Phiwe Mngadi is teaching other women make-up skills and empowering them to launch their own beauty businesses.



Phiwe Mngadi learned the intricate art of micro-blading (eyebrow tattooing) as an extension of what she already knew: nail art and make-up, which she picked up while still at high school.



She didn’t know then that years later, she would turn entrepreneur with her own outfit, the Plush Art Studio, in Johannesburg.



The make-up artist, who has now turned teacher, started in the beauty industry as a nail technician at the age of 17. Self-taught, even way back, instead of attending her matric dance, Mngadi was gainfully employed making her classmates look glamorous for their special day.



She has since not looked back. Having worked in beauty salons in and around Johannesburg to gain more knowledge and experience in the industry, she has now built her own personal brand.



“You learn a lot that way,” says Mngadi of her journey.



In 2015, she resigned as a salaried employee working in salons. She knew she had plenty to offer as an entrepreneur and launched Plush Art in vibrant Soweto and has since expanded to Africa’s richest square mile – Sandton in Johannesburg.



Her focus is permanent make-up and micro-blading.



“You don&#8217;t need a specific background or qualification to be in the business, that&#8217;s what I love about this industry. Having said that, my journey has been interesting because I&#8217;ve started teaching women from different walks of life on how to do permanent makeup and this includes doctors, lawyers, cashiers, teachers, and anyone with the drive to learn the skill with respective qualifications,” says Mngadi.



She adds that she has made an impact in invariably helping women start a new career in the beauty business and become self-sufficient.



With Covid-19 and the world shutting down, she says Plush Art Studio somehow managed to stay afloat.



“I had savings to overcome the stress that came with not working. Business did take a hard knock but women are always desperate to do their brows, so when the country opened, we were back in business and making sales again,” she says.



Mngadi says she has traveled across Africa imparting what she knows. She also has a worked with South African celebrities such as Natasha Thahane, Thando Thabethe and Palesa Madisakwane.



From Soweto to Sandton, she is leaving her mark.

Plush Art

Nailing The Art And Making A Mark

All Omphile Magasa knew was baking, so the 30-year-old took to it as a full-time entrepreneur, and is perhaps one of the few to have tasted success in 2020.  



After losing her salaried job in 2017, Omphile Magasa had no choice but to wipe her tears and turn on the oven to bake. After all, she had to raise her daughter and had debts to pay. 



Magasa, founder of Baked By Opy, was born and raised in Mabeskraal, a small village an hour’s drive away from Rustenburg in South Africa’s North West province.



At the age of seven, Magasa inherited her grandmother’s passion and skill for baking. Raised by her grandparents, the young baker remembers how she was always assigned tasks to help her ‘grandma’.



“It got to a point where I was always craving cakes; always buying pre-mix products and I remembered that I grew up in a family where we baked all the time; we know how to make cakes from scratch,” says Magasa.



In 2015, three years into her IT career, she started making biscuits and cakes to sell at work for R100 or R150 ($7 or $11) a bucket for extra cash.



Magasa was then motivated to explore her baking skills. With the help of online tutorials, she baked a cake for her daughter’s first birthday. Magasa then posted a photograph of it on her social media accounts. This caught the attention of an old school mate who wanted a customized cake too.



This was her first official client, which led to the birth of Baked By Opy.



Unfortunately, Magasa lost her full-time job at the time.



“When you get retrenched, it’s something you never really expect, you think about your debts, child support and I started looking for another job, but my partner reminded me that I’ve been baking and I was probably retrenched because I was too focused on my baking,” she laughs.



“I started baking more, I started posting more on social media because I had more time, I took on more orders and the business started growing and I turned over about R17,000 in 2016/17.”



In 2020, Magasa says she felt the pinch of the lockdown in South Africa only during alert level five. However, business picked up rapidly when she got back to baking action in May. 



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">&#8220;Covid was a blessing in disguise&#8230;.&#8221;</blockquote>



“My business grew bigger during the lockdown. Covid was a blessing in disguise, everyone was home, including the kids, so parents would get customized cakes. Things just started going crazy, I even employed people. When businesses were retrenching, I was hiring and I still intend on hiring more people,” she says.



Magasa also employed an accountant to balance her books.



“My accountant was telling me that it’s important I register for VAT because the business is turning over a million now.”



With the festive season in South Africa, she is receiving multiple orders.



The customized delicacies range from R750 to R19,000 ($52 to $1,300).



From selling biscuits in a bucket, to packaging Christmas desserts for companies, her business has had a sweet ending this year.



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Omphile Magasa

From A Childhood Hobby To Making Dough And A Sweet Year Ending

Six months into the coronavirus pandemic in South Africa, the fate of most small businesses remain uncertain. The few left are struggling to survive. Skilled laborers are without jobs and the country faces an unemployment crisis. On the following are snapshots of some parts of the economy slowly crawling back to life.



BUSINESS WAS GOING WELL FOR JOHNNY ZULU, the owner of a 20-year-old salon named K&amp;S Beauty in Johannesburg, before Covid-19. But ever since the state-imposed lockdown that unfolded in various stages in the country, he says he has lost more than half of his customers. “I am not making money like I used to. Most customers say they fear for their lives and the virus,” rues Zulu. “I had no income, I had to make means to pay my rental. I survived through house calls.” To minimize the risk of clients getting infected, Zulu has now employed a new staff member so customers don’t have to wait in queues outside, and he has also started working on appointments. In this image, Zulu is wearing PPE as he works on a client, and as he also awaits another customer who is late for an appointment.



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A fully-loaded taxi leaves the crowded Winnie Mandela taxi rank at Kempton Park, east of Johannesburg on a busy weekday. All passengers are to mandatorily wear masks and sanitize before boarding the vehicles. 



Sifiso Vilakazi, a taxi owner and former professional South African soccer player, says during Level 5 of the lockdown in South Africa, most drivers lost their daily income and their families went hungry. “Now, since people are going back to work, we have more commuters and things are slowly getting back to normal,” says a hopeful Vilakazi.



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With lockdown restrictions gradually easing, and restaurants and bars reopening in South Africa, people are rediscovering the simple joys and conviviality of eating out. Here, youngsters treat themselves to their favorite local delicacy, called inyama yenhloko (head meat), with pap and salsa, at the popular Kwa Skero restaurant in Soweto, Johannesburg’s urban sprawl. 



Tiisetso Kumbula, a regular patron at the eatery, says she hadn’t enjoyed her favorite meal since March. “When the lockdown started, I had to learn how to cook from TV shows and when the President reopened restaurants, the first thing I wanted was to come here,” enthuses Kumbula.



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A mobile street vendor pushes his trolley filled with fresh fruits and vegetables on a sunny Friday morning. He can now conduct his business freely, without being asked for a special permit as was required during lockdown Levels 5, 4 and 3, by the South African National Defence Force (SANDF) and South African Police Service (SAPS) patrolling the streets in some parts.



<figure class="wp-block-image size-large is-style-default"><img loading="lazy" decoding="async" width="1024" height="684" src="https://www.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/5-1024x684.jpg" alt="" class="wp-image-48262" srcset="https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/5-1024x684.jpg 1024w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/5-300x200.jpg 300w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/5-768x513.jpg 768w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/5-1536x1025.jpg 1536w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/5-2048x1367.jpg 2048w, https://cms.forbesafrica.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/5-600x401.jpg 600w" sizes="auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px" /></figure>



With South Africa’s tourism sector reopening, strict Covid-19 regulations have been implemented in most facilities such as the Kloofendal Nature Reserve in the West Rand of Johannesburg, where mask-wearing, temperature-scans and hand-sanitizing are mandatory. Only smaller groups are allowed for hiking activities.



Adventurer Sabelo Zitha, who loves hiking, is happy to be back at the park, and says: “When President Cyril Ramaphosa announced we could hike again, I was very pleased to hear that. The recent hike we did was quite adventurous because I was doing what I love: being outdoors and engaging with various people, after a long stay at home. It was priceless. Now, I am even happier we can travel and hike in different provinces.’



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After a fairly long and dry spell in South Africa, television shows have been given the green light to be shot on-location. In this image, an elderly citizen passes the site of a TV shoot in progress with Morgan Gould, a South African international footballer, in Rockville Soweto.



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Senior citizens wait in long queues at a local municipal building in Soweto to collect their monthly social grants. Social distancing is mostly not adhered to at these collection depots. Some of the grantees arrive early to stand in line, braving the cold morning air and Covid-19.

A Day In The Life Of…

On Wednesday, South Africa’s labour unions and federations united to send strong statements to the government against corruption, gender-based violence, job losses and unemployment, bemoaning the state of the economy. Most protesters at the march were not wearing masks but donned a common stance.

IMG_0085

United Stance

The small-towner started off as a model, then ventured into fashion, constructing Afro-urban clothing the unconventional way. Lebogang Makgale is a creative on a mission.



In Johannesburg’s cultural and creative nerve center that is Newtown, a chic district in the inner city with bustling clubs, cafés and art galleries, Lebogang Makgale’s fashion studio is an apt adornment.



The curious, vibrant young passers-by outside his door often stop to inspect his garments but to the 27-year-old fashionista, the uncontested center-piece in his bright blue studio is a hard-working sewing machine he bought for $34. It stands as a symbol of hope that gave fresh impetus to his life – and continues to be his career’s biggest investment, carefully-positioned in a corner enveloped by photographs from his first fashion collection. 



The space is otherwise strewn with clothes, fabric and accounting books. He is at ease with each of these objects. After all, his journey started studying accountancy at the University of Johannesburg (UJ), a venerable higher learning institution located close to where he is today.&nbsp;&nbsp;



Long before that, in high school, the Soweto-born creative artiste called himself ‘MacGale’, a play on his surname, which he artfully inscribed on classroom desks. The name stuck.



It must have been ordained. Today, that’s also the name of his fashion brand.



“A bookworm, shy and not very social” in school, fortunately, his interest in sport and athletics ensured he always had a coterie of friends and followers. But he also had another quality that endeared him to them – his interest in fashion and his distinct sartorial sense.&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;



&nbsp;He wanted to be a sports star, and his parents wanted him to become a chartered accountant, but this was the only talent – like his self-styled sobriquet – that stuck, and carried him through his growing years.



&nbsp;He pursued an extended diploma in accounting, but Makgale felt out of place; accounting was dull and gloomy in comparison with the myriad colors of the fashion world.



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“About seven months into the course, a classmate told me that I am tall and had style and advised me to take on modeling. I took it seriously and joined an agency. They [the agencies] told me I am not tall enough, not masculine enough, but I persisted despite everything being shut out,” recalls Makgale when we meet him one warm January afternoon in Johennesburg.



Floyd Manotoano, known in South Africa’s emancipated fashion circuit as Floyd Avenue and winner of the GQ Scouting Menswear Competition in 2017, gave Makgale the modeling platform, and he didn’t look back.



His trips to designers’ studios for fittings and fashion shows only grew his innate love for couture.



“I was still enrolled at UJ but not going to class, I was going to studio. My transport fare and lunch money were used to buy fabric. We always had a plan showcasing across Johannesburg and always buying fabric. A friend also taught me how to thread a sewing machine. I was also introduced to styling and started consulting to make outfits for matric dances,” says Makgale.&nbsp;



The networking and mingling in the fashion world helped. He thereby met a tailor who sold him his sewing machine for $34. Now, all he needed was to perfect his craft.&nbsp;



He turned to technology, and characteristically for a youngster in the digital age, sought the help of online tutorials to learn to sew. He debuted with an ethnic Ndebele print collection.



In 2013, reality kicked in. His father asked for his varsity results. He had to break the news to him. That he was not keen on accounting, and he had been bunking classes. His concerned father asked him: “There are a lot of designers, how are you going to make money?”



He had enrolled at a fashion school with little knowledge and experience of the industry. But he was beginning to make an impression with his clothes.



Two years in, Makgale dropped out to focus on the business side of fashion. Being blogged about and being known on the streets wasn’t paying the bills; he had to make ends meet.



“I disappeared and disconnected from the street to focus on the brand, MacGale. I had to start from scratch. I had to create a client base, a target market. I slowly established myself as a professional fashion designer. That’s when the true identity of the brand evolved, in 2015,” he says.



During his off-grid period, he worked on a collection for BackToTheCity, South Africa’s biggest annual hip-hop and street culture festival. 2015 was a definitive year for him; he tailored an African-inspired street wear collection and incorporated it with plastic.



Soon after, fashion photographer Chris Saunders approached him. He was shooting for an international magazine profiling the coolest kids in Johannesburg. Saunders selected Makgale and that became part of a showcase at the Tropenmuseum in Amsterdam.



&nbsp;Business started trickling in; Makgale was making matric dance suits, whilst polishing his designing skills.



“There was a time when that was the only kind of work I would be getting. It wasn’t fun, but it made business sense because the matric boys would refer everyone to me,” he recalls.



In 2015, he was also introduced to cycling by a long-time friend and athlete. His original love for sport was stoked. But there again, his love for fashion prevailed.



“Cycling equipment and kits are expensive. The color combinations didn’t make sense to me, so I made [comfortable clothes] I could cycle in that would also look cool. I started with jackets with pockets at the back, then shorts with tights that go underneath. I then decided to make a fashionable active wear collection,” he says.



About a year later, this got the attention of Moja Nation, an advertising agency working on the ‘Let Wonder Out’ campaign for Oreo cookies. This was going to be Makgale’s first corporate gig.



Despite the challenges he faced, Oreo loved his work and asked him to work on their second campaign. This time, he was more experienced and able to execute the whole order by himself.



He worked on it whilst helping Floyd Avenue with his 2017 South Africa Fashion Week collection.



“I worked with Lebo when I won the GQ award. I’ve known him for a long time; I even made his matric dance suit that was inspired by Kanye West. I’ve seen his growth; he has invested in his craft. I knew him as a student at UJ. Years later, we started meeting at fashion events and started working together,” says Floyd Avenue.



In 2017, Makgale was also part of a TV show, 100 Percent Youth, on SABC1, which documented his sourcing and creation processes.



“I came across striped fabric and fell in love with it. I made a striped jacket live on camera. Little did I know that was the beginning of an era, I started my stripe journey,” he recalls.&nbsp;&nbsp;



The stripes inspired his tailored suits, not of the traditional kind, but also motivated by waistcoats, and women’s wear like corsets and dungarees. This was his third official collection.&nbsp;



After 100 Percent Youth was aired, he started receiving more orders for his suits and he was soon appearing in season two of SABC’s fashion reality TV show Raw Silk. He made it to the top five and that too got him traction and customers.



By this point, he had developed working relationships with hip and happening local celebrities such as Khetsiwe Morgan, also known as DJ Doowap. Most of the women’s garments that Makgale creates are for her. He had never seen himself crafting womenswear until Raw Silk happened.



“I don’t like shopping at the mall; I’m about creating things that no one wears, so I was trying to find a tailor for the longest time. My boyfriend told me about Lebo’s collection, I met him and he is super-easy to work with. He is super-honest and tells me when something isn’t going to work. The first garment he made for me was for the Metro FM Awards in 2017, he made a three-piece garment using Swati fabric,” says DJ Doowap.



Makgale has expanded his business since and is working on costume design for local and international advertising campaigns. His journey started in an accounting classroom. But today, he is a passionate fashion entrepreneur on his way up. He may not be balancing books, but he is certainly on the money.

IMG_1130

The $34 Investment That Fashioned A Career

Tshego Manche grew up in Klerksdorp and found sartorial visibility in big city Johannesburg.



Born in Klerksdorp, a small town in the North West Province of South Africa, Tshego Manche was raised in a business-oriented family.



Her parents owned a salon and cosmetic store in the township for over 20 years before venturing into other businesses.



“Coming from that environment, I already knew I wanted to be an entrepreneur,” says the 30-year-old fashionista today. “I aimed for what I am passionate about. Growing up,&nbsp;I always said I am&nbsp;a small town girl with big city dreams.”



Manche, known for her sartorial sense among friends, studied for a BCom degree in Marketing Management and whilst in varsity, worked at Pulsate, a fashion store in Africa’s richest square mile, Sandton, in Johannesburg.



“Two weeks after being employed, the owner flew down and said he had to meet me as there was a spike in sales. I was never afraid to approach people and tell them about the store, and also interact with customers. I then learned customer and marketing skills, and developed a deeper love for fashion which led me to want to start my own brand,” says Manche.



La Manche clothing was registered in early 2012 and was ready to put the all the theory into practice. Manche dropped out of varsity during her third year and went on to start selling on a small scale to friends and family, and she opened her physical store end of 2012.



Her mother contributed immensely to her startup and invested in clothing, packaging, and also paid for her flights and accommodation to look for stock in China and Turkey. The brand started growing. In 2014, she employed three workers, teamed up with stylists and magazine editors and the brand grew with sales doubling, she says.



“In 2015, we hit our million mark [offering local and international clothing]. From 2016 onwards, we hit a decline in sales as new entrants in the market came; rental for my space was also high and the location remote. In 2017, I started 100% custom-making; growth had been slow yet steady and I had nine employees by the end of 2019. I decided to close my physical store in April 2019 and stay with one employee.&nbsp;Now in 2020, we are focusing solely on the online space we have rebranded and restructured.”



The coronavirus also had an impact on business but this has taught her that digitizing the business is the best way to go. She also took to social media, encouraging other entrepreneurs during the tough times.



“I invited different people from different industries to come talk to people and engage about entrepreneurship every Monday for 10 weeks. We had one livestream with over 10,000 viewers,” says Manche.



Who would have thought a small town girl would encourage entrepreneurs in a big city to keep pushing ahead in the hard times.

Tshego Manche

The Small-Towner With Big Dreams For African Fashion

Zibusiso Mkhwanazi employs the ‘strategic creative firepower’ he uses in advertising to help businesses innovate and survive the current crises.



Today, he is the Group CEO of M&amp;N Brands and co-founder of Avatar, but Zibusiso Mkhwanazi’s entrepreneurial journey started in primary school, when he would sell sweets to make transport money. The sugar rush was his first taste of entrepreneurship.



Later, in high school, during the holidays, he sold ice-cream in the sweltering streets of Johannesburg’s Central Business District, sometimes rewarding himself with KFC chicken at the end of a long day.



Somewhere along the way, he discovered a love for computers that would groom him to one day start his own website development business.



“My mom didn’t have the means to take me to varsity, so she gave me R2,000 ($118). I put it in the stock market and significantly turned it into about R14,000 ($820). I used that money to start my website business at a time when creativity was not implemented in the website industry,” says Mkhwanazi.



He also bought his first suit so he could attend meetings, printed his first company profile and started buying student website samples for about R2,000 and selling the designs to corporates for about seven times that amount. All of that enabled him to commence his business in 2001 when the internet was still new for most Africans.



“We saw a gap, the internet was growing, but ICT companies were designing horrible websites because they are not designers, but we knew people who could actually design and make something look really good,” he says.



He worked with big brands and that accelerated the growth. In 2006, the company merged with Krazyboyz, a digital solutions company present in Johannesburg and Cape Town.



In 2012, Mkhwanazi co-founded Avatar with business partner Veli Ngubane to move from web design to integrated marketing.



“We were just about ideas, whether for the web, the radio, TV or print; it was about ideas that solve human problems. We were building communication according to human truth and human insight, like how the consumer wants to be spoken to,” he emphasizes.



Mkhwanazi left Krazyboyz with nothing except a few customers and since then, Avatar has grown at over 100% every year according to him. In the first year, the company turned over about R1 million ($60,000) and today, is one of South Africa&#8217;s largest black-owned and managed advertising agencies.



Like most business affected by the coronavirus, Avatar has had its share of issues and has had to adapt.



“It is very important to be there for our clients in a time of need, so we try as much to accommodate them. What we did was pivot as a business and said ‘we have strategic creative firepower that we create advertising work with, what if we could use the same firepower to help companies innovate, because coronavirus means they have to change very quickly and all of that requires innovation’,” says Mkhwanazi.



As a business, he adds, that is what they do daily, solving problems in creative ways.



“Some companies are not built around innovation, we became their center of innovative thinking to help them rethink themselves and that is how we are helping many corporate companies survive the coronavirus under ‘the new normal’. The ultimate aim is to save as many jobs as possible,” he says.

Zibusiso Mkwanazi (left) and co-founder Veli Ngubane

From Selling Candy To Tasting Success

Tsholanang Mathibe never let her humble upbringing come in the way of her big dreams designing for the rich and famous in South Africa.



Picture this. Somewhere in Kanana, a rural village in the innards of South Africa’s North West province, a young girl takes a break from a routine day out playing in the fields with her friends, and accidentally leafs through the fashion pages of a glossy magazine, awe-struck by the style and design aesthetics of the big city. And she plans her life in that one moment.&nbsp;



Today, at 29, Tsholanang Mathibe is a fashion entrepreneur and founder of Blackmarble Designs in South Africa’s capital Pretoria, designing for brides and businesswomen, but still recalling that day in the sun when life shone her career path.



“I’ve never seen myself doing anything else from the age of nine,” says Mathibe.



The coronavirus-induced economic downturn in South Africa has no doubt affected her business as well, but it is a good time to reflect on how far she has come, and how much farther she wants to go.



“Lockdown has affected business greatly because most of our clients get garments done to attend special events. With [not many of those events happening], people are sceptical [about] purchasing costumed clothing,” she says.



Mathibe is now fashioning face-masks and recently rented out a wedding gown for a private ceremony.



Her formative years were tough. After high school, she moved to Pretoria for a B.Tech in Fashion Design at the Tshwane University of Technology. It was not easy adjusting to life in the city and the challenges of higher education. She even briefly mulled switching careers to deejaying, but her mother motivated her to stay the course.



“The fashion journey is tough, and the fact that people don’t talk about that side of the industry baffles me, because when I was in high school, I thought it was all glitz and&nbsp; glamor, until I got to varsity.”



When it came to finally starting her own business and choosing a name for her brand, she harked back to her maths classes in school, when her teacher, in discussing numbers, always referred to marbles.



Mathibe used it in conjunction with black, her favorite color, and Blackmarble Designs was born.



The maths teacher had also shown interest in the young creative that Mathibe was and arranged for her to meet with fashion designer, Ephraim Molingoane of Ephymol, a menswear fashion label.



Blackmarble was registered in 2013 when she was still in her final year, and commenced operations in 2014.



“I was helped by the fact that I won an industrial sewing machine for a fashion range I had produced during my third year, when students showcase their work. I won the best innovation award. That helped me start my business.”



In the first year of operation, Mathibe was working out of her aunt’s backroom in Soweto, sleeping alongside her equipment and waking up to work all day or night.



“I spent most of my time in that room doing mostly ready-to-wear garments to showcase and sell at social markets between Johannesburg and Cape Town. A client then referred South Africa’s popular radio deejay, DJ Sabby, to me. He needed an outfit for the J&amp;B MET. That was my first celebrity client,” she recalls.



The following year, she moved back to Pretoria to live with her partner. Business was picking up and she enjoyed making bespoke outfits rather than ready-to-wear. She also started promoting the brand online to reach a wider audience; things were getting better and the business had momentum.



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“I am still using my home as my studio, and in 2019, the business got its first bridal client and since then, that was the market we were mostly [focusing] on before the lockdown,” she says.



Her first client for a bridal outfit was Lindiwe Sibiloane, who had seen a matric dance garment that Mathibe had designed.



“I was looking for something very similar to that [matric dance garment]; then I asked her to do a bridal gown, and she did it. I am still happy about it, everyone was raving about that dress; they still are,” says Sibiloane.



Mathibe’s bridal gowns cost upwards of $1,000.



So far, Blackmarble Designs has also dressed FORBES AFRICA 30 Under 30 alumna such as South African actor Thuso Mbedu and Reabetswe Ngwane, co-founder and MD of Kreamfields, who incidentally, Mathibe has known from primary school.



Mathibe dressed Ngwane for the glamorous Veuve Clicquot Masters Polo social event in 2019.



“I told her I needed a dress. I gave her a brief the week of the event. I sent her a few pictures I had seen on Pinterest. A few days later, the dress was done to the ‘T’ and didn’t need any adjustments, save for a button,” says Ngwane.



Somewhere in Kanana, a young girl must be reading this article now and being suitably inspired, just like Mathibe had been, all those years ago.&nbsp;

DSCF8086

A Day In The Fields, A Lifetime In Fashion

He ran away from his circumstances in war-torn South Sudan. Today, this refugee athlete has crossed boundaries, broken barriers and has Olympic aspirations.



Seventy million. That’s the number of refugees forcibly displaced worldwide. The size of an entire nation. People without homes in a world that is now saying ‘stay home, stay safe’.



&nbsp;Jamal Abdelmaji Eisa Mohammed is one of them, forced to leave his home at a young age. Still in his 20s, this South Sudan-born migrant refused to confine himself within boundaries. In fact, he crossed several of them, as a full-time ‘refugee athlete’, eventually making it to the finish line and winning gold at world sporting events.



When he was only eight years old, he had to endure the tragedy of losing his father – who was shot and killed by the militia in his home country. “When you grow up, you have your dad and you don’t need to worry about anything because someone cares about you, and [then] you lose him and life goes from good to terrible and that’s how I decided to do something for my siblings because I was now the head of the family,” recalls Mohammed.



In 2010, this led him to decide to leave his conflict-ridden country to seek greener pastures. However, he legally couldn’t because he was underaged, but arranged to pay to have his date of birth changed.



“I saved money and changed my birth year from 1996 to 1993. I then traveled to Egypt and then Israel and slept in the park until I met a kind Sudanese person who let me move into his house.”



Two years on, Mohammed had made friends in the foreign country and played football with them. One of them advised him to take to athletics because he could run behind a ball for hours.



In 2014, he joined a club, and won his very first competition.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">&#8220;When you grow up, you have your dad and you don’t need to worry about anything because someone cares about you, and [then] you lose him and life goes from good to terrible and that’s how I decided to do something for my siblings because I was now the head of the family.”</blockquote>



Today, Mohammed is a part of the Athlete Refugee Team (A.R.T), formed in early 2017 by Kenyan long-distance runner, Tegla Loroupe, for refugee track athletes competing in global IAAF (World Athletics) events and the Olympics. A.R.T is funded by On Running, IAAF, the UNHCR and Pascal Gerdsmeier, a private investor based in Monaco. A.R.T, made up of refugees from the Congo, Ethiopia, Somalia, South Sudan and Morocco, is hoping to take them to next year’s Tokyo Olympic Games as medal contenders.



A 90-minute documentary titled RUN, released on June 20 (World Refugee Day), depicts the story of A.R.T from inception to the current coronavirus crisis that has stalled the sporting world. The documentary, shot over three years and across three continents, follows the athletes’ “emotional journey to compete at the Olympics”, and covers their lives, from “living in war-torn tribal regions to competing on the world stage”. It’s the story of the human spirit and how sport can change lives.



Since 2017, Mohammed has traveled between Europe and Africa competing professionally. A top contender for the now-postponed Olympics, he continues training hard for the proposed event in 2021. He ran away from his destiny at a young age, and continues to change the course of his life.

Jamal Mohammed [2]

Success In The Long Run

A tourist magnet, this small town in South Africa faces its own Covid-19 crisis, but the outdoors still entice. 



In the northeastern region of South Africa, nestled in the verdant Mpumalanga province is a capital city named Nelspruit, now known as Mbombela, a stunning and popular getaway for city-dwellers and tourists from other parts of the country.



Personal reasons took me to Mbombela recently, with special permission to move between provinces. And in the current pandemic, with no tourists flocking to the town to admire its iconic scenery or engage with the friendly locals, I had all the time and space to soak it in and capture it all on camera.



I arrived here around noon by road from Soweto, the vibrant township where I reside, 371kms away in Johannesburg.



Mpumalanga was warm in comparison with the wintry Gauteng province, which Soweto is a part of.



Although in the same country, the two provinces have many obvious differences, but the conversations and concerns around the coronavirus pandemic were the same, when I was there.



Despite Mpumalanga recording lower infection rates – and hardly any power cuts as in Gauteng – the face-mask was a common motif here too, from the petrol stations to the parking lots.



An old family friend came to pick me up in a small town called White River. He had arranged a safe place for me to rest and work in at the Kabokweni township, where he resides. The driving was different. I am used to Johannesburg’s beautiful tarred roads but this time, I was up in the bumpy mountains in my 1.4-liter car. I was worried because the locals were speeding up and down and I had to be extra-careful as I negotiated my way up to my place of stay.



I was now settled and able to respond to work emails, make calls and even sample the province’s tap water (although I prefer the water in Johannesburg). The next morning, it was back to business. I was up early like any professional photographer to catch the early rays of the Mpumalanga sun. It was enchanting. My friend and I wore our masks and gloves and topped our hand-sanitizers. We walked down the hill and the first stop was at the local eatery where women were rustling up African cuisine on the side of the road. They could tell I was not a resident because of my accent, but didn’t mind me photographing them. 



About a kilometer down the road, was a church that I had spotted enroute to my accommodation the previous day. I was intrigued by the architecture of this Lutheran Church.&nbsp;



As we continued walking and admiring the landscape, keeping clear of speeding cars, I also spotted a mosque on the horizon, and couldn’t leave without capturing it. We walked up to it and spoke to the caretaker about how they were practising social distancing here.



On our way back, I heard that 13 nurses had tested Covid-19 positive at the local clinic, so the town’s inhabitants had started taking the virus seriously. However, I did discover the face-mask-and-social-distancing rules were being flouted considerably at the shopping malls.



Well before my return to Johannesburg, I had picked up and could now speak a new language: siSwati (Bantu language spoken in eSwatini and South Africa by the Swazi people). I was fascinated by how the locals spoke it and I didn’t really care about what they were saying to me; I just wanted them to keep talking. I have since become a new convert to tuning in to siSwati news on the telly every day, still enthralled by how much a small town can teach fast-paced city-dwellers like me.

MIP_6327

The Road Trip To Mbombela

As South Africa enters Alert Level 2 of the lockdown today, with the ban on alcohol and tobacco products lifted, the country’s restaurants, bars and taverns are hoping for a new lease of life. Liqour stores across the country witnessed snaking queues today. In this picture, taken in the morning, consumers wait in line outside Makro in the Crown Mines area, to buy alcohol in bulk. Some of them arrived in the early hours even before the shops opened.

IMG_8530

The True Spirit Of Level 2

South African tattoo artist Sibusiso Cele on how he has been leaving an impression despite the pandemic.



‘Stay home, avoid contact’ is the prevailing motto of our times.



But, as it appears, not for South African freelance tattoo artist Sibusiso Cele, who has actually been receiving more requests for home visits at this time.



Tattoo art is hugely popular in Johannesburg, and since the reopening of tattoo parlors in level 3 of the national lockdown, artists admit to increased interest in people wanting to get themselves inked, some even reportedly wanting to capture the historic pandemic with a tattoo. &nbsp;&nbsp;



“Personally, the lockdown has worked out in my favor in so many ways,” says Cele.



Known as ‘Inkboy Que’, Cele, now 24, was born in Johannesburg and raised in the Umlazi township in Durban, a coastal city in the KwaZulu-Natal province of South Africa, by his aunt who has been his greatest support. His older brother, Simphiwe, taught him to draw from a young age.



“Simphiwe played a huge role in the manifestation of my career. It is unfortunate that Simphiwe is now late and he can’t see my exceptional work thus far. Eventually, I put my all into drawing, to a point where I drew everything and anything in school; it was a passion,” recalls Cele.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">&#8220;I already had a face tattoo and the corporate world regarded it as being unprofessional to have any visible tattoos.&#8221;</blockquote>



In 2013, with a good friend, Cele invested in his first tattoo kit. He traveled locally tattooing but worked mainly from his backroom at home in Umlazi. At the time, his family didn’t consider tattoo art a career, but he persisted.



“In 2015, I was admitted into Durban City College for an engineering course. It was an amazing opportunity to further my studies, however, it was affecting the family financially, also, I already had a face tattoo and the corporate world regarded it as being unprofessional to have any visible tattoos.&nbsp;That was more of a reason not to pursue that career, [so] during the third semester, I dropped out. Above everything at that time, I had invested so much into doing tattoos and the name ‘Inkboy’ was born,” says Cele.



Shortly after that, he moved to Mpumalanga where he had already created a clientele.&nbsp;In 2018, he joined the Soweto Ink family that helped mould his craft until early this year when he officially became an independent tattoo artist and traveled widely across provinces.



But with the coronavirus pandemic and South Africa closing borders and businesses, including tattoo parlors, and the country going into lockdown, Cele had to slow down on the travel. But that didn’t stop him from seeking opportunities locally.



“Firstly, I have financial control, I take my own decisions, and I am comfortable. Normally, I see one or two clients a day because of the traveling and setting up,” he says.



Before the lockdown, Cele mostly traveled to Durban and Mpumalanga, from his home in Johannesburg. His daily travel expenses to clients start at R900. But clients are considerate enough to meet him half-way; besides that, his tattooing rates start at R300, depending on size and detailing.



Cele says getting himself tested for Covid-19 is a big priority for him.



“I do it regularly. Actually, the last time I was tested was a few days ago and because my clients are mostly artists, their profession requires them to get tested too. Besides, I make sure I always wear my PPE for extra safety,” he says.



Since branching out on his own, Cele has been seeing professional growth and has worked with socialites and celebrities in the entertainment industry such as South African musicians ‘DJ Tira’ and Naak MusiQ among others.



Cele says he has learned a lot from the business and his art.



“I wouldn’t say I am making a lot of money but I am getting the hang of being financially stable and it comes with all the responsibility, but it’s a good thing, I’m getting used to this,” he smiles.



Clearly, leaving an impression is his specialty.

Sibusisi Cele InkBoy

Ink Is In: Tattoos In The Time Of Covid

Katlego Thwane has had to dip into his own savings, with the Covid-19 crisis, to fund his noble cause, teaching the underprivileged in a South African township.



He is in his twenties, yet turning around the destiny of underprivileged young people around him.



Katlego Thwane, a 28-year-old born and bred in South Africa’s lively township of Soweto, is an educator and founder of the Atlegang Bana Foundation here that caters to primary school learners who struggle to keep up at school and need additional help.



“Our foundation also provides for needy learners from underprivileged backgrounds. One of my biggest campaigns at the foundation every year is to give confidence and motivation to learners for the year ahead,” says Thwane.



He has bagged numerous awards and accolades for his work, as a 2017 Young Community Shaper, 2018 Lead SA hero and featuring on live television show Big Up on SABC Mzansi in 2018.



Growing up, he was a “naughty boy”, as he describes himself, but says many are now astonished at the serious, ambitious young man he has become.



“Teaching has always been a passion of mine. I love seeing change, transformation and grooming leaders, and value their education while being innovative in taking&nbsp;our country forward.”



Thwane has recently established a clothing brand, BANA, under the Atlegang Bana Foundation. He is also currently handing out food parcels to the needy in his community, in partnership with Hollywoodbets.



“The virus has affected us immensely with many parents losing their jobs or taking salary cuts, we are not receiving the financial support as before. This has led to me [dipping] into my own personal pocket and [using it] to buy tutors data for teaching virtually,” says Thwane.



Most schools continue operating online because learners haven’t as yet returned to school, however, this has come with its share of setbacks.



Makosha Masedi, a parent of a Grade 4 learner, says her challenges come with network issues and understanding the tasks given to the child.



“Some of the programs that the work is loaded on to is not friendly for all devices, so submitting and retrieving becomes a problem, as also understanding some of the work,” rues Masedi.



But Thwane powers on, hoping for a better tomorrow, for himself and his country.

Katlego Thwane

All For Grooming Future Leaders

After 14 days in isolation as a Covid-19 patient, this FORBES AFRICA photojournalist recovered to see the world with new eyes and realize he had the gift of life.



It was around 3PM on June 24 when a nurse called to tell me that I could now officially end my 14-day self-isolation period at home. I had tested Covid-19 positive three weeks before and now was in total disbelief that I had survived this particular physical trial and mental ordeal.



Before testing positive, I was like any other ordinary South African, pursuing my work from home, and as a FORBES AFRICA photojournalist, recording the impact of the coronavirus.



I had thought my face-mask and hand-sanitizer were my armour against the virus, but I guess one can never be too careful.



The first 72 hours of knowing that I had confirmed positive for Covid-19 came with its own set of emotions and experiences. Some friends, and even family, criticized and judged me for carrying the virus, but I also came to know about the ones who cared.



A group of doctors visited me at home to check if I needed hospitalization. They were young and not cloaked head-to-toe in PPE as I had thought. One of them was wearing a camouflage top and sported a few tattoos on his left arm. After his consultation with me, he spoke excitedly about the baby he and his wife were expecting, due later in the year. 



There was hope in the world.



I was confident my health was getting better until a nurse called me a few days later. She was the pin that burst my bubble, as she stated things I didn’t want to hear at the time. They were facts, she clinically warned, as she sees people dying daily of the virus. 



My mind raced to the previous two nights, when I experienced mild short breaths and thought how the attack could have been worse. I could have died at night all by myself, just trying to breathe. I shed tears as she spoke.



Soon after that, an old friend of mine, who had been shot (and injured) in the spine during an armed robbery attack, called. His timing was perfect. He encouraged me to live on and smile, and told me that the nurse was only doing her job, in advising me to keep to a healthy diet during this time. He brought a smile to my face.



A week later, it was my mother’s birthday. Every year, I visit her with a gift and a cake. This time, all I could do was video-call her; she was both happy and sad not to be able to see me. Two days later, it was my own birthday. I felt low and lonely, but was glad to be alive as my two weeks in self-quarantine was going to be over soon.



<blockquote class="wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow">&#8220;I asked if I would be added on as a statistic to the official recovery numbers, and she laughed.&#8221;</blockquote>



I was reluctant to leave the house, but on June 24, the call by a lady who identified herself as &#8220;Nurse Nomsa from the Department of Health&#8221; liberated me. She was following up on my health status for the previous two weeks and I had ticked all the right boxes. I asked if I would be added on as a statistic to the official recovery numbers, and she laughed. She told me I had recovered, but should continue maintaining a healthy lifestyle.



Today, I can stand outside my home in Soweto and watch the neighbors’ kids play, shout and scream, asking from their yards, “Malume (uncle), are you okay?”



With a gentle laugh and nod, I acknowledge my story of survival to them.

T 610

The Test, Trial And Triumph

With a deadly virus still lurking in the streets and tougher times ahead, traders in South Africa’s colorful townships desperately look to resuscitate their businesses with creative offerings online. 



It’s almost two months into lockdown in South Africa and the country’s townships, once bustling hubs of trade, are slowly bracing themselves, with every ounce of willpower left in them, for the unprecedented reality that is ‘the new normal’.



For many, the national shutdown and closed shutters have meant lost jobs, stalled incomes and empty pockets, not to mention a deadly virus stalking them in every street and alley. The small entrepreneurs here – the lifeblood of any economy – now on their last pennies, are still hopeful their re-evaluated strategies and revamped resilience will see them through this fearful nightmare, as the restrictions ease and the townships will slowly crawl back to life again.



Behind the respectful veneer of the lockdown, some of the smaller traders hustle on illegally, under the radar, dodging police patrols and armed surveillance. They have no choice but to stick to their street-smart ways, to survive and feed their families.&nbsp;



In the township of Soweto, bigger, popular establishments such as The Box Shop on Vilakazi Street – the historic stretch home to Nobel Peace Prize winners Archbishop Desmond Tutu and the country’s former President Nelson Mandela – are looking to the future with great uncertainty, and have been forced to devise alternative digital strategies as lifelines for the present.



Sifiso Moyo founded The Box Shop, a lifestyle and retail outlet with his business partner, Bernard Msimango, and today, the street it’s located on, which attracted thousands of local and international tourists every day prior to the pandemic, is eerily quiet.



It will be a while until planes of international visitors land again, so the duo have chosen to go to them – online.



“For The Box Shop, we built hype around online and have taken the entire offering that existed in our physical infrastructure into a digital platform and that has made us into an innovation space, giving us access to a global audience. We are beginning to see our products being sold in places like Switzerland and the United Kingdom and we now have started harnessing partnerships,” says Moyo.



The website was launched in May, but the bigger vision for the entity was to start as a retail outlet and work backwards into the manufacturing space.



Moyo says the coronavirus taught them two things – to adapt digitally, and to work in the value chain.



The shop now also makes face masks, sold to public hospitals and NGOs.



A short drive from Vilakazi Street is a restaurant named Sancho, selling African cuisine and founded by Thato Mothopeng, a serial entrepreneur who also founded the popular annual Soweto Camp Festival.



Mothopeng is one of the few entrepreneurs in the tourism sector without a formal degree or training, but has had a roaring business nevertheless and is quite well-known in the circuit.



Mothopeng says all SMMEs are at a standstill because business thrives on human contact. But business also needs to be flexible, he adds.



“There are opportunities in the harshest environments. I am using this time to review my strategies. I am also not panicking because the country is managing the crisis; this is an opportunity for SMMEs to reflect because our people are sober now.”&nbsp;



He had to let go of a few employees and is working remotely.



Further in the township of Soweto, Thembeka Nkosi, the founder of Le Salon, has also developed her own coping mechanisms.



Her shop is shut, but people still seek her grooming advice. As per South Africa’s Level 4 lockdown restrictions, salons and beauty parlors are not allowed to operate.



“This [lockdown] is very stressful, more especially now because other businesses are operating. I still can’t make money, I still have to stay at home and not work,” rues Nkosi.



In addition to getting to spend more time with her five-year-old son, she has recently started sharing her haircare tutorials on social media.



“Now that shops are open to buy hair products, I send video clips to my clients and that brings me joy, knowing that I am still useful to them; even though it’s not making me any money yet, at least I am interacting with my clients,” she says, looking at the bright side.



Ronewa Creations is yet another small business in these parts.



Founded by Lesego Seloane and Dinah Kgeledi, the business offers landscaping services, garden maintenance and water harvesting solutions, and employs seven full-time workers. None of these services are allowed in the current phase of lockdown.



“Now that our province is still on Level 4, it is really difficult to focus because when we were working out our plans, there was so much uncertainty and we didn’t know how they could actually be implemented,” says Seloane.



She is grateful the duo have been active on social media, running a garden makeover campaign and offering landscaping designs for free.



“We are using a three-dimensional technology that revamps the look of gardens to give people an idea of how their gardens could potentially look like in the end.”



Despite the challenges, the two keep sane by spending time with family.



“If the business fails, I fail. If I don’t come out of my down moment quick, then I will fail and the entire organization fails,” says Seloane.



You can detect the determination in her voice to overcome this period, come what may.



Like many around her staring fear in the face, she has no other choice.

Motlabana Monnakgotla

FORBES AFRICA SOCIAL MEDIA