of many of the employees being holders of<br />
BGCSE. As Konopo points out, in a country where<br />
the instinct is to take unremitting advantage of<br />
workers, employers will exploit such ignorance to<br />
the full.<br />
“Labour laws are more effective if workers<br />
know their rights and speak out if their rights are<br />
violated,” she says. In her view, the government<br />
is also a part of the problem because under the<br />
law, workers must obtain permission of the police<br />
to demonstrate while the Trade Disputes Act<br />
empowers employers to demand de-registration of<br />
unions.<br />
As an HR practitioner, she gets involved in<br />
a good deal of mediation, which she defines as<br />
helping people understand their own conflicts. In<br />
the process, she reveals an often obscured view<br />
that pursuing a matter may prove detrimental<br />
to the employee. “Thankfully, most people come<br />
to appreciate this soon enough and abandon the<br />
potentially treacherous path because they know<br />
how to resolve their own conflicts,” Konopo<br />
explains.<br />
“It is really just a matter<br />
of listening to them<br />
and understanding the<br />
mechanisms in place to<br />
resolve conflicts.”<br />
She may be familiar with the abject lot that the<br />
working-class woman has been reduced to, yet<br />
she holds out hope for the attainment of equal<br />
pay for equal work for women which she believes<br />
will eventually come to pass. “It is as inevitable as<br />
establishment of the Kingdom of God on earth,”<br />
she says with a sigh. “The means to that end - in<br />
both symbolic and literal sense – will entail the<br />
voice and the vote for women. When that happens,<br />
it will be the culmination of Universal Suffrage and<br />
consummation of ‘Thy Kingdom Come.’”<br />
22<br />
Rethabile Konopo<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
Because anything can happen...<br />
even when on the lookout<br />
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www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 23
IN CAREER<br />
Stanbic Stalwarts Rewarded<br />
From Motshwari Sekgabo’s “deadly Yellow Belt punch” to the Star Performer in Sarah Sekgabi, Stanbic Bank was the<br />
‘Guardian of the Galaxy’ when it recently celebrated 25 years with employees who have been with the bank from Day<br />
One. As inBusiness’ MALEBOGO RATLADI reports, it is a matter of conjecture which way they went because when<br />
ordinary folks are flush with cash, they smile all the way to the bank<br />
ANASTASIA MOTSUMI<br />
I joined the bank 25 years ago as<br />
a young woman who knew close<br />
to nothing about banking and its<br />
products or customer service. But<br />
because I have been deployed<br />
to various departments over the<br />
years, I have and acquired a wealth<br />
of knowledge and skills without<br />
interruption. I have developed myself<br />
by attending various courses within the<br />
bank and studied with the Botswana Institute<br />
o f Bankers up to the final stage of Botswana Institute<br />
of Bankers Associates Stage II. I cannot say it has been an<br />
easy journey, having to deal with and manage people from<br />
different backgrounds and cultures. Even so, I consider<br />
myself competent in people skills, especially when I look<br />
back over the past 25 years and find that there is much to<br />
celebrate. I now look forward to the next 25 years of moving<br />
the country forward with the Blue Team.<br />
SARAH SETLHABI<br />
I am a true Stanbic Banker<br />
of 25 years’ experience. I<br />
have moved through the<br />
ranks of Branch Manager,<br />
Accounts Officer, Officer–<br />
in–Charge (Corporate<br />
Banking<br />
Division),<br />
Manager’s Clerk and Signing<br />
Officer. I am grateful for the<br />
training and exposure that Stanbic<br />
Bank<br />
Botswana has afforded me over the years. Since June<br />
20<strong>13</strong>, I hold the position of Regional Manager (Personal<br />
and Business Banking). I am proud to share that I hold<br />
an Associate Diploma in Banking Stage I through the<br />
Botswana Institute of Bankers, the Botswana Institute<br />
Administration of Commerce’s Intermediate Diploma<br />
in Secretarial Studies, and Certificates in Business<br />
Administration, Database Management and Project<br />
Management through ABE, CAB and BNPC respectively.<br />
I have twice been nominated Branch Manager of the<br />
Year, having exceptionally served the Gaborone and<br />
Francistown markets. I am also the recipient of the Star<br />
Performer Award for Retail Banking for 2005.<br />
MOTSHWARI SEKGABO<br />
I joined the bank in January 1992<br />
as a teller. Our training was done<br />
at Stanbic in Mmabatho. Union<br />
Bank at the time opened its<br />
doors at what is now Broadhurst<br />
Branch. In the course of the<br />
year I moved to the new branch<br />
at G-West. I got transferred to<br />
the Francistown Branch in 1995<br />
where I understudied the Branch<br />
Administrator who was a South African. I<br />
ran the branch’s administration for two years before<br />
returning to Gabs to join the Ops team as a Routine Control<br />
Officer. My first managerial appointment was in 1999 when<br />
I was appointed Assistant Operations Manager, covering<br />
Ops support that included cash management, processing,<br />
clearing and settlements. I joined the bank with a DABS<br />
(Diploma in Accounting and Business Studies) and am today<br />
proud to say I am an Associate from the Botswana Institute<br />
of Bankers, a Bachelor of Finance degree holder from the<br />
University of Botswana and Lean Six Sigma Yellow Belt<br />
(LSSYB) from Juran Consulting and Training. I look back on<br />
the years and marvel at the transformation that the bank has<br />
undergone, from a one-branch bank to where we are today.<br />
I stand tall as a part of the journey of Stanbic Bank Botswana.<br />
I propose a toast to the next 25 and beyond!<br />
24<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
BAAGI MOTAOSANE<br />
It’s a worthy milestone;<br />
an achievement of note.<br />
I look back with pride<br />
because I have had a share<br />
in the growth of this bank.<br />
I feel honoured that I am a<br />
recognised founding pillar of<br />
SBBL. I served the bank’s first<br />
customer as a young man in<br />
my early 20s in Broadhurst. It’s<br />
been a long journey, but as the<br />
Chinese adage says, ‘A journey of<br />
thousand miles begins with a single step,” we have<br />
made it from one branch in 1992 to 10 branches in 2017;<br />
from 24 staff then to 600 plus today. I came in as a young<br />
man but I am now a proud father and homeowner, thanks<br />
to Stanbic Bank Botswana Limited. I have represented this<br />
bank internationally on various UATs aimed at improving<br />
our products and customer service. I’m here today and<br />
will be here tomorrow because prospects look bright<br />
here at Stanbic!<br />
Stanbic Botswana:<br />
A Brief History<br />
LETTY WEDU MAPHANE<br />
I started out as a 30-year old<br />
general clerk at Stanbic’s<br />
Vehicle Asset Finance 25<br />
years ago. I have been<br />
through various units and<br />
departments of Stanbic, who<br />
were my second employer.<br />
I work as a Recoveries<br />
Officer responsible for<br />
written off account collections at<br />
present. It’s been an invaluable<br />
experience learning on the job from<br />
various experts locally and internationally. I have been<br />
to Mafikeng and Johannesburg for training and acquired<br />
a Botswana Institute of Bankers Associate Diploma here<br />
at home. I am proud and honoured to be one of Stanbic<br />
Bank Botswana’s pioneers and I shall forever be grateful to<br />
be associated with the brand that moves customers and<br />
communities forward.<br />
ALBERT MAPOSA<br />
•Union Bank Botswana Ltd is incorporated as a subsidiary<br />
of Standard Bank Investment Corporation (SBIC) in 1991.<br />
•Stanbic Bank starts trading as Union Bank in Botswana at<br />
Broadhurst on March 2, 1992 with 24 staff, incl<br />
uding expatriates, under the leadership of Dave Brown.<br />
•Richard Flattery is the first Brach member of Stanbic<br />
bank. The first branch was Broadhurst Branch and was<br />
located at Broadhurst Industrial Estate on Legolo Road.<br />
•SBIC acquires ANZ Holdings, including equity control<br />
of ANZ Grindleys banks in Zimbabwe, Zambia, Kenya,<br />
Botswana, Uganda and Zaire (now the DRC) in 1992.<br />
•ANZ Gridleys Botswana acquires Union Bank of<br />
Botswana Ltd for P10m and assumes the name “Union<br />
bank of Botswana Ltd” in 1992.<br />
•All operations of ANZ are brought into the Stanbic Bank<br />
fold and the Union Bank of Botswana Ltd is re-branded as<br />
Stanbic Bank of Botswana Ltd in 1993.<br />
•Stanbic Bank has had five Managing Directors, being<br />
Dave Brown, Neil McLeman, Walter Price, Dennis<br />
Kennedy and the current CEO, Leina Gabaraane, who is a<br />
Motswana.<br />
•The Lean Six Sigma Certification deals with management<br />
approach to business performance and strategy. It has<br />
levels that are named as karate belt grading. Motshwari<br />
Sekgabo obtained the Yellow Belt in 2016.<br />
I became a member of<br />
Stanbic Botswana through<br />
ANZ Grindlays Bank Africa<br />
Operations in 1992 after I joined<br />
ANZ Grindlays Bank Botswana<br />
in November 1991. At the time<br />
the two banks merged, Stanbic<br />
Bank Botswana of today was called<br />
Union Bank of Botswana Ltd. I started<br />
out in Stanbic’s Treasury Department which dealt<br />
with retail forex, forex deals and back office functions. I was the<br />
only Motswana in a team of four members. Fast forward to today,<br />
and I marvel at my movement through the ranks by means of<br />
training courses, contributing to the bank’s growth and success.<br />
I currently hold the post of Operations Project Manager. It has<br />
been a great honour and privilege to be a member of the Blue<br />
Team.<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 25
ENGAGE WOMEN<br />
Norman Moleele<br />
Coco Chanel Features Big in WIBA<br />
Programme<br />
Although a key denizen of European Haute Monde, the famous French Fashion and Beauty<br />
Outfit knows how to extend a Helping Hand to the Third World. The programme it sponsored<br />
was so successful that it is being replicated for the greater benefit of women, writes<br />
MALEBOGO RATLADI<br />
The first PSDP mentorship programme for<br />
WIBA has been so successful that a similar<br />
one is due course to be implemented<br />
under a new Memorandum of Agreement,<br />
inBusiness has established.<br />
The Private Sector Development<br />
Programme (PSDP) devised and<br />
implemented the first Women<br />
Entrepreneurship Programme (WED)<br />
Programme in collaboration with Women<br />
in Business (WIBA) in May 20<strong>13</strong>, a threeyear<br />
programme that ended in June last<br />
year.<br />
Thirty-five women participated in the<br />
programme, 30 of them WIBA members.<br />
The same group is targeted for the repeat<br />
programme, even though the current PSDP<br />
is coming to an end this month (June).<br />
WED was aimed at unlocking the<br />
potential of women-owned businesses by<br />
providing support in capacity building and<br />
linkages in finance and markets.<br />
The Coordinator for WIBA, Boikanyo<br />
Koitsiwe, told inBusiness Magazine ahead<br />
of the signing of the MoU on May 10 that<br />
the mentorship programme saw some of its<br />
beneficiaries go on benchmarking trips to<br />
external markets while others crafted and<br />
presented funding proposals by themselves.<br />
“Generally, the aim of this mentorship<br />
programme was to give women the ability<br />
to compete effectively in the identified<br />
value chain, as well look outward for<br />
external markets,” he said, adding that<br />
as an intermediary, WIBA would like all<br />
of its members to benefit from the WED<br />
programme.<br />
At the signing of the MoU, the Director<br />
of PSDP Norman Moleele explained that<br />
the new programme would emphasise<br />
networking and entail more benchmarking<br />
missions.<br />
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www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
Nametso Carr<br />
“Inspite of the PSDP programme<br />
coming to an end this month, we have<br />
entered into a MoU with WIBA to extend<br />
our affiliation.” He explained that women<br />
entrepreneurs who are WIBA members<br />
would be the primary beneficiaries of the<br />
next PSDP (WED) programme for which<br />
funding is being sought.<br />
Signing on behalf of WIBA, the<br />
organisation’s Vice President Nametso Carr<br />
was so delighted that she expressed a desire<br />
for the ‘wedding’ between PSDP and WIBA<br />
to last forever.<br />
PSDP is a government initiative<br />
supported by the Ministry of Investment,<br />
Trade and Industry, the European Union<br />
and the Centre for the Development of<br />
Enterprises (CDE). Other intermediary<br />
organisations involved in the mentorship<br />
programme are Business Botswana,<br />
HATAB, BNPC, LEA and BOBS.<br />
The first WED programme was<br />
financed by Chanel Corporate Foundation,<br />
the corporate social responsibility arm<br />
of famous French fashion and beauty<br />
company Coco Chanel, to the tune of<br />
€340 000 (approximately P4 million) and<br />
executed by CDE under the auspices of<br />
PSDP. The programme was transferred to<br />
Business Botswana for implementation<br />
in November 2015 following the orderly<br />
closure of CDE in March 2016.<br />
Pictures: Baagedi Setlhora<br />
The enchanted world of<br />
COCO CHANEL<br />
Gabrielle Bonheur “Coco” Chanel (19 August 1883 – 10 January<br />
1971 was a French fashion designer and businesswoman. She<br />
was the founder and namesake of the Chanel brand. Along with<br />
Paul Poiret, Chanel was credited in the post-World War I era<br />
with liberating women from the constraints of the “corseted silhouette”<br />
and popularizing a sporty, casual chic as the feminine standard of<br />
style. A prolific fashion creator, Chanel extended her influence beyond<br />
couture clothing, realising her design aesthetic in jewellery, handbags,<br />
and fragrance. Her signature scent, Chanel No. 5, has become an iconic<br />
product. She is the only fashion designer listed on TIME magazine’s list<br />
of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century Chanel designed<br />
her iconic interlocked-CC monograph, meaning Coco Chanel, using it<br />
since the 1920s.<br />
Chanel was known for her lifelong determination, ambition, and<br />
energy which she applied to her professional and social life. She<br />
achieved both financial success as a businesswoman and catapulted to<br />
social prominence in French high society, thanks to the connections she<br />
made through her work. These included many artists and craftspeople to<br />
whom she became a patron.<br />
Her social connections appeared to encourage a highly conservative<br />
personal outlook. Rumors arose about Chanel’s activities in the course<br />
of the German occupation of France during World War II, and she<br />
was criticised for being too comfortable with the Germans but never<br />
thoroughly investigated. One of Chanel’s lovers was a German military<br />
officer, Hans Gunther von Dincklage. After the war ended, Chanel was<br />
interrogated about her relationship with von Dincklage, but she was<br />
not charged as a collaborator. After several years in Switzerland after<br />
the war, she returned to Paris and revived her fashion house. In 2011,<br />
Hal Vaughan published a book on Chanel based on newly declassified<br />
documents of that era, revealing that she had collaborated with Germans<br />
in intelligence activities. One plan in late 1943 was for her to carry an SS<br />
separate peace overture to British Prime Minister Winston Churchill to<br />
end the war<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 27
YOUTH INBUSINESS<br />
Rosewell Chauffeurs:<br />
When Etiquette is of the<br />
Essence<br />
The young woman behind Rosewell Chauffeurs has such grit that she counts good old Uncle<br />
Bob, Zimbabwe’s Robert Mugabe, among her clients. But her geriatric responsibilities proven,<br />
she is spreading her wings further to establish Gem Driven in South Africa, an outfit doubtless<br />
named with Botswana’s economic mainstay in mind<br />
Words: Ononofile Lonkokile<br />
Pictures: Baagedi Setlhora<br />
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www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
Travelling as an individual and<br />
as an entrepreneur has benefits<br />
that allow one to broaden<br />
one’s horizons and experience<br />
diverse sceneries. Founder of<br />
Rosewell Chauffeurs, Sukoluhle<br />
Mafika, attests to this and reminisces about her<br />
first flight to the UK that she says was more<br />
than an eye-opener, hence she treasures the<br />
experience to this day. She vividly remembers<br />
how everything was at her disposal and how<br />
time was highly respected.<br />
Now armed with a Master’s degree in<br />
Human Geography (majoring in Geographical<br />
Information Systems) from the University<br />
of Leeds, these experiences shaped the<br />
entrepreneur that Mafika is today that she<br />
highly recommends travelling for budding<br />
entrepreneurs. She returned to the country in<br />
2011 and worked for GeoFlux a Geographical<br />
Information Systems Consultant before<br />
striking it out on her own by establishing<br />
Rosewell Chauffer Services in 20<strong>13</strong> where<br />
she became a cab driver for a year, gaining<br />
invaluable first-hand experience of operations<br />
and the market.<br />
In the same year, Mafika approached CEDA<br />
for a loan. However, it took considerable<br />
persuasion on her part to convince the<br />
empowerment agency that her business was<br />
viable and worthy of funding. Rosewell is<br />
about executive transport and was something<br />
of a novelty in Botswana when she started,<br />
hence the initial reluctance at CEDA. The<br />
idea was born of a rather unpleasant personal<br />
experience.<br />
She explains: “I called a cab to fetch me from<br />
work to my place. After booking the cab a day<br />
in advance, it delayed for hours on end. Mind<br />
you, this is on a day that I was working half-day<br />
and so had planned to do other things with the<br />
rest of the day. When the cab finally arrived,<br />
the driver was completely unconcerned and<br />
carried on with his colleagues on his twoway<br />
radio while the loud music was causing a<br />
cacophony in the entire estate. That’s where the<br />
idea for my business came from. I suppose it is<br />
the proverbial silver lining.”<br />
The experience taught her that etiquette and<br />
customer service must define everything in her<br />
business. Because her cabbies - both men and<br />
women – understand this essential element,<br />
they are distinguished by their well-pressed<br />
uniform, outstanding civility and eloquence<br />
of expression in both Setswana and English.<br />
There is greater emphasis on the latter for<br />
the reason that most clients – up to 90% - are<br />
foreigners. “Personal hygiene and appearance<br />
are a part of deal,” says Mafika.<br />
“But much more important<br />
is being conversant with<br />
current affairs. Afterall,<br />
conversation without<br />
information becomes just<br />
so much bluster.”<br />
But if decorum is highly valued at Rosewell<br />
Chauffeurs, safety is even more so because in<br />
the proprietor’s view, the value of human life<br />
is beyond any measure. Hence her cabbies<br />
routinely and regularly undergo training in<br />
defensive driving. And then the inevitable – if<br />
naughty – question arises: Are there ‘extras?’<br />
After giving yours truly an eyeful, Mafika’s<br />
expression takes on a sombre aspect before she<br />
enunciates her answer: “We are in the business<br />
of transport. Executive transport. It is strictly<br />
transport. Our drivers are men and women<br />
of upright character. It is our pre-condition<br />
to be clean in all respects, including clean of<br />
criminal record.”<br />
At present, Rosewell Chauffeurs has a fleet<br />
of eight vehicles. The Mercs<br />
and BMWs are for executive<br />
clients while the company<br />
uses top notch Corollas for<br />
cab services, usually for<br />
long-term clients. The cars<br />
are not branded because<br />
most clients value their<br />
privacy, which they regard<br />
as an essential part of the<br />
security.<br />
Mafika and her Rosewell<br />
Chauffeurs are riding the<br />
crest of the wave at present<br />
because they count none<br />
other than Kenyan President<br />
Uhuru Kenyatta and the indefatigable Uncle<br />
Bob, Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe,<br />
among their impressive list of clients. With<br />
a branch at the Diamond Trading Park in<br />
Gaborone, Botswana’s diamond industry<br />
accounts for a major share of Rosewell’s<br />
market, with Lucara, Okavango Diamonds and<br />
Be Beers itself regular customers. Branches<br />
at the Grand Palm and Masa are for the<br />
convenience of the well-heeled guests at these<br />
upmarket hotels.<br />
Meanwhile, diamonds being the mainstay<br />
of Botswana’s economy, Mafika became the<br />
country’s subtle ambassador and commercial<br />
attaché when she joined forces with Lebo<br />
Gunguluza, the South African millionaire<br />
entrepreneur, to open a chauffeuring business<br />
in the neighbouring country that she styled<br />
Gem Driven in July last year. She plans to<br />
launch a mobile app before this year is out<br />
so her clients may reach her at the touch of<br />
the button. The app will include a concierge<br />
service for parents to have their children and/<br />
or groceries picked up and delivered. Rosewell<br />
Chauffeurs currently has an online present at<br />
www.rosewellchauffeurs.co.bw for bookings.<br />
Although she describes herself as a cautious<br />
spender, Mafika admits to being fond of the<br />
finer things in life. Her splendidly luxurious<br />
office at the Diamond Park bears this out. And<br />
while she is not a fitness fanatic, the 33-year<br />
old mother of one is a regular at a Gaborone<br />
spa where she goes “to recharge and get<br />
rejuvenated”. For an only child, she works hard<br />
because she says she had to prove that she was<br />
not a spoiled brat.<br />
.<br />
. . . . . .<br />
ACCOMODATION: 11 standard double, 2 executives,17 standard twins, All rooms<br />
equiped with T<br />
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Reservations Email: reservations@thakaduhotel.co.bw<br />
Sales Email: sales@thakaduhotel.co.bw<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 29
ENTREPRISE<br />
Of Sacred Cows and Holy Men:<br />
the Story of PK Leathergoods<br />
It makes for dramatic irony that Botswana being a land of more cattle than<br />
people, the country’s fledgling leather industry should have to import its key<br />
input<br />
Words: Malebogo Ratladi<br />
Back in 2014, the incumbent<br />
MP for Lobatse, Sadique<br />
Kebonang, spoke of an<br />
elaborate vision in which the<br />
town famous for meat and<br />
mental health would have a<br />
multi-faceted and self-sufficient leather<br />
park where skins would come off animals<br />
as they were slaughtered straight into a<br />
treatment plant before being supplied to<br />
factories in situ for the manufacture of a<br />
variety of leather products.<br />
If the inexplicable absence of such an<br />
industry is forgiven, the pledge made<br />
perfect sense even as a campaign<br />
issue. Afterall, here was a candidate<br />
with the advantage of youth and who,<br />
being a man of letters, was presumably<br />
sufficiently well-read to appreciate what<br />
was needed to transform Lobatse from<br />
a one-street dorpie on what looked<br />
like a permanent brink of decay into a<br />
flourishing free trade zone, an aspect<br />
that has also been mooted.<br />
Lobatse’s potential consisted in the<br />
town being the historic headquarters<br />
of the country’s beef industry where up<br />
to 8 000 cattle and 500 small stock can<br />
be handled per day at an integrated<br />
complex that includes an abattoir, a<br />
cannery and a tannery. On the surface of<br />
things, establishment of the envisaged<br />
leather park may entail a weaning of the<br />
small scale tannery from the major plant<br />
of the Botswana Meat Commission where<br />
it has never been on an industrial scale to<br />
the winning site where there should be<br />
surplus production sufficient for export.<br />
But lo and behold, after much ado in<br />
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www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
studies and reports, Kebonang’s pledge<br />
has turned vacuous in the fashion of the<br />
pipe dreams of many a politician, wellmeaning<br />
and otherwise. It is hardly the<br />
stuff of psychotherapy for the ‘inmates’<br />
at Sbrana Mental Hospital for whom<br />
Lobatse is also famous.<br />
Even so, the vacuum has not deterred<br />
everyone. In a tale of two nations and<br />
genders, Portia Oaitse of Botswana and<br />
Kudakwashe Munyarari of Zimbabwe had<br />
registered PK Leathergoods, a company<br />
in secondary manufacture of leather<br />
goods, in 20<strong>13</strong> and have not allowed<br />
the delayed inauguration of Kebonang’s<br />
leather park to have a deleterious<br />
effect on their work. “It is ‘secondary<br />
manufacture’ because we design<br />
processed leather into finished products<br />
like bags, jackets and belts,” says Oaitse.<br />
Pertunia Mnkandla and Portia Oaitse<br />
“But we have to import<br />
the leather. Why should<br />
we have to import<br />
leather when the story of<br />
Botswana is the story of<br />
more cattle than men? Is<br />
this our version of ‘Sacred<br />
Men and Holy Cows?’”<br />
Pictures: Baagedi Setlhora<br />
The latter is an idiom whose figurative<br />
meaning refers to something that can<br />
neither be questioned nor criticised.<br />
While the adage is thought to originate<br />
in the lofty place that cattle enjoy in<br />
Hindu society, cattle are also venerated<br />
in Setswana in which a poem refers to<br />
such a domesticated beast as a “softnosed<br />
God” (Modimo o’ nko e metsi)<br />
and where cattle confer an elevated<br />
status to the one who owns them in large<br />
numbers.<br />
But because there are no sacred men<br />
and holy cows in a democratic society,<br />
Oaitse is free to raise the question.<br />
Hence she does, and so in the year that<br />
Kebonang was making his pledge on the<br />
campaign trail, she and Munyarari invited<br />
another Zimbabwean, Petunia Mnkandla,<br />
to join them because they needed her<br />
design, sewing and marketing skills.<br />
“She fit in well because her given name,<br />
Petunia, shares the ‘P’ in the company<br />
name with my given own name, Portia,”<br />
Oaitse explains, clearly delighting in the<br />
little serendipity.<br />
inBusiness is speaking with them at<br />
their workshop in Tlokweng. “I met<br />
Kudakwashe (Munyarai) at the open<br />
market at Extension 14 in 2012 when<br />
I went to buy school uniform for my<br />
child,” Oaitse continues. A conversation<br />
with Munyarari about the goods on<br />
display in his small workshop solicited<br />
the advice that she could train under<br />
the government’s Nyeletso Lehuma<br />
initiative (poverty elimination) through<br />
which “people are taken for training at<br />
institutions of their choice”.<br />
Being unemployed, Oaitse took the<br />
advice of her new acquaintance and was<br />
soon undergoing training at Morongwa<br />
Stores in Gaborone. Fat-track to today<br />
and we hear of a small business that is<br />
trying to diversify its product range and<br />
animal skins. Mnkandla picks up the cue:<br />
“When time and money allow it, we go<br />
to Zimbabwe to buy ostrich, elephant<br />
and crocodile leather to spice things up<br />
a bit.”<br />
Because they cannot re-invent the<br />
wheel, the threesome finds inspiration<br />
in existing designs and adds its own<br />
touch to them. But it is in custom designs<br />
that PK Leathergoods makes a distinct<br />
mark. The company participates in the<br />
annual Women’s Expo and never misses<br />
out on the monthly Bull ‘n Bush market,<br />
the Pop Up market and the Stock Men’s<br />
Option. Yet Oaitse describes the market<br />
as “unfriendly.” That is because she<br />
and her partners have to contend with<br />
an unusual kind of credibility issues.<br />
She believes that there is a strong link<br />
between her failure to win prizes at<br />
trade fairs and widespread incredulity<br />
among people who matter, judges<br />
included, that Batswana are capable of<br />
quality designs and products. “Especially<br />
leather products,” she says. “There is this<br />
massive wall of incredulity.”<br />
Another problem is the ‘swansong’ of<br />
SMEs: funding. Applications to CEDA,<br />
the Ministry of Gender Affairs and other<br />
funding organisations have turned up a<br />
blank for PK Leathergoods. But Oaitse<br />
and her partners still hold out the hope<br />
that MP Sadique Kebonang’s campaign<br />
pledge will come into fruition one day<br />
because a leather park would make all<br />
the difference for them. “I believe he<br />
is well-placed to influence things as<br />
Minister of Mineral Resources, Green<br />
Technology and Energy,” she says.<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 31
TOURISM<br />
Room50Two: an Astral<br />
Experience on Terra Firma<br />
To celebrate its opening recently, the management of the latest addition to the capital’s<br />
increasingly plush travel and leisure sector, Room 50Two, invited journalists to sample<br />
what’s in store for the discriminating guest at this ‘astral’ affair at Gaborone’s new CBD.<br />
inBusiness’ ONONOFILE LONKOKILE was among them<br />
32<br />
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02<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017<br />
Sheer contentment, sensations of<br />
deja vu about something good but<br />
elusive, a lifting up of the senses<br />
and a whole gamut of feelings are<br />
what overtook me when I saw the<br />
view from the 28th floor of newly<br />
opened hotel, Room 50Two. Breathtaking…<br />
As though the entire capital city of Botswana<br />
had conspired with the lights of the city - now<br />
a mystic, gentle haze - to transport me to<br />
destinations unknown.<br />
A colleague even remarked that we could be<br />
on the threshold to a 21st Century Edenic<br />
Park.<br />
The whole city seemed to be on high definition<br />
and you could identify your own house<br />
and see that your neighbour had obliged you<br />
by switching on the lights! We then repaired<br />
to the uppermost room in the entire country,<br />
the quaintly-named Table 50Two, which,<br />
perched at the apex on the 28th floor, just<br />
sealed the deal on a night to remember for<br />
penumbral vistas of Botswana’s capital from<br />
the cosmos.<br />
This restaurant is a picture perfect al fresco<br />
affair ideal for hosting a dinner parties or that<br />
wedding engagement to build a dream on.<br />
The food was a delectable array of meats and<br />
starches. I tasted chicken lollipops (chicken<br />
winglets where the meat is cut loose from<br />
the bone end and pushed down to create the<br />
appearance of a lollipop) for the first time. My<br />
palate welcomed the crisp skin as my tongue<br />
hailed the marinade. It was the perfect a<br />
appetizer before I waded into the fish and the<br />
meatballs!<br />
The main course consisted of rice, at once<br />
spicy and savoury with a tinge of curry.<br />
The tender mutton stew came with steamed<br />
vegetables whose freshness was enhanced by<br />
herbs.<br />
Beyond the food, the décor - modern and chic<br />
- stood out for the colour schemes of bright<br />
couches and paintings on the walls. Contemporary.<br />
Cosmopolitan. Even cosmic, thanks<br />
to the ‘lofty’ standing of Table 50Two on the<br />
28th floor!<br />
But inspite of its name, the hotel boasts 54<br />
rooms. A spokesman of Overseas Development<br />
Enterprises, which also owns Travel
Pictures: Room50two<br />
Lodge and Trans Cash and Carry, told<br />
me it was about what sounded right, “and<br />
Room 50Two did”. The lodgings consist of<br />
36 standard rooms, 6 premium rooms and<br />
12 premium plus rooms that have balconies<br />
opening on vistas of the city. My room had<br />
the most amazing view. I stood at the window<br />
to take it all in, mulling over what a brilliant<br />
idea it was that Gaborone should have a new<br />
CBD. In the morning, the minute men at<br />
work at a nearby construction site made me<br />
look to the future with renewed confidence<br />
that the skyline of Gabs will become a galaxy<br />
in its own right. And when that comes to pass,<br />
Room 50Two will assert its outstanding stellar<br />
quality from the pride of place that it already<br />
occupies. Nay, it will become the ‘Guardian of<br />
the Galaxy!’<br />
The location of this hotel at iTowers South in<br />
the CBD is a good address that commands<br />
a special allure for the discerning business<br />
traveller and tourist. It is within a convenient<br />
distance to major points in Gaborone,<br />
especially Government Enclave just east; the<br />
train station, bus terminus and Rail Park Mall<br />
just north; and the civic centre, Gabs’ Main<br />
Mall, the Central Police Station and Princess<br />
Marina Referral Hospital further east. Guests<br />
of Room 50Two can be said to breathe the<br />
same air as justices of Gaborone High Court<br />
and the Industrial Court whose addresses<br />
are almost the same as this latest addition to<br />
Gaborone’s travel and leisure sector that has<br />
created 60 new jobs.<br />
At Room 50Two, the concierge is present<br />
24/7. This is in addition to wireless internet<br />
access, car parking with valet facilities, as<br />
well as airport transfer and laundry services,<br />
among others. There are several approaches<br />
to Room 50Two: from the south it is via New<br />
Lobatse Road and right after the intersection<br />
or from Nelson Mandela Drive onto Old<br />
Molepolole Road and two right turns after the<br />
intersection. Go there. An astral experience<br />
on terra firma awaits you.<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 33
TOURISM<br />
Photography:extraordinaryjourneys.com<br />
34<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
Stop or Gently Pass<br />
This is the World Tourism Destination No. 1<br />
Diversifying its tourism products means that Botswana is taking advantage of its Godgiven<br />
beauty in the multiplicity of its wildlife species that is hardly found anywhere else<br />
and tough terrain in the middle of which a parched palate and quenching thirst can take<br />
on a literal meaning, writes TUDUETSO TEBAPE<br />
Africa is a continent known for<br />
its wealth of natural resources,<br />
including flora and fauna. But<br />
perched high on southern Africa’s<br />
plateau, Botswana stands out as a<br />
microcosm of the rich endowment of the<br />
Mother Continent that must at once be<br />
enjoyed by contemporary generations<br />
and conserved for posterity. While<br />
obtaining and maintaining this delicate<br />
balance can be tricky, Botswana has<br />
found the equation and is looming large<br />
as a tourism destination because it is the<br />
ideal place to find a wide array of wildlife,<br />
most notably the Big Five.<br />
But underneath the stampeding<br />
hoofs of migrating hartebeest and<br />
herds of wildebeest, there is a shift of<br />
emphasis from wildlife tourism to a<br />
new - though almost always in support<br />
of conservation - brand of visitor to<br />
the country. Motorsport and adventure<br />
tourism are taking the country and the<br />
world by storm. Literally so because the<br />
gearshift often entails raising hell in the<br />
sand dunes of the Kgalagadi Desert in<br />
Botswana’s wild west.<br />
This shift - which is more of a<br />
diversification because the world will<br />
always fawn on the fauna – is spearheaded<br />
by the Ministry of the Environment,<br />
Natural Resources Conservation and<br />
Tourism in conjunction with Botswana<br />
Tourism Organisation (BTO) that directs<br />
marketing and promotion of Botswana<br />
as the destination of choice from tourists<br />
the world over.<br />
Considerable achievements have<br />
already been in this regard, with the<br />
country emerging the winner of the 2016<br />
World Tourism for Tomorrow award from<br />
the World Travel and Tourism Council.<br />
This has happened in the Destination<br />
Award category under which the world<br />
famous Okavango Delta, Makgadikgadi<br />
Salt Pans and Chobe National Park took<br />
the lead as winning destinations. It is<br />
significant that commitment to resource<br />
conservation and benefit to ordinary<br />
citizens are taken into consideration<br />
before these awards are conferred.<br />
“It my ministry’s role to ensure (that)<br />
these areas are carefully utilised to<br />
ensure (that) they are sustained to carry<br />
us into the future without losing their<br />
authenticity and value,” said tourism<br />
minister Tshekedi Khama at a recent<br />
media briefing in Gaborone.<br />
While the value of Botswana’s<br />
popularity as a wildlife tourism<br />
destination is established, the evercompetitive<br />
global tourism industry<br />
is putting pressure on the country to<br />
enhance its appeal by diversifying.<br />
The answer to this has been to ‘ride’<br />
on Toyota Desert Race and introduce<br />
a series of events aimed at attracting a<br />
new brand of tourist to the country while<br />
invigorating local participation.<br />
Said Minister Tshekedi at the media<br />
briefing: “BTO continues looking at ways<br />
through which to diversify the Botswana<br />
tourism product so as to reduce<br />
pressure from these natural resources<br />
while we grow tourism and increase<br />
revenue(s) drawn from the industry. It is<br />
because of this that we have embarked<br />
on diversifying our product through<br />
introduction of events-based tourism.”<br />
The latest of these events, the World’s<br />
Strongest Man, came to Botswana for<br />
the first time last month and itself took<br />
advantage of the synergy created by<br />
two pleasantly harsh motorsport events<br />
that are not for the faint-hearted, the<br />
gruelling Khawa Dune Challenge and the<br />
arduous Makgadikgadi Epic. These two -<br />
now firmly established international draw<br />
cards and still growing - were punctuated<br />
by another prime attraction of recent<br />
introduction, the Race for Rhinos whose<br />
name speaks volumes as a fundraiser for<br />
protection of the endangered species.<br />
Said Tshekedi, an enthusiast like no<br />
other: “Events-based tourism lends itself<br />
well to tourism diversification. We started<br />
with a few events and I can confidently<br />
say when we started, the idea was to<br />
inculcate the spirit of travel among locals.<br />
We see more locals attending the events<br />
nowadays with a noticeable interest in<br />
the regional market.”<br />
According to figures revealed by<br />
Tshekedi, these events are a shot<br />
in the arm for the economies of the<br />
communities that host them. “In Khawa<br />
alone, a comparison can be made<br />
between a normal weekend sales spend<br />
of an approximated P2.1 million to<br />
P5.6 million over the event weekend,”<br />
he said. “The event drew over 12 000<br />
spectators last year, which is up from<br />
6 000 in 2015 and 3 700 in 2014. The<br />
positive tourism effects are not only<br />
during the event weekend, with 42% of<br />
spectators interviewed during the event<br />
saying that they visit the area outside of<br />
the event itself.”<br />
The minister noted that during the<br />
Makgadikgadi Epic in 2015, Nata<br />
Conservation Trust received P70 300.<br />
The Gaing-o Community Trust, which<br />
manages Lekhubu where the Race for<br />
Rhinos was held, received P67 000<br />
in camping fees and gatetakings, as<br />
well as a donation of P47 000 last<br />
year. In earlier Race for Rhinos, the<br />
Tlhokomela Endangered Wildlife Trust<br />
received donations of P250 000 towards<br />
conservation while it received a donation<br />
for the capture, relocation and protection<br />
of 100 rhinos from Conservation 360.<br />
The stage is clearly set for Botswana to<br />
become the theatre for more motorsport<br />
and adventure tourism. In this regard,<br />
the country is simply taking advantage<br />
of its God-given beauty in its spectrum<br />
of wildlife species hardly seen anywhere<br />
else and tough terrain in the middle of<br />
which a parched palate and quenching<br />
thirst can take on a literal meaning.<br />
Those responsible have decided that the<br />
new chapter will feature motorsport and<br />
adventure tourism as never before.<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 35
TOURISM<br />
SKL: From Germany with Tourists<br />
A lot has been shared about<br />
Botswana’s participation at ITB Berlin<br />
2017 where the country was an official<br />
partner-sponsor of what is widely<br />
regarded as the world’s leading travel<br />
trade show. However, little is known<br />
about Botswana tour operators who<br />
attended this prestigious exhibition<br />
where goers are promised “valuable<br />
first-hand knowledge through personal<br />
interactions with international<br />
professionals”, according to its<br />
website. In this Q and A, inBusiness’<br />
TUDUETSO TEBAPE speaks with<br />
Rachel who went to Berlin for the SKL<br />
Group for which she is Marketing<br />
Officer<br />
Q: Please give a brief<br />
description of SKL.<br />
A: The SKL group of camps operates public<br />
campgrounds in Botswana’s prime national<br />
parks, being the Chobe National Park,<br />
Moremi Game Reserve and Makgadikgadi<br />
National Park. We now also run two tented<br />
camps at the heart of the Chobe National<br />
Park. SKL was founded in 2010.<br />
Q: You were an exhibitor at<br />
ITB 2017. Kindly explain why<br />
you went to Berlin.<br />
A: Apart from the fact that Botswana was<br />
first the African partner-sponsor country,<br />
there are quite a few reasons why we were<br />
exhibiting at the 2017 ITB. But ultimately our<br />
main focus was and is always to market our<br />
products. Through attending such big scale<br />
travel fairs, one learns from others in the industry,<br />
sees what they are doing and how one<br />
can incorporate what might work for one.<br />
Q: Was it the first time you<br />
were in the ITB?<br />
A: No. We have been attending the ITB since<br />
20<strong>13</strong>. So it has been four years in a row. You<br />
need to keep the consistency of your brand<br />
and product so people trust in your products.<br />
I shouldn’t forget the most important thing,<br />
which is to build a better relationship with<br />
European tour operators.<br />
Q: What benefit to SKL does<br />
exhibiting at ITB have?<br />
A: It is all in the exposure. The more we<br />
attend such fairs, the more people get to familiarise<br />
themselves with our brand. They will<br />
definitely remember the company brand as<br />
it imprints on their minds every year. Should<br />
someone else ask where one can do camping<br />
in Botswana, SKL will pop up in answer.<br />
Q: Have you started to reap<br />
any benefits from your<br />
exhibiting at the ITB?<br />
A: To be honest, reaping the benefits from<br />
any marketing fair takes time. You have to<br />
nurture it. I would describe it like a growing<br />
plant. You have to feed it with nutrients, water<br />
it and give it light so you can see the fruits it<br />
will bear. And for it to bear those fruits takes<br />
time. However, from where we stand today,<br />
we are definitely seeing benefits. The tourism<br />
sector has a different approach to its marketing<br />
strategies. When you market your product<br />
in 2017, it means you are prepping yourself<br />
for better sales in 2018. The reason is that one<br />
has to plan for a holiday destination well in<br />
advance.<br />
Q:What assistance, if<br />
any, did you receive<br />
from Botswana Tourism<br />
Organisation at this year’s<br />
ITB?<br />
A: First of all, I would like to salute the Botswana<br />
Tourism Organisation for all that they<br />
have done for us in the industry. The organisation<br />
paves the way for tour operators to be<br />
able to penetrate such markets, thus providing<br />
us with a massive platform to showcase the<br />
different destinations in our country. BTO’s<br />
being there all the time to facilitate shows<br />
their commitment to their mandate.<br />
Q: What sort of expenses are<br />
incurred by a company to<br />
attend the ITB?<br />
A: As a business, marketing costs quite a bit<br />
and all costs to attend such a show are incurred<br />
by the company. One has to look at the<br />
logistics of paying for a representative’s flights,<br />
accommodation, food and transport while in<br />
Europe. This is in addition exhibiting fees.<br />
Q: What advice can you give<br />
other tour operators who<br />
may want to go to the ITB?<br />
A: Talking from experience, attending such<br />
fairs works. Not only do you expand your<br />
agency scope. As I mentioned before, the<br />
more one attends the more agents get to know<br />
more about one’s products. We also interact<br />
with other companies to see how we can<br />
improve ourselves. That is why I would like us<br />
to attend again next year.<br />
36<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 37
FOOD<br />
38<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
At Lunch with a Foodie<br />
Words: Tuduetso Tebape<br />
Photography: Baagedi Setlhora<br />
For this edition’s Food Section, inBusiness Mazine<br />
visited Musa Mhlasi’s kitchen to get up close and<br />
personal with Food-With-A-Foodie, Mhlasi’s<br />
company that offers catering and private chef<br />
services. While the catering industry is quite<br />
vibrant, Food-With-A-Foodie is unique in its<br />
positioning because Mhlasi’s is the complete<br />
foodie’s brand.<br />
Foodie, of course, being a term used to describe<br />
someone who is very passionate about food. It’s<br />
actually a way of life for such people. Usually selftaught,<br />
they are knowledgeable about food.<br />
Mhlasi is certainly a foodie, resigning from full<br />
time employment to pursue his passion for food<br />
and turning it into a business venture as well. We<br />
asked the proprietor of Food-With-A-Foodie if we<br />
could be present while he did what he does best -<br />
prepare food. He gladly agreed for us to see him<br />
in full view as he went about his labour of love.<br />
Which we did, chatting him up in the process.<br />
What a privilege! Mhlasi followed a quick and<br />
simple recipe to make spaghetti bolognaise.<br />
Here are the steps he took to prepare the meal.<br />
Steps, by the way, that he does not mind you<br />
following at home.<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 39
TECHNOLOGY<br />
Nokia 3310: The Retro Darling<br />
Returns to Life<br />
Words: Raymond Moremi<br />
The chatters in the techno world are nothing but the<br />
truth. The Nokia 3310 has made a nostalgic return<br />
in the form of a more modern handset. Since news<br />
of its release broke earlier this year, the air has been<br />
abuzz with anticipation of the latter day version of the<br />
indestructible gadget that consumers were introduced to 17<br />
years ago.<br />
The iconic device has finally arrived, hitting the southern<br />
African market on May 30. Eager customers are already snapping<br />
up what is arguably the sturdiest, if now slicker, phone from select<br />
stores like MTN and Cell-C.<br />
It is expected that the user-friendly handset will reach<br />
Botswana from any time in mid-June. Much like its forerunner, the<br />
revamped phone is still called Nokia 3310 and runs an updated<br />
version of the S30 software of the prototype. The software mimics<br />
the behaviour of the original, throwing users into a delectable<br />
delusion of déjà vu in which time is indivisible.<br />
Like the prototype, it may not have WhatsApp but it has a web<br />
browser. It charges through a USB port and has a headphone<br />
socket. Perhaps the greatest appeal of this revamped phone is<br />
its battery life. While smart phones run out of gas faster than a<br />
bat can run out of hell, the standby time on the new 3310 is a<br />
whopping 31 days while it packs 22 hours of talk time! This is<br />
unheard of since the wheel was invented.<br />
Another notable difference is that the remake comes with with<br />
a colour screen, a camera and a price tag range of between P600<br />
and P700. At 80g it is lighter and slimmer. The dark blue of the<br />
prototype is maintained while a yellow-and-red glossy version is<br />
available for the bright-eyed and bushy-tailed customer.<br />
40<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017<br />
Figures indicate that Nokia has sold over 126 million of the<br />
original 3310 since it was launched in the Year 2000. Nokia was<br />
the ultimate ruler that remained popular until it was knocked off<br />
its lofty perch by the arrival of the iPhone and Samsung. Fastforward<br />
to 2017 and it seems nostalgic marketing of the ‘brick<br />
phone’ will ensure it claims a respectable place in the market.<br />
It may sound preposterous to think diehard devotees of Nokia<br />
3310 will give up their smart technology from brands like Huawei<br />
and Samsung, but budget bargains are always hard to ignore.<br />
That alone should be enough to drive meaningful sales.<br />
Eager customers - predictably mostly the 50 plus demographic<br />
- have HDM Global, the Nokia-branded phone makers, to thank<br />
for remembering them in this pleasant manner. HDM Global has<br />
such confidence of the market success of the return of the 3310<br />
that it refers to the doppelganger as “a classic re-imagined.”<br />
Said Shaun Durandt, HMD Global’s manager for southern Africa,<br />
recently: “HMD has received an incredible reception from our<br />
partners so far. It seems everyone shares our excitement for this<br />
next chapter. Our consumers are more discerning and demanding<br />
than ever before, and they’ll always come first. We’ve worked<br />
really hard with our teams around the world to bring together<br />
world-class manufacturers, operating systems and technology<br />
partners, enabling us to proudly start sales of the Nokia 3310, a<br />
classic re-imagined.”<br />
Indeed. Buy it for your granny or child. Even for yourself for<br />
emergencies. Afterall, the device has a web browser and the<br />
famous snake game. Significantly, it is Bluetooth-enabled. The<br />
modern doppelganger is awakening ethos of the turn of the<br />
century when durability still mattered. What a way to relive the<br />
Year 2000!
RE GO FA THUSO KA NAKO<br />
E O E TLHOKANG THATA.<br />
A o amegile mo kotsing ya koloi kana o itse mongwe o o<br />
amegileng mo kotsing ya koloi. MVA Fund e ka go thusa fela<br />
thata go go busetsa mo botsogong jo bo eletsegang.<br />
Re tlhaloganya thata seemo sa motho yo o amegileng mo kotsing ya koloi, re itse fa a tlhoka thuso ya potlako<br />
ebile e le maleba, ke moo re itlamileng go go fa thuso e e tshwanetseng mo nakong e e khutshwane.<br />
Mongwe le mongwe yo o amegileng mo kotsing ya koloi o ka bona dithuso tse di latelang:<br />
MEDICAL ASSISTANCE /<br />
THUSO YA BONGAKA<br />
E ke thuso e e fiwang ba<br />
ba bonyeng dikgobalo<br />
mo kotsing ya koloi.<br />
Maikaelelo magolo a<br />
thuso e ke go busetsa<br />
yo o gobetseng mo<br />
botsogong jo bo<br />
eletsegang. Re go thusa<br />
mo Oureng e le nngwe fa<br />
ele thuso ya potlako kana<br />
malatsi a le matlhano fa e<br />
se ya potlako.<br />
FUNERAL ASSISTANCE / THUSO YA<br />
DITSHENYEGELO Re go thusa mo di Oureng TSA tse di PHITLHO ferang bobedi<br />
A ke madi a a ntshiwang<br />
go thuso mo phitlhong ya<br />
motho yo o tlhokafetseng<br />
mo kotsing ya koloi.<br />
Madi a a ka se fete<br />
P7 500. Re go thusa<br />
mo di Oureng tse<br />
di ferang<br />
bobedi.<br />
LOSS OF EARNINGS / THUSO YA<br />
TATLHEGELO ITSHETSO<br />
Thuso e e fiwa ba<br />
dikgobalo tsa kotsi ya<br />
koloi di bakileng gore ba<br />
latlhegelwe ke pereko kana<br />
ba seka ba tlhola ba kgona<br />
go itshetsa. Re go thusa<br />
mo bekeng tse thataro.<br />
LOSS OF SUPPORT / THUSO YA<br />
BA BA LATLHEGETSWENG<br />
KE MOTLHOKOMEDI<br />
Thuso e e fiwa ba ba<br />
latlhegetsweng ke<br />
motlhokomedi mo kotsing<br />
ya koloi. E ka nna bana,<br />
batsadi, monna kana mosadi,<br />
kana mongwe le mongwe<br />
fela yo o ka supang gore<br />
one a tlhokomelwa ke<br />
moswi. Re go thusa<br />
mo kgweding tse<br />
pedi.<br />
MVA Fund Botswana<br />
Gaborone 3188533 •<br />
Rail Park Mall 3911180 •<br />
Francistown 2410670 •<br />
Maun 6861788 •<br />
Kang 6517124/1 •<br />
Palapye 4921022 •<br />
Selebi-Phikwe 2600275/63<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 41
BOOK REVIEW<br />
Author Exposes<br />
the Heresy of<br />
19th Century<br />
Apartheid<br />
TITLE: Fiela’s Child<br />
AUTHOR: Dalene Mathee<br />
PUBLISHER: Penguin Book (1987)<br />
PAGES: 358<br />
BOOKSHOP: BSPCA Kgale<br />
A<br />
journey of self-discovery,<br />
love, tenacity and yearning<br />
for identity sum up the novel,<br />
Fiela‘s Child. The story is<br />
set in the forests of Knysna<br />
and in Long Kloof Village in 19th Century<br />
South Africa at a time when white power<br />
reigned supreme.<br />
It is based on Fiela Komoetie, a rural coloured<br />
woman who has adopted a 3-year<br />
old white child that she found crying on<br />
her doorstep one cold night. She names<br />
him Benjamin. Nine years later, two male<br />
census enumerators discover him and find<br />
it strange that Fiela should claim him as<br />
her own when she is coloured and he<br />
white.<br />
Emotions run high when they take Benjamin<br />
away to Knysna to check if he is not<br />
the long lost son of woodcutters there. The<br />
theory doesn’t make sense to Fiela because<br />
he found Benjamin when he was three<br />
years old, and travelling to Knysna using<br />
a cart takes two days. What more by foot!<br />
For a young boy he couldn’t have made it<br />
that far because the area is also infested<br />
with elephants.<br />
Benjamin, now 12, is taken to Knysna.<br />
He is anxious that that he may just belong<br />
to the woodcutters. As he gets to Knysna,<br />
Elias and Barta van Rooyen come and<br />
identify him as Lukas, their son who wandered<br />
off nine years before. The tone of<br />
white supremacy is clear when Benjamin<br />
is at the magistrate‘s office. He keeps on<br />
calling the magistrate “Master” inspite of<br />
being told him not to because he is white<br />
he doesn’t need to.<br />
Days go by and Fiela becomes stressed<br />
by the day while Benjamin cannot cope or<br />
adapt to his new family. But he hopes that<br />
Fiela will one day come back to reclaim<br />
him. His new pa, Elias van Rooyen, makes<br />
money out of making beams but it is never<br />
enough. He is depicted as an abusive man<br />
who punishes his children by whipping<br />
them with ox reins. He once cut his daughter‘s<br />
hair with a knife as punishment. The<br />
way he treats his wife is also mean, at times<br />
screaming at her and calling her names.<br />
Yet he loves her. There is a part at the<br />
beginning of the story where he lovingly<br />
stares at her and thinks to himself that<br />
she is beautiful. Barta van Rooyen is hardly<br />
heard, she being a submissive wife who<br />
agrees to all that her husband says and<br />
doesn’t want to ever engage in conversation<br />
with Benjamin. The peak of the story<br />
is when Benjamin, now 20, finally confronts<br />
Barta about if he is really their child.<br />
She breaks down and says he was not. Recalling<br />
the day that they were at the magistrate‘s<br />
office, she tell Benjamin how the<br />
census man had whispered to her before<br />
she got in that she should claim the one in<br />
the blue shirt as her own!<br />
Benjamin finally manages to escape to<br />
Long Kloof. To Fiela‘s surprise, he is no<br />
longer the young boy who used to cling to<br />
her. He has grown tall and handsome. But<br />
though he feels home, he is still confused<br />
regarding who he really is. The mystery of<br />
the story remains even after the last page<br />
because we do not know who Benjamin’s<br />
biological parents are.<br />
However, after much soul searching,<br />
he concludes that he should be known as<br />
Benjamin Komoetie. Maybe he is Fiela‘s<br />
gift from God, a refrain that she keeps<br />
returning to throughout the story. The<br />
novel is thought provoking and brings out<br />
the element of belonging and how much<br />
someone‘s background plays a major role<br />
in their existence.<br />
TINT BOULEVARD<br />
STOP<br />
ORIENTED SERVICES<br />
benmakhala@gmail.com<br />
42<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
MUSIC REVIEW<br />
“YOU” - DJ IZZY FT ONTEFETSE, E.P.I.C &<br />
KAST<br />
MONATJE WA LERATO - FRESH LES FT BERRY<br />
HEART<br />
Jazz speaks all languages, especially the language of love.<br />
And whether you are a native speaker or not, the meaning<br />
of the heart is clear. Fresh Lesokwane and songstress<br />
Berry Heart vehemently show this in their collaboration<br />
on “Monatje Wa Lerato,” an exuberant urban jazz ride<br />
that is as artful as it is articulate and inspired. Wrapped<br />
in clever Sekgalagari lyrics in the midst of layers of jazzy<br />
instrumentation, this is a song that paints love as an<br />
invocation of hope and enables people to overcome<br />
anything in life. This duo makes a perfect combination for<br />
this jam that has a melody that is mellow, warm and inviting.<br />
The song is presented with a versatile Afro-jazz attitude<br />
blended with playful vocals, suggesting that a whole lot<br />
of fun was had during the recording. Lesokwane kicks in<br />
with the intro on the 0:21 mark, bringing a feel good and<br />
cozy-textured vocal that defines the smooth style of jazz.<br />
“Ke sebaka moratiwa / ke tsamaya lefatshe le / ke batla<br />
wena sthando sam,” he croons in the first verse. That is<br />
immediately before smoky, sultry fumes emanate from<br />
Berry Heart’s vocals in the second stanza like liquid fire.<br />
She stokes the embers in the verse with a velvety touch,<br />
especially on the 1:28 mark. The groove is really hot in this<br />
song. The chemistry is evident and I have no doubt the<br />
record will appeal to everyone from the casual listener to<br />
the discerning aficionado.<br />
Within four minutes and one second, “You” finds time to<br />
allow DJ IZZY to showcase his creative dexterity and prove<br />
he is one of the best artists in the local space. The track is<br />
a combination of raw talent, focus, commitment and joy<br />
while the guests featured in this hit song are as special as the<br />
music itself. Izzy is paired up with talented vocalist Ontefetse<br />
Osego who won Season 10 of My Star. Rounding out the bill<br />
are E.P.I.C and the history making Kast of the Tlatsa Lebala<br />
project. Izzy’s appetite for crowd-pleasing music is always as<br />
big, a factor that is on full display here. “You” contains the<br />
essential ingredients of a solid radio banger. Once the 30<br />
second mark passes and the beat and intro finally settle in,<br />
Ontefetse comes on hard with a syrupy vocal delivery that is<br />
rich with ambient textures and full-chest supplies. Lyrically,<br />
this song is a declaration of love and affection for someone<br />
truly special, and Ontefetse complements the message with<br />
colour-drenched vocal calisthenics that are also greatly felt in<br />
the chorus. The chorus, which is one of the highlights of the<br />
song, is adorned with a groovy melody and sing-along lyrics<br />
that are bound to stick in your head. In their own verses,<br />
E.P.I.C and Kast also come off like a winning insurance plan<br />
as they blend in to make the song tighter than a screw jar.<br />
Each individual component of Kast’s delivery has a distinctive<br />
flow that confirms as the star that he is. Elsewhere Bob Cartel<br />
proves his mettle with the way he handles the production<br />
of the song. Izzy has crafted an infectious mid-tempo<br />
soundtrack that is truly ahead of the curve.<br />
INCERTITUDE - KETZ JOHNSON<br />
“Incertitude” is a type of song that captures the true essence<br />
of the soulful house sound. Records like these should never<br />
be taken lightly because they are so rhythmic, so dramatic<br />
and so avant-garde. Ketz Johnson has carved for himself<br />
a tasteful formula that showcases his amazing depth and<br />
sophistication. This is such a silky and mesmerising track<br />
that also has a moody dance beat. It is about expressions of<br />
longing, affection and need for assurance in a relationship.<br />
The beat, the bass line and gentle percussive touches in the<br />
song make it easy for the lad to deliver a magisterial piece<br />
of vocal treasure. If you are a club DJ and are looking for<br />
music that could capsule your nights, this is the song for you.<br />
If you are looking for a song that takes hold of you from the<br />
beginning to the end, look no further than “Incertitude.” 3<br />
Experience it on a great sound system and you will surely be<br />
thrown onto the dance floor, willingly or otherwise.<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 43
MOTORING<br />
The Audi RS6 Avant:<br />
An Expression of Passion for Performance<br />
• It Goes From 0 To 100km/h Within 3.9 seconds<br />
Words: Alpha Molatlhwe<br />
It has been more than 12 years<br />
of both passion for performance<br />
and unpolluted Vorsprung durch<br />
technik with the first iteration of<br />
the Audi RS6 Sedan having been<br />
introduced to southern Africa in<br />
2003 along with the second generation of<br />
the Audi A6. Sold in limited volumes, it<br />
featured a V8 4.2 litre Biturbo engine and<br />
Quattro technology and was blessed with<br />
a massive 331 kW of power output and<br />
580 Nm of torque competency.<br />
The second generation of the Audi<br />
RS6 was launched in 2008 along with<br />
the third generation Audi A6 and<br />
was equipped with a V10 5.0 Biturbo<br />
44<br />
powerplant producing 426 kW and 650<br />
Nm of torque aptitude. It was the single<br />
most powerful Audi ever built. Following<br />
the recent facelift to the Audi A6 range,<br />
the Audi RS6 Avant retains the character<br />
and legacy of its predecessors, offering<br />
refreshed styling and technology.<br />
It is more efficient, attractive and<br />
more sophisticated than ever but it still<br />
manages to convey the notion of passion<br />
for performance. Its exterior design<br />
architecture gives no illusion as to its<br />
performance and its significantly wider<br />
front and rear track, wider wheel arches<br />
when combined with a set of 21-inch<br />
wheels makes it simply unmistakable.<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017<br />
Along with its crushing performance,<br />
the RS6 can also be hugely practical with<br />
a large boot and flexible interior. Being<br />
a fully-fledged RS model, the RS6 Avant<br />
has wider wheel arches. RS specific front<br />
and rear bumper treatment, twin RS<br />
exhaust pipes and brushed aluminium<br />
exterior treatment elevate its sporting soul<br />
without losing its membership of the best<br />
high-performance machine available.<br />
Taking it on the highway, the driver<br />
has a maximum of 412 kW of power<br />
output on tap, which, in conjunction<br />
with an extraordinary 700 Nm of torque<br />
proficiency, makes for remarkable<br />
performance. Its ability to do away with
the 0 to 100 km/h business within an<br />
earth-shattering 3.9 seconds puts it<br />
on a par with super sports cars. This is<br />
thanks in no small part to the 8-speed<br />
tiptronic with its barely perceptible, yet<br />
rapid gearshifts and the standard Quattro<br />
drivetrain which uses a centre differential<br />
with a higher locking rate. Audi cylinder<br />
on demand technology in the 4.0-litre V8<br />
TFSI engine also ensures relatively low<br />
fuel consumption figure of just 9.8 l/100<br />
km. Pinnacle speed with the optional<br />
dynamic package plus is 305 km/h.<br />
The core component of the Quattro<br />
drivetrain in the Audi RS6 Avant is<br />
the self-locking centre differential.<br />
The basic configuration of the purely<br />
mechanical planetary gear set splits the<br />
drive torque asymmetrically between<br />
the front and rear axle to promote<br />
dynamic handling. Together with wheelselective<br />
torque control, it allows the<br />
drive force to be distributed individually<br />
to each wheel as the driving situation<br />
dictates. The standard Quattro Sport<br />
Differential enables the vehicle to turn<br />
into corners even more spontaneously.<br />
The continuously variable distribution of<br />
the drive torque between the rear wheels<br />
leads to a tangible increase in driving<br />
pleasure.<br />
Additionally, the standard RS adaptive<br />
air suspension combines air suspension<br />
with a continuously variable damper<br />
system to enhance the driving dynamics.<br />
As it is linked into the Audi drive select<br />
feature, the suspension can be customized<br />
across a range of characteristics. The<br />
benefits of this include a continuously<br />
adaptive damping system at all four<br />
wheels that automatically adapts to<br />
every driving situation in milliseconds.<br />
Damper control and ground clearance<br />
is adjusted, depending on which Audi<br />
drive select mode is chosen. The body is<br />
kept level at all times even when the car<br />
is unevenly loaded, thanks to permanent<br />
self-levelling. The RS sport suspension<br />
plus and Dynamic Ride Control (DRC) is<br />
also offered as an option. However, unlike<br />
the RS adaptive air suspension, steel coil<br />
springs are used, which leads to a firmer<br />
ride.<br />
Offering the same top-quality interior<br />
as the A6 sedan, travelling in the RS6<br />
Avant is as comfortable as it is sporty.<br />
High quality materials abound, while<br />
customers can choose to customise the<br />
interior to their heart’s content with<br />
Audi exclusive. A full list of standard<br />
equipment is included, offering a superb<br />
mix of technology and refinement.<br />
The Audi RS 6 Avant is also extremely<br />
practical, offering 565 litres of luggage<br />
capacity, which increases to 1 680 litres<br />
with the rear seats folded down. The<br />
optional dynamic package plus includes<br />
ceramic brakes, matrix beam headlights<br />
and sports suspension plus with DRC.<br />
There are also a wide range of driver<br />
assistance systems available, including<br />
an adaptive cruise control with Stop n’<br />
Go function. Audi side assist, which uses<br />
radar sensors to check blindspots when<br />
changing lanes, works closely together<br />
with Audi active lane assist, which<br />
prevents unintended lane changes. The<br />
night vision assistant now includes even<br />
more functions, with the Audi pre-sense<br />
basic safety system available as an option.<br />
Customers are also able to specify the<br />
Audi RS6 Avant with a head-up display<br />
system.<br />
The Audi RS6 Avant comes standard<br />
with a 5 year/100 000km Audi Freeway<br />
Plan that’s extendable to a 6 years/200<br />
000km plan.<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 45
SPORTS<br />
46<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
An Atlantic Mind Aided By A<br />
Pacific Outlook<br />
This is Ocean Lottering, the defiant dyslexic whose dexterity turned him into<br />
the highest scorer at Barcelona Academy where he trained alongside 99 other<br />
youngsters from the world’s best footballing nations in 2015 while his exceptional<br />
aptitude for maths and science is leaving teachers at Livingstone Kolobeng<br />
awestruck<br />
Words: Raymond Moremi<br />
Ocean Lottering is a name that<br />
should soon reach universal<br />
status. The lad behind it is a<br />
19-year old footballer who has<br />
proven that no situation is too<br />
much to overcome. By age 16, the<br />
zesty left footer was already being acclaimed<br />
as one of Botswana’s most promising football<br />
prospects. And with compelling reason.<br />
The show-stopping quality with which he<br />
propelled and controlled the ball on the field<br />
was attracting the attention of people close<br />
to the beautiful game. Ocean’s unmistakable<br />
skill belied his youth, thanks in large part to<br />
his father’s monitoring, especially over the<br />
previous six years. It has been quite a long<br />
way now since the lad discovered that playing<br />
football was what he wanted to do for a living.<br />
And his father Kirk, who early on became<br />
the biggest hand in the youngster’s kicking<br />
abilities, saw that Ocean understood promptly<br />
that talent alone was not enough. It would take<br />
hard work - a lot of hard work – father told<br />
son, to cultivate the talent and turn it into skill.<br />
Perseverance, nay, bare-knuckled doggedness,<br />
Kirk taught, would ensure that the youngster<br />
kept his nose to the grindstone for honing the<br />
skill further. But lo and behold, a damnable<br />
learning disorder called dyslexia sought to<br />
disrupt the lad’s progress and change the<br />
course of his life.<br />
According to Wikipedia, this awful affliction<br />
is characterised by trouble with reading even in<br />
the presence of normal intelligence. Problems<br />
may include difficulties in spelling words,<br />
reading quickly, writing words, ‘sounding out’<br />
words in the head, pronouncing words when<br />
reading aloud and understanding what one<br />
is reading. As it happened with Ocean, these<br />
difficulties are often first noticed at primary<br />
school. The difficulties are involuntary and<br />
people with this disorder have a normal<br />
desire to learn. However, when someone who<br />
previously could read loses the ability, it is<br />
known as alexia.<br />
The antithesis struck when Ocean was 10<br />
years old, and it was determined that he was<br />
a laggard - academically and in other ways -<br />
by two years. It sounds needless to state that<br />
Kirk and his wife, Renee, were devastated by<br />
the diagnosis, to say nothing of Ocean himself.<br />
However, they knew that wallowing in self-pity<br />
would achieve nothing and probably lead to a<br />
poorer prognosis. And so with doctors’ help,<br />
they underscored their son’s strengths as a<br />
counterbalance to his condition. Ocean had<br />
demonstrated a pronounced proficiency in<br />
mathematics and science and had often shown<br />
flashes of brilliance in arts and crafts.<br />
This combination, together with his<br />
aptitude for soccer as already shown by his<br />
dexterity on the ball, was to become the basis of<br />
the lad’s rehabilitation. “We thought this could<br />
be a winning formula for him,” Kirk explains.<br />
“He would get to play football and get a shot at<br />
boosting his physical<br />
strength. We agreed<br />
this practical<br />
solution that relied<br />
on his strength to aid<br />
his weakness.”<br />
The parents have<br />
come to accept the<br />
formula as a way of<br />
life for their beloved<br />
son and will not<br />
regard dyslexia as an<br />
obstacle to Ocean’s<br />
development.<br />
And much like his<br />
parents, the lad<br />
began to foster<br />
endurance to a point<br />
where this crucial<br />
attribute gradually<br />
developed into an<br />
inbuilt quality. He picks up the cue: “From the<br />
time that my parents told me about it, I have<br />
not allowed the fact that I am dyslexic to put<br />
me off in any way. Of course, compared to<br />
my peers, my learning ability is very slow. It<br />
is a sad fact, but it has also given me a bit of a<br />
Ocean with his Barca certificate<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 47
thicker skin to focus on what I do best. It is a<br />
beautiful challenge for me.”<br />
With such an audacious fortitude, Ocean’s<br />
trajectory should stay on course and bolster<br />
his reputation as one of the hottest properties<br />
in Botswana football. The talent and skill of<br />
the nifty left footer saw him become one of the<br />
top three players out of 100 youngsters who<br />
attended a two-week long training camp in<br />
Barcelona, Spain in July 2015. Getting to train<br />
with what is arguably the best football side in<br />
the world, the invincible Barca, could very well<br />
have been one of Ocean’s improbable dreams<br />
for some time. However, when the illusion<br />
took form and rapidly morphed into reality, the<br />
youngster had to pinch himself several times<br />
to be sure that he was not in ‘Cuckooland’ or<br />
suddenly become a somnambulist.<br />
Barca’s style of training that Ocean took part<br />
in at the Barcelona Academy has produced star<br />
players in the order of Cesc Fabregas and Lionel<br />
Messi. It is thus perfectly understandable that<br />
the opportunity was immensely momentous<br />
for Ocean. “It will remain the highpoint of my<br />
life for some time,” he enthuses. “I was joined<br />
in the camp by 99 youngsters from countries<br />
such as Brazil, Mexico and Canada. It was<br />
a bit intimidating at first because these are<br />
outstanding football nations and I a lad from a<br />
country notorious for losing. I got a bit unsettled<br />
and wondered how I would fare against them.”<br />
As it turned out, the lad from Botswana<br />
emerged the best. Throughout the camp, the<br />
100 boys underwent a skills development<br />
programme and a series of test games focusing<br />
on team culture. With his adroit footwork,<br />
pace and astute understanding of the game,<br />
Ocean became the highest scoring player,<br />
hitting the net 11 times in 10 games. He says<br />
he felt unstoppable and increasingly confident<br />
with each game. In time he was convinced<br />
that he was the proud possessor of a powerful<br />
engine that propelled him on when others<br />
began to wane. The ease with which he baffled<br />
his opponents was a marvel to behold, leaving<br />
talent scouts in awe of the wunderkind from a<br />
relatively little known country called Botswana.<br />
Exercise of his well-earned bragging rights<br />
continues: “One of the coaches called me<br />
over and gave me one-on-one advice.<br />
And I was the only player who<br />
got such attention. The coach<br />
told me that he was truly and<br />
absolutely impressed with me<br />
and noted that I had a powerful left<br />
foot. He encouraged me to work on my<br />
right foot.”<br />
The impression that the little midfield<br />
dreadnought made would be a prelude to great<br />
things. Also a product of Gaborone Football<br />
Academy, Ocean’s appearances since the<br />
Barca camp have been brief but magnificent.<br />
Township Rollers has wasted no time signing<br />
him on and is gradually unveiling him to a<br />
watching nation. “Township Rollers are one<br />
of the best, if not the very best team in the<br />
country,” he points out. “Being a part of that the<br />
Blue Family is just amazing. They have taken me<br />
in and are cultivating me further. Since joining<br />
them a year ago, I have grown both as a player<br />
and as an individual. My technique and vision<br />
on the field have improved. I know how to study<br />
an opponent and that it is more than shining on<br />
the field. It is about teamwork for the benefit of<br />
the entire team.”<br />
Meanwhile, the Manager of Township<br />
Rollers, Motshegetsi Mafa, has described Ocean<br />
as “this fearless, vibrant lad with a brimful of<br />
cheek who was ready to set the world on fire”<br />
when he met him as an 18-year old last year.<br />
“He had a technique and composure far above<br />
a boy his age,” Mafa recalls. “Even today he has<br />
a big heart for a boy his age. Our stalwarts Joel<br />
Mogorosi and Mogogi Gabonamong always<br />
guide him on how he can better himself as a<br />
player, and Ocean is always hungry to learn and<br />
execute.”<br />
Although Ocean is a relatively new arrival<br />
at Rollers, also known as the Happy People,<br />
Mafa says the “efficient midfield destroyer” can<br />
be assured of a regular starting place because<br />
in addition to being highly disciplined on and<br />
off the field, his style is garlanded with winning<br />
tricks. He has already been fielded against<br />
major sides like South Africa’s Kaizer Chiefs<br />
and Platinum Stars and shown great mettle.<br />
Even so, keen observers who admire the lad<br />
say Ocean is yet raw and needs to improve his<br />
physical strength and overall game. His dad,<br />
who may be said to be one of them, reminds<br />
him of this every day. “I still think he is far from<br />
reaching his full potential,” Kirk says. “The<br />
good thing is that I can see that he also wants<br />
to go further. I want him to have such a hunger<br />
and feed off it. He has immense potential.”<br />
But if his father is his biggest critic, his<br />
siblings are Ocean’s biggest fans. They consist<br />
of older sister Bronwyn (21) and little brother<br />
Henry (16). Both are infinitely proud of “the<br />
man” that their brother has become. Says Henry<br />
of one whose biggest idol is Barca’s Lionel Messi:<br />
“Ocean has achieved so much and I really look<br />
up to him. He didn’t even have to go for trials<br />
before he was signed on by Rollers.<br />
That’s genius i n<br />
my eyes.”<br />
The most abiding ambition of this defiant<br />
dyslexic is to play alongside the world’s best in<br />
Europe. But in the meantime, he is investing<br />
his heart and soul in the team that currently<br />
has the richest vein of form in Botswana,<br />
Township Rollers, which is basing its plans for<br />
the next season on Ocean’s playing a key role<br />
in offence and scoring. Having left 11 goals out<br />
of 10 games at the Barca training camp, the<br />
Blues know they can trust in Ocean’s ability to<br />
baffle their foes and send enough volleys past<br />
goalkeepers to win games. That is because his<br />
style has been compared with that of the likes of<br />
Ángel Di María, the attacking midfielder who<br />
currently plays for French Ligue 1 club, Paris<br />
Saint-Germain.<br />
Does he ever feel the pressure of competition<br />
from his older counterparts? “No,” he says<br />
without hesitation.<br />
“Honestly, I train to better<br />
myself every day. I always<br />
plan to test my own<br />
boundaries, to become a<br />
better player and person<br />
than I was yesterday.<br />
My competition is my<br />
potential.”<br />
As for academic performance, the head<br />
teachers’ secretary at Livingstone Kolobeng<br />
College leaves the enquirer with the distinct<br />
impression that their phenomenal Form Fiver’s<br />
Atlantic mind is aided by a Pacific outlook. “He<br />
tackles complex formulas with ease and<br />
is never in trouble with anyone,”<br />
says Khumo Muncho. “And his<br />
schedule with Township Rollers<br />
does not affect his focus.”<br />
48<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
Focus on Skills that<br />
Underlie Reading<br />
IN ADDITION TO THE PROGRAMME<br />
DESCRIPTIONS, WE HAVE PROVIDED<br />
A TABLE THAT SUMMARISES SOME OF<br />
THE PROGRAMMES AND THEIR VARYING<br />
FEATURES.<br />
While very<br />
little is<br />
known<br />
about<br />
dyslexia<br />
and its extent of in Botswana,<br />
the heart-warming story of<br />
Ocean Lloyd Lottering and<br />
his struggle to overcome<br />
the debilitating disease<br />
compelled us to browse the<br />
Internet where we found a few<br />
programmes recommended<br />
for coping.<br />
“There are no universally<br />
effective programmes, but<br />
here are knowable principles<br />
that need to be incorporated<br />
in all programmes about how<br />
we teach written language.”<br />
- Maryanne Wolf, researcher<br />
and parent, in Proust and the<br />
Squid, 2007, p. 209<br />
The following is a list of<br />
some programmes that<br />
have been developed for<br />
struggling readers and<br />
writers. Some were created<br />
specifically for dyslexia,<br />
like the Orton-Gillingham<br />
approach.<br />
Depending on the<br />
programme, it may focus on<br />
one of more of the various<br />
skills that underlie reading<br />
- oral language, phonemic<br />
awareness, vocabulary,<br />
comprehension, spelling<br />
or writing. You will need to<br />
determine which programme<br />
works best for your child.<br />
Most generally, these<br />
programmes are best used in<br />
an individual or small group<br />
therapy setting. Professionals<br />
Gillingham approach,<br />
either for training courses<br />
or to access a certified<br />
tutor or therapist, look for<br />
programmes/courses that<br />
have been accredited. The<br />
International Multisensory<br />
Structured Language<br />
Education Council (IMSLEC)<br />
holds their accredited<br />
courses to rigorous standards<br />
that in turn allow the<br />
courses to certify qualified<br />
individuals who meet these<br />
standards as teachers,<br />
therapists and instructors.<br />
will want to familiarise<br />
themselves with the<br />
programme. Some require<br />
specific training. Orton-<br />
Gillingham is a multi-faceted<br />
programme that was created<br />
specifically for dyslexics. It<br />
teaches reading, writing and<br />
spelling by using auditory,<br />
visual, and tactile measures.<br />
Many other reading and<br />
writing programmes utilise<br />
the Orton-Gillingham<br />
approach.<br />
When researching a<br />
Structured Literacy based<br />
programme, such as one<br />
that is built on the Orton-<br />
These accreditationcertification<br />
credentials<br />
ensure access to reliable<br />
and effective instruction.<br />
Other reliable resources<br />
for programs serving<br />
dyslexics are found through<br />
the Academic Language<br />
Therapy Association and<br />
the International Dyslexia<br />
Association.<br />
All About Learning Press<br />
All About Reading teaches phonics, decoding, fluency and<br />
comprehension in a fun and engaging way. All About Spelling<br />
teaches encoding skills, spelling rules and multisensory strategies<br />
to help students become proficient spellers for life.<br />
Visit: http://www.allaboutlearningpress.com<br />
The Barton Reading & Spelling System<br />
The Barton Reading & Spelling System is a one-on-one tutoring<br />
system that improves spelling, reading and writing skills. It<br />
works well for children, teenagers and adults who struggle due to<br />
dyslexia or a learning disability.<br />
Visit: http://www.bartonreading.com<br />
The Family Fun with Fluency Kit<br />
Produced by the Neuhaus Education Centre, this manual<br />
contains a set of passages marked at the hundredth word. A child<br />
can read the passage to the hundredth word while a parent times<br />
how long he takes and tracks his progress over time.<br />
Visit: http://neuhaus.org/family-fun-with-fluency<br />
Literacy Lab<br />
This research-based reading programme starts with the user<br />
distinguishing letters and letter sounds and ending with the<br />
user reading full sentences and stories. In the end, the user can<br />
comprehend and analyze what he or she just read.<br />
Visit: www.mayer-johnson.com/literacy-lab<br />
REWARDS Programme<br />
The REWARDS programme is a family of reading and writing<br />
intervention materials created for young struggling learners.<br />
The programme aims to increase fluency rates, enhance reading<br />
comprehension and increase precision in sentence writing.<br />
Visit: www.soprislearning.com/literacy/rewards-program<br />
Sonday Systems 1 and 2<br />
The Sonday Systems are beginning and intermediate reading<br />
intervention programmes that use the Orton-Gillingham<br />
approach to language instruction. Students will learn and<br />
systematically go through core reading and writing skills such<br />
as sound blending, basic vocabulary, handwriting, and reading<br />
comprehension. The programmes include complete lesson plans<br />
and instruction material for teachers.<br />
Visit: www.winsorlearning.com/products/sonday-system-1<br />
SPELL-Links<br />
This unique programme offers specific activities that are tied<br />
into a student’s curriculum and that assist students with spelling,<br />
reading and writing. The program emphasizes the five categories<br />
of word study: phonological awareness, phonics, vocabulary,<br />
word parts and related words and mental images of words.<br />
Visit: http://www.learningbydesign.com<br />
Source<br />
http://dyslexiahelp.umich.edu/tools/reading-programs<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 49
COMMUNITY<br />
MABU: She takes them from Callow<br />
to confident to Broadway<br />
Soft-spoken in the lilting way of singing lullabies, this entrepreneur and social<br />
activist speaks of the priceless value of life and the need to spend each day as<br />
if it were the last, writes ONONOFILE LONKOKILE<br />
“There is a special place in hell for women<br />
who do not support each other,” said<br />
American politician Madeleine Albright.<br />
Her thinking resonates with Mabu Nteta<br />
who agrees that this observation “sums<br />
it up”, adding that women who do not<br />
want to go to hell should support their<br />
fellow women.<br />
”Even so, the notion that women do<br />
not support one another is tired now,”<br />
says Nteta, better known by her given<br />
name, Mabu. “It is said too much and<br />
confessed too much. Perhaps we should<br />
tell different stories about women who<br />
do not perpetrate and perpetuate this.<br />
At any rate, what about men? There are<br />
men who do not support other men.”<br />
But women, she observes, have no<br />
reason not to support one another<br />
because they were birthed by women,<br />
to start with. She volunteers the<br />
information that it is different with her;<br />
after leaving full time employment and<br />
venturing into the world of business,<br />
she was helped by several women who<br />
gave her her big break.<br />
Feminist, social activist, mother and<br />
businesswoman does not begin to<br />
sum up the force that is Mabu Nteta<br />
(nee Molokomme) – soft-spoken in<br />
the lilting way of singing lullabies but<br />
eloquent and tenacious in the way that<br />
she discusses and analyses issues. She<br />
says the role that she enjoys the most is<br />
that of mother, which she characterises<br />
as the ultimate journey of love that she<br />
50<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
has travelled. Yet she also enjoys her<br />
role in the community where she has<br />
an educational facility called House of<br />
Young for mentoring young people.<br />
Love, which is the wellspring of<br />
sharing, is a virtue that was inculcated in<br />
Mabu from birth. She is now nurturing<br />
it in her children and sharing it with the<br />
community because love is bountiful. At<br />
House of Young, which she describes<br />
as her vehicle of giving back to the<br />
community, Mabu enables the teaching<br />
of a variety of arts. Established in 2011,<br />
House of Young was a response to a gap<br />
that she and her children had identified.<br />
It is a music, drama, arts, dance and<br />
cultural education ‘home’ for children<br />
aged 3 to 23 years.<br />
It provides extra-curricular activities<br />
that are aimed at building selfconfidence,<br />
communication skills<br />
and cultural awareness in the young.<br />
Different tools and exercises are used<br />
to nurture the creative minds of the<br />
young and to groom them to become<br />
confident, ‘life-savvy’ and assertive<br />
adults as poets, singers and performers.<br />
Says Mabu: “It’s about enabling young<br />
people to lead lives rich in cultural<br />
identity and a sense of wonder while<br />
appreciating the virtues of honesty and<br />
compassion. And if we all have the right<br />
to pursue happiness, so much more do<br />
the young. Their sense of humour, Godgiven<br />
talents and creativity, should be<br />
cultivated and used to help them earn a<br />
living and enjoy life to the fullest.”<br />
Because Mabu holds that every child<br />
deserves a performing arts experience,<br />
the programmes at House of Young<br />
are aimed at helping young people<br />
from all walks of life. Hence the vision<br />
is that Botswana’s young people should<br />
be “Liberated, Enchanted and Stay<br />
Forever Young.” The motto is Personal<br />
Best, which is about helping the youth<br />
understand that one’s success depends<br />
on one’s willingness to reach the best<br />
of one’s ability, no matter the level of<br />
experience and/or background.<br />
While House of Young classes are paid<br />
for, they are highly subsidised as the<br />
operations are not for profit. However,<br />
98% of the operations are sponsored by<br />
Mabu and her family, with some of the<br />
children directly sponsored by Mabu<br />
herself. She is so enthusiastic that she<br />
looks at the famous Broadway, “the<br />
highest level of commercial theatre<br />
in the English-speaking world”, as a<br />
realistic target for her youth mentees.<br />
This is understandable, considering that<br />
one of her protégés is budding musician<br />
Katlego Ntirang who has collaborated<br />
with hip-hop star ATI on his hit song<br />
‘Poelo Morago.’<br />
In addition to her wide range of<br />
activities, Mabu is part of an informal<br />
network called Women Adding Value<br />
to Each Other (WAVE) where women<br />
and girls meet for mentorships and<br />
adding value to one another. The<br />
forum is particularly good for fledgling<br />
entrepreneurs, but time is also invested<br />
in advising young women on how to<br />
tackle the different issues that they face<br />
on a daily basis.<br />
While there is a lot that can be<br />
said about Mabu and her social<br />
entrepreneurship, she is also a<br />
businesswoman of note. She graduated<br />
with an MBA from UB where she also<br />
did her junior degree from 1987 to 1991<br />
and Masters thereafter. Upon obtaining<br />
her MBA, she landed her first job in the<br />
hospitality and airline industry in charge<br />
of Air France operations and customer<br />
service in Botswana.<br />
She speaks about this job with<br />
considerable nostalgia because in<br />
addition to being her first and best, it<br />
came with the perquisite of travelling<br />
constantly to Paris mainly for further<br />
training. “It was an eye-opener that<br />
exposed me to a different environment<br />
and fuelled my passion for service, great<br />
work ethic and excellence,” she says.<br />
Whereupon Mabu, sufficiently<br />
“It’s about enabling young<br />
people to lead lives rich<br />
in cultural identity and<br />
a sense of wonder while<br />
appreciating the virtues of<br />
honesty and compassion.<br />
And if we all have the right<br />
to pursue happiness, so<br />
much more do the young.<br />
Their sense of humour<br />
should be cultivated.”<br />
confident to stand on her own, formed<br />
an outfit that she called Service Bridges<br />
Consulting, a company that teaches<br />
that cultivating a positive customer<br />
service work culture will lead to greater<br />
productivity. She has conducted<br />
training in industries such as finance,<br />
manufacturing and insurance in both<br />
the public and private sectors, giving<br />
her a profound insight into Botswana<br />
business ethics and environment. Her<br />
current clients include First National<br />
Bank, Botswana Investment and Trade<br />
Centre, De Beers Botswana, Botswana<br />
Diamond Trading Company, and<br />
Botswana Unified Revenue Service with<br />
whom she works to improve application<br />
of standards of excellence and workrelated<br />
principles.<br />
But busy as she is, Nteta makes time<br />
for sharing with her family and speaks<br />
most affectionately of her husband<br />
and best friend Thapelo Nteta and<br />
their three children. Her philosophy is<br />
that people can – and should - find it<br />
in themselves to appreciate their loved<br />
ones while they are still in life. The loss<br />
of her siblings – her sister Jacqui and<br />
brother Calvin - made her appreciate<br />
the value of life more profoundly and<br />
the significance of spending each day<br />
as if it were the last.<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 51
Matsieng Airshow<br />
in Pictures<br />
Pictures: Baagedi Setlhora<br />
52<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
The world’s strongest man 2017<br />
in Pictures<br />
Pictures: Baagedi Setlhora<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 53
JAZZ FESTIVAL<br />
Featuring<br />
KIRK WHALUM (USA)|JONATHAN BUTLER<br />
TRINITY MPHO, AMANTLE BROWN, ELEMOTHO(NAMIBIA) LORRAINE LIONHEART,<br />
PHILLIP MATE, JAZZ MAN, SINO’S DELUX<br />
VENUE<br />
Venue: Stanbic Bank Piazza | Date: Sat 26 August 2017 | Time: 3pm until Late<br />
Ticket P500<br />
(Normal)<br />
Ticket P750<br />
(Golden Circle)<br />
VVIP P2500<br />
(includes Free ticket<br />
to Champagne Picnic)<br />
CONTACTS<br />
+267 3923381<br />
+267 73156870<br />
54<br />
Tickets sold at Liqourama (Riverwalk, Molapo Crossing & Kgale Only), Webtickets<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017
Visit Your Nearest Branch/ Sales<br />
Branch<br />
Head Office<br />
Private Bag 0053 | Gaborone<br />
Tel: 395 <strong>13</strong>41 | Fax: 395 2926<br />
Serowe Branch<br />
Private Bag Rs 1 | Serowe<br />
Tel/Fax: 463 0291<br />
Rasebolai<br />
Moshupa Branch<br />
P O Box 244 | Moshupa<br />
Tel: 544 9232 | Fax: 544 9205<br />
Pitsane Branch<br />
P O Box 71 | Pitsane<br />
Tel: 548 6205/ 540 7292<br />
Fax: 540 7164<br />
Gaborone Branch<br />
Plot 14395 | New Lobatse Rd.<br />
G/ West Industrial | Next to Cashbuild<br />
Gaborone<br />
Tel: 392 2826/ 316 2039<br />
Fax: 318 2461<br />
Selibe-Phikwe Branch<br />
Private Bag 15 | Selibe-Phikwe<br />
Tel: 261 0455<br />
Fax: 261 1810<br />
Pandamatenga Branch<br />
P O Box 107 | Kasane<br />
Tel: 623 20<strong>13</strong> | Fax: 623 2204<br />
Francistown Branch<br />
(Dumela Industrial)<br />
P O Box 649 | Francistown<br />
Tel: 241 3886/ 241 9546<br />
Fax: 241 3672<br />
Kanye Branch<br />
P O Box 594 | Kanye<br />
Tel: 540 3316| Fax: 544 0644<br />
Mahalapye Branch<br />
P O Box 439<br />
Tel: 471 0249 | Fax: 472 0351<br />
Maun Branch<br />
P O Box 383 | Maun<br />
Tel: 686 0392 | Fax: 680 0978<br />
Palapye Branch<br />
P O Box 151 | Palapye<br />
Tel: 492 0291 | Fax: 490 0291<br />
Hukuntsi Branch<br />
Tel: 651 0343<br />
Molepolole Branch<br />
Tel: 590 6050<br />
Tutume Branch<br />
Tel: 247 0005<br />
Jwaneng Branch<br />
Tel: 588 3311<br />
Sales Office<br />
Mochudi Sales Office Lobatse Sales Office Goodhope Sales Office Takatokwane Sales Office<br />
Letlhakeng Sales Office Nata Sales Office Letlhakane Sales Office Rakops Sales Office<br />
Bobonong Sales Office Masunga Sales Office Ghanzi Sales Office Gumare Sales Office<br />
Shakawe Sales Office Sehitwa Sales Office Kasane Sales Office Machaneng Sales Office<br />
Francistown Sales Office Tsabong Sales Office Middlepits Sales Office Werda Sales Office<br />
(Next to BTCL)Tel:241 3870<br />
Bokspits Sales Office Kang Sales Office<br />
For more information<br />
call 395 <strong>13</strong>41 or<br />
email: Communications@bamb.co.bw<br />
YOUR ONE STOP<br />
AGRICULTURAL MARKET<br />
OF CHOICE<br />
www.bamb.co.bw<br />
www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017 55
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www.inbusiness.co.bw | <strong>Issue</strong> <strong>13</strong> | 2017