Africa’s brave investigative journalist, Bob Rugurika, has no place to call home and is living in fear of arrest and his life. Rugurika’s crime was to do his job by exposing human rights violence in his country. He’s one of over 100 Burundian journalists living in exile.
“As an investigative journalist, when I decide to go on, I become very attached to a story. I am very attached to my cause, to my mission, and that is informed by our radio editorial philosophy, it is to promote accountability to the members of government. We want to create a country without violence. If we are in a country with violence encouraged by authorities, then we can’t say we are in a country, we are in a (war) jungle. If we give up, this world will deteriorate,” says Rugurika, the Managing Director of African Public Radio; banned, but operating on the web.
The steadfast radio journalist, who was this year’s winner of the Press Freedom Award at the CNN Multichoice African Journalist Awards, presented this year’s Carlos Cardoso memorial lecture at the University of the Witwatersrand (Wits). Cardoso was the slain Mozambican journalist who cut his teeth in social activism at the college in South Africa. Cardoso was a Wits student when the apartheid government deported him. Like Rugurika, Cardoso was also a thorn in the side of his corrupt government and was assassinated in 2000 when he was investigating a bank linked to the son of the president.
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“I grew in a weak society – Burundi. There were too many cases of human rights violations. There was a bad conception of power in the minds of the politicians and authorities. Then, I had a dream of becoming a lawyer or a policeman to reduce all those cases of injustice. But when I graduated in university I realized that those two sectors were the most corrupt in Burundi. Then I decided to join the African Public Radio – a voice-of-the-voiceless radio – we documented human rights violations against the members of the public,” says Rugurika.
Mathatha Tsedu, an adjunct professor at Wits and veteran journalist, said Burundian officials were at the university looking for Rugurika. They wanted him arrested because he is a fugitive in his country.
In January 2015, Rugurika was held for more than a month after he interviewed a former government soldier who was in hiding. The soldier was part of the paramilitary who were allegedly instructed by the government officials to murder three Italian nuns who worked in Burundi. Rugurika’s case caught the attention of the international civil community, and thousands of Burundians demanded his release. He was released in March.
Burundi was supposed to go the polls in 2015, but the government decided to use its paramilitary to threaten civilians who protested the decision to stall elections. The Italian nuns were witnesses and ready to testify, so the national intelligence decided to kill them, said Rugurika.
“Since 2010, they tried to corrupt several journalists. I am not accusing my colleagues. Some are victims of this corruption, they fear for their lives if they refuse to take the money. It was the same case with me&#8230; They told me I have two choices, either I take the money, or face jail, or be killed. I refused the money and risked being killed. Deep in my heart I decided to publish the reports (about the death of nuns). It was my contribution to show the world that we have a criminal government. I don’t have fear to state that,” he says.
“The government didn’t release me to give me my freedom, they planned to kill me. On 29 March (2015) three armed guys were sent to kill me in my home. Fortunately, they went to look for me in a neighbor’s home.”
Rugurika went into exile in neighboring Rwanda and later Brussels.
Rugurika says before the government started persecuting journalists, there were attempts to enforce a law for journalists to reveal sources, but Burundians fought against it. This failure led to the formation of Rema FM, a government propaganda radio station. All the independent media houses were banned and are under police surveillance.
It may be unsafe for journalists like Rugurika for some time yet.

‘They Planned  To Kill Me’

Peer pressure has been the cause of many young – and not so young – people going sadly astray. For Elethu Rotsho, a 15-year old, Grade 10 student at the Centre of Science and Technology (COSAT), a secondary school in Khayelitsha, Cape Town, peer pressure has led him down a much more positive path. He is one of 12 students who are collectively known as the Optimistic Youth Reporters, which he joined “because my friends forced me to join”.
In October last year, the Optimistic Youth Reporters had the first broadcast of what is the first public high school radio station on the African continent. The COSAT radio project was established by the Children’s Radio Foundation (CRF), which is involved in projects across six African countries (Liberia, Cote d’Ivoire, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Tanzania, Zambia and South Africa) designed to provide platforms for young people to express themselves using radio.
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The relationship with COSAT was, as explained by Project Manager, Linda Daniels, “initiated by a journalist who spent some time doing a story on the school for international media. He had been working with a group of Grade 7 kids and felt that, considering our work with young people, it was a good fit.”
Despite joining because of his friends, for Rotsho, “as time has passed, I really got into it. I really want to contribute to getting teenage voices around the country heard. While I grew up in a comfortable home in Khayelitsha, the environment in the township has a lot of negative influences, like smoking and crime. I don’t think that mainstream media are doing enough in talking about the issues that affect us a young people.”
Ongeziwe Mgidi, also a 15-year old Grade 10 student, agrees.
“Most of the media focuses on older people while it is us young people who are facing the biggest challenges. If they could put more attention on the young, including highlighting young people reaching higher levels of society at a younger age, it would help,” she says.
Mgidi signed up because she has always been interested in a career in journalism. While she initially thought becoming an Optimistic Young Reporter would involve writing articles, it has given her insight into a different aspect of journalism as well as running a radio show.
“We broadcast once every two weeks to a live audience but meet every Friday for training and to prepare for each show. We divide ourselves into the different positions, i.e. producer, researcher, presenter, etc. for that specific show. My favorite role is producer. I’m good at keeping time and I like people to do what I say,” says Mgidi.
“We look at the challenges that we, as youth, the township and the whole country, face and put together the show topics from that. We go out and interview our school mates and people from the community, which we include in the show. The presenters then discuss it on air before opening up for comments from the audience,” says Rotsho.
The show is broadcast from a radio desk that has been built in a hall at the school. CRF’s role has been to facilitate the weekly sessions, which started over two years ago, providing the young reporters with a solid foundation in radio reporting skills, media ethics and child rights. They will be leaving the school and the young reporters to maintain and run their station independently in the next few months.
“This has been very much a two-way process; a horizontal exchange between myself, other CRF colleagues and the young people. What’s exciting is we can see a lot of the topics push beyond the school gates into community. We have had parents and teachers engaging. It’s been an incredible learning experience. I’ve been struck by the vibrancy and energy of these young people, who we can learn from. As adults, we tend to think we know better in terms of guiding and teaching. They have much to teach the world,” says Daniels.
And the young reporters have gained immensely from being part of the project, both in terms of their own personal development as well as in contributing to the solving of some of the issues they face.
Mgidi says she has become much more confident and comfortable with asking questions and sharing her opinions, although a journalism career no longer seems to be in her future.
“I talked to my parents about journalism but they feel it isn’t a stable career. The more you are published, the more you get paid but it isn’t guaranteed. I’m now thinking of forensics because I like finding out things.”
For Rotsho, who raps and is passionate about music, the future is not as clear. At this stage, his focus is on doing what he can as part of the Optimistic Young Reporters.
“It is important to communicate directly with the residents of the township. We need to try find solutions from them because (we) are the ones living with the challenges. Radio helps with this and we normally get positive feedback. It has also taught me how to think better as well as differentiate between positive and negative things,” he says.
What COSAT’s radio project demonstrates is that the future of Africa are truly engaged in their lives and the world around them. They are playing their part to ensure that the past and present create a very different future.

Taking Back THE Airwaves

Zain Verjee started her career on the radio before going on to become one of CNN’s most respected television journalists. Today, Verjee is an entrepreneur in the digital space in Africa.
What is remarkable is that Verjee sustained a high-profile career in television despite suffering psoriasis, a skin ailment that manifests in the form of red spots and patches covered with silvery scales. For years, she endured this privately, drawing strength from family. The odds were stacked against her.
Born and raised in Nairobi to a Kenyan family of Indian ancestry, her early education was in Kenya before moving to Montreal, Canada, to study English Literature and Development Studies at McGill University. Verjee returned to Kenya and enrolled for a graduate degree in environmental studies. Meanwhile, she heard of a job opportunity in radio.
“A new radio station opened up called Capital Radio at the time. I started reading the traffic news. Then I filled in for a love line show at night where I started learning how to become a radio DJ. I gave romantic advice on the radio at age 21/22 and read poems and was soppy and played sad songs on air, which was great. When the embassy was bombed in 1998 [Al Qaeda bombings of United States’ embassies in Nairobi and Dar es Salaam], it was close to the Capital FM radio station, so I got involved in reporting the story and so that really forced me to become more engaged in hard news. So I did some work for the BBC. Then I started working for Kenya Television network and then I applied to CNN,” says Verjee.
Given her limited experience, Verjee’s application was a long shot. However, she was not willing to back down.
“The manager at the time told me I didn’t have enough experience, I had never done breaking news and that I shouldn’t bother applying. But I continued to apply and I begged for a screen test and eventually managed to convince her after at least 10 or 15 email exchanges where I was bordering on becoming ‘stalkerish’. So she said ‘OK, fine! Come to Atlanta, I’m not going to pay you, I’m not going to hire you, you are going to have to pay your own way, but we will do a screen test and then go away’. So I did the screen test and then she said to me ‘I’m going to do something I’ve never done before, I’ll offer you a job on the spot, but as a writer, not as an anchor, and we’ll train you and if you are good, we’ll promote you. If not, then you can go back to Kenya after three years’. And it was amazing. I learned how to anchor, I learned how to write. Everyone at CNN helped me succeed and gave me many opportunities. And the journey evolved from there.”
Verjee’s persistence earned her a posting to the Unites States’ State Department as a foreign policy correspondent. This was during the difficult days of the Bush administration with Condoleezza Rice as Secretary of State and the war in Iraq. She explains: “When I went to the State Department, I was very scared. I was very intimidated and nervous because I had no idea what to do. And I didn’t understand nor did I have sources and I didn’t have relationships that would give me information at the time. And I remember after making one phone call on a major story to the State Department spokesman at the time, I didn’t know who else to call so I was just pacing the corridors waiting for him to call me back because I didn’t know what else to do. I was really in a panic because the phones were ringing, there was pressure, there was information wanted, ‘match the story, break the story’; I was sweating bullets. But eventually I learned. The State Department press corps were fantastic. Condoleezza Rice was a great personality and powerhouse to cover. U.S. foreign policy was in an interesting moment at the time and CNN was really pushing me to be better than I thought I could be.”
All this while, Verjee had to manage her ailment whilst maintaining her poise in front of the cameras.
“Right before I applied to CNN in 1999, my skin condition was so bad I could barely walk properly. What happens is because it’s such a visually ugly disease, especially for a young woman, it psychologically has a terrible impact, and you get very afraid of exposing skin, you get afraid of close relationships, you are nervous; because now I was developing a profession in television, yet my face was the only thing I was projecting that was clear. So by the time I was at CNN, until I moved to London, I was in remission, so I was really more confident of myself. I was appreciating my own body, my own skin, my own freedom a lot more. And I didn’t have any struggles until I got to London when it inflamed again because I was stressed. It was a difficult adjustment for me at the beginning and it affected my immune system and my stability. So it became again very hard because on the one hand I was fighting my own body and trying to control it, and on the other hand, being glamorous and trying to present comfortably. And when my skin is bad, I become psychologically a bit disturbed and can’t focus. So I’m always having to cope with my skin as a way of personally dealing with the health issue, making sure that in my profession it doesn’t create the obstacle it once did.”
Of all the stories she anchored, Verjee singles out the brutal attack by Somali terrorist group, Al Shabaab, on the Westgate Shopping mall in Nairobi as the most challenging. The siege occurred in her backyard and most of the people and families affected were known to her. Verjee walked a fine line as she balanced her emotions covering such a personal story while upholding her professional responsibility.
Nairobi was also the scene of one of the scariest moments Verjee faced as a journalist. She was covering the protests that erupted after Kenya’s national elections in 2008 when an attempt to pre-empt a march by protesters resulted in Verjee being hit by a tear gas canister shot by the police.
“It was opposite Uhuru Park where the GSU paramilitary were. And they just started targeting journalists and they targeted me first because I was walking and talking. All of a sudden I heard a loud boom and a very sharp pain in my back, and my eyes started watering because it was teargas. It was in such close proximity that had that canister hit my face or my spine, we would have been having a very different conversation.”
In April 2014, Verjee made the decision to leave CNN. Her passion for Africa and desire to actively contribute to its growth led her to establish Akoma, a digital storytelling platform. With the new project, Verjee seeks to enable Africa’s digital generation to tell their stories.
“I believe it’s time young Africans who have access to smartphone technology and are increasingly connected to the digital world, get to say what they want. If they have an idea or an opinion, it should come authentically from us. It should come from something that is created by Africans that is just as good as the rest of the world’s innovations.”
A proud African, Verjee believes African women will shape the future of the continent. “I believe African women can set the benchmark for the world. The kind of passion, innovation, enthusiasm and opportunities that I have seen directly in the last six months engaging with many of these women leads me to believe that African women are shattering the glass ceiling and that some of the real innovation that will come will be from them.”
Verjee is surely leading the way.

CNN Digital Rebranding 2013

The News Anchor Who Begged For  A Screen Test

Ufuoma Ekpecham left Lagos for London eight years ago with her suitcases, two kids and a heavy heart. She had to leave; she needed a change: the heartache following her parents’ death, three months within each other, was too much to handle. She had to divert her mind, and quickly.
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She always had a flair for fashion – she had previously been “making some good money” designing clothes for friends and family, but not as a full-time professional.
Thanks to a supportive husband, who said “go back to school, learn it properly”, when the opportunity presented itself, she left Lagos to take up a degree in fashion design in London.
Her husband stayed on in Nigeria, and Ekpecham dove into her studies, managing the home and looking after the children on her own “minus the luxury of nannies or drivers”.
It was tough, but today, the 42-year-old is the London-based creative director of her clothing brand Josh &amp; Nicol, named after her children.
Recently in Johannesburg for the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Africa, showcasing her spring summer 2015 collection, Ekpecham says she is in a happy space, stronger and independent, just like the motif she uses throughout her new fashion line.
Her Popidia collection for the show was a tribute to Queen Idia of Benin, the only West African warrior queen from the Niger Delta.
“She epitomizes the African woman, strong and dependable,” says Ekpecham, who returned to her roots for inspiration for the new line.
As a child growing up in Benin and Port Harcourt, she wanted to become a doctor. She graduated with a degree in microbiology, but her love for fashion and Asoke fabrics overtook all academic pursuits. Her visits to the markets and her Ghanaian tailor, who gave life to her sketches, became more frequent. After a brief stint as a computer analyst, Ekpecham married at the age of 28, and between changing nappies, tailored wedding gowns and traditional outfits out of her garage.
Describing herself “a passionate go-getter”, Ekpecham’s goal is to start her own manufacturing unit in Lagos in 2015. London is only a six-hour flight away, and the new venture will see her returning home more often.
<h1>Riding A Wave</h1>
Noni Rwaxa, better known as the radio jockey ‘Ms Cosmo’, who hosts The Stir Up hip hop show on radio station 5FM, is now part of a collaborative campaign between Australian jewelry firm Mimco and Frends to promote – what else – headphones.
The 26-year-old radio personality, also a veejay on Channel O, has opened for big artists like Kanye West, Chris Brown, Kendrick Lamar and 2 Chainz.
Her family wanted her to take on the tried and tested route through education. She had other plans.
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“My father’s concern was for me to get a tertiary qualification. I graduated with a BCom degree in finance from the University of Johannesburg; my mother still finds it amusing when I pack my equipment for an event,” says Rwaxa.
After graduating, she worked as a property finance consultant. The time she spent in the corporate space is a period she describes as the worst, as she suffered depression. It was clearly not for her.
Hip hop musician Khuli Chana suggested she join the Fuse Academy school for female disc jockeys. She enrolled and after the course, made inroads in radio in 2012. She was invited to play on Channel O Bassment, and YFM, a South African youth radio station. She finally joined 5FM hosting The Stir Up.
“I’m happy the projections for radio in South Africa are positive. That said, I can’t ignore what is happening in Ghana, Kenya and particularly Nigeria. Nigerian artists are collaborating with international acts. Nat-C, Davido and P-Square are breaking boundaries putting in the hard work to reap rewards.”
She wants to be in the industry for the long haul, and is doing everything to ensure the longevity of her brand.
“I have sought partnerships with various brands for growth for myself and the brand of choice, as hip hop is cool influential culture…I have two other event deals I want to announce but you will have to wait until January.”
Watch this space for more.

Designs On Africa

No one could ever accuse songstress Shingai Shoniwa of being dull.
When she hits the stage late on Sunday evening at Ronnie Scott’s legendary Jazz Club in London’s Soho, she is in her third change of outfit, each brighter and more spectacular than the last. Each with an African twist.
Clearly, launching a solo music career is serious business and for Shingai dressing for the occasion is part of the theater.
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Born in South London of Zimbabwean parents in 1981, she has been the lead singer and bassist with Indie pop band The Noisettes for 11 years and has been touring the world, headlining gigs and creating music with fellow Noisette Dan Smith for far longer.
Together, they hit the big time in 2009 with their second album titled Wild Young Hearts, an album packed with catchy melodies and great vocals from Shingai, a singer who is confident and comfortable with her craft.
“Believe it or not, it has been really hard to get people to accept me in the music industry, a brown girl who plays bass and who sings and writes her own material. People want to pigeonhole you into a particular genre, and I don’t fit.”
For years, Shingai has been singing the lyrics to Sometimes a bitter-sweet break-up tune: ‘Sometimes…  we start over&#8230; and go solo’. Now it’s her turn to start over. For the last three months, Shingai has been in Los Angeles recording her debut solo album &#8211; the first time she is recording music without Smith.
For Shingai, the United States (US) has a broader musical canvas.
“In [Britain], radio trends are not daring, not exciting and they are driven by imported music. In the US, pop music has room for a lot of original characters.”
When we were arranging this interview, Shingai texted me from Cuba to tell me: “Cuba is incendiary! It’s a feast for the creative spirit&#8230; I’m recording some wonderful music here with Afro Cuban artists… I’m very inspired.”
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Her Los Angeles life is obviously still evolving, and as they rehearse together in the jazz club’s downstairs dressing room she shows Smith pictures of her newly rented West Hollywood home. Transitioning her life from one continent to another is already well underway. She has sold her old Mercedes in London, and a new vintage model is about to be purchased. Laughing loudly, she says she is now based between Hollywood and Hove, a town on England’s south coast.
Tonight, at Ronnie Scott’s, is the first time she will have performed any of the new material on stage and she admits she is nervous and has butterflies. Some musicians drink to gain some Dutch courage. Not Shingai.
“I won’t drink alcohol because you have to feel the music and drink just kills it.”
She’ll be playing a short set of tunes old and new. But, for her it’s all about the audience’s reaction to the Thomas Mapfumo-inspired Zimtron, which sounds like a mash-up between Mapfumo and the afro-pop of Fela Kuti.  I think this is a big step on from the Indie pop of The Noisettes but true to form Shingai kicks back.
“I don’t think so, it feels like an evolution. Zimbabwean music and Shona culture has always been a big reference point for me.”
Watching Shingai rehearse the set during the soundcheck is a revelation. Doors open and paying guests arrive for song and supper at 6.30PM sharp. Shingai, performing as a guest with the Natalie Williams Soul Family, has 22 minutes to run through four songs which are brand new to the band. Acting as musical director, Shoniwa sings her own part and eases the arrangements up and down, bringing the band and three vocalists in earlier and later as required.
“Most singers just know how to sing. This was a hard night with lots of new songs and she took the pressure off us by doing that,” says the Soul Family bass player afterwards.
Shingai has flown in from Los Angeles for tonight’s London gig and her large family are here in force to see her perform.
“I’ve never been away from them for this long before, and I’ve been missing them so much,” she says.
By coincidence her twin sister, Shorai Shoniwa, a media executive, slips into a seat beside me when I’m settling down to watch Shingai sing.
“Since she was four years old, Shingai has been performing, and we are all so proud of her,” says Shorai.
When I mention that we were all supposed to meet at 4PM and Shingai had turned up at 5PM &#8211; still without her stage dress,which is in Kilburn, west London &#8211; Shorai laughs.
“We call that Shingai-time in the family!”
When Shingai  was 10 years old she went and lived with her grandmother in the savannah plains of Tete in Mozambique for a year. She explains that if not for the colonial boundaries, her Malawian gran would have been from the Chewa tribe.
“That year made a big impression. It just made me appreciate the richness of the colors, the sounds, the fashion, the voices of my African heritage.”
Which explains why Shingai reflects Africa so vividly in her clothes and in her work today.
For Shingai, music was always a part of family life.
“I’ve grown up in an environment where I’ve had a lot of musicians coming in and out of my living room. From the late eighties my mum and uncle used to put on events at the Africa Centre. Someone would ask me: ‘Who’s your favorite singer?’ and I’d say Whitney Houston and they’d say: ‘Well this is how you play it Zimba style!’”
Shingai was born in Brockley, raised in South East London and is quick to emphasize that’s where all the best London art colleges, like Goldsmiths and Ravensbourne, are. She went to the prestigious BRIT school for the Performing Arts and Technology in Croydon and studied theater for two years. Towards the end of her stay, she formed Sonarfly with Smith.
Sonarfly quickly moved from an eclectic repertoire of blues standards and cover songs to writing their own original material. The Noisettes arrived in 2003 and in part had to busk to raise the money to record their first album. They have subsequently recorded two more acclaimed albums and are delighted to have made more of an international impact with their third album Contact.
But, tonight belongs to Shingai, the London singer who is so proud of her Zimbabwean heritage. The audience reception to Zimtron is rapturous and Shingai is thrilled.
So what does the future hold for her?
“We live in the global world where we have access to and can see what everyone else is up to. It’s about reaching everybody. To me, headlining festivals in Zimbabwe and in Malawi, on Freedom Day in Johannesburg and at Belladrum in Scotland is just as important as playing Abbey Road, the O2 and Glastonbury. We’ve done that, enjoyed it, and now for me it’s about reaching out to people internationally.”
So watch out Africa, Shingai Shoniwa is coming!
&nbsp;

Solo In Soho With A Songstress Of Steel

When Ruth Obih completed her legal studies she could see law and nothing else.
“I wanted to be a lawyer so badly, I was bent on it! That was my passion,” she recalls with a smile.
It didn’t work out that way for Obih. After practicing for a year, her first legal firm decided not to retain her. It was a blow to her dreams, to say the least. Few knew then, including her, that this set back was to put her on the path to a fortune.
Obih forgot law and made a 180 degree turn into fashion. She enrolled at the London College of Fashion and returned to Nigeria with her newly acquired skills.
“People always admired what I wore. So, when you tell me you like what I’m wearing, I’d tell you I sell it,” she says.
Fashion whiled away the time, but Obih yearned for more.
“I get bored really easily and always set new tasks for myself. On achieving them, I move on to my next task,” she says.
So it was back to London, where Obih enrolled for her Qualified Lawyers Transfer Test (QLTT) in the hope of practicing law again. While studying, she interned at a property law firm and became intrigued by the business of real estate. With no formal training in property, thoughts of using her legal skills in the real estate business flooded through her mind.
In 2006, Obih started 3Invest Limited UK, in London—a company focused on providing legal advice and property for those wanting to invest in real estate. A good response in London, led to thoughts of how this kind of service would fare in Nigeria.
Obih moved back to Nigeria later that year. She registered 3Invest Homes in Lagos and began hunting for properties to market with her legal advice.
In January 2007, Obih made her first big sale—a property worth millions of naira. She moved money from her thriving fashion label—Ruru Tunics—to secure the deal.
“I never went to the banks to ask for a loan. I almost have a phobia for that,” says Obih.
Sale after sale, 3Invest grew in leaps and bounds, as did Obih’s ambition.
“Yet again, it was time for me to do something different, I had toyed with the idea of starting a real estate advocacy platform using radio,” she says.
It took a number of approaches to radio stations and months of uncertainty. In the end, Obih’s proposal was accepted leading to the launch of Nigeria’s first real estate radio show, in March 2011, called Real Estate on Air.
“This show, is geared at empowering the Nigerian populace and helping them make better informed decisions when investing in real estate, the program is a one-stop shop, for real estate in Nigeria,” says Obih.
She also runs a real estate blog, driving traffic to the radio show.
With a fashion brand; a growing real estate business and a radio show under her belt, Obih is not done yet.
As a business woman, Obih describes herself as shrewd and dynamic.

Law, Fashion, Property, Radio, Success

Thabo Molefe, famously known as ‘Tbo Touch’ in entertainment circles, is not your typical, hunky, media personality. In all frankness, mention of his name rarely inspires dreamy emotional reactions from adoring fans. And even though he does his fair share of kissing babies and dishing out top-notch prizes on his many media platforms; the lion’s share of the coverage is about his “annoying” American accent, tabloid titbits of his personal life and how he is supposedly the world’s biggest name-dropper; hell-bent on importing American culture to Africa.
As someone who is no stranger to his drive-time show on South African Metro FM, and the many television shows he has hosted; I was not surprised or put off by the strong American influence which marks his speech and content. With Touch, it is definitely all about hip hop, basketball and “swag”.
“What a lot of people do not know is that my family has a very strong exile background,” he says. “My connection to the US is enforced by the fact that I was raised there, schooled there and I even lost blood there,” he continues, explaining that his father, Vernon Molefe, was assassinated there because of his political activism.
“My father had a project which saw him working with South African struggle icons. Through the Nelson Mandela Education Fund, he facilitated troubled South African kids to be taken to the States to be educated , away from the horrors of the apartheid uprisings. So one can say that I feel indebted to his cause,” Touch elaborates. He says his father was shot seven times in 1992, and that his murder remains unsolved to this day.
“I was taken in by Bishop Noel Jones who became my guardian, as a way of paying homage to my late father,” he says.
The month of July is of significance to Touch. This month brings to a climax his plans of returning to permanently live in the United States, and as he puts it—this time he’s going there to make huge investments, and not to look for hand-outs, like before.
“I feel that I have come full circle as Tbo Touch. In as much as I am grateful for the opportunities that I have been given by the national broadcaster (SABC) since my return to the country seven years ago; I feel it is time to take my radio show, The Touch Down 3-to-6, to New York, where it will be broadcast live on a daily basis for the next three years. This has never been done on African radio before, and what it basically means is that instead of calling up big name artists like Jay Z or Mary J. Blige and speaking to them telephonically, I will have them live in studio interacting with our South African listeners,” he says with palpable excitement.
“This has taken many months to set up. My team and I have been at pains to get the national broadcaster’s buy-in, but now I can announce that it is all systems go. We have set up our own studios in New York, and we have engineers on-site working around the clock to make sure that the show runs seamlessly. The radio show will also feed content to other programs as well. Top American broadcaster Ryan Seacrest has been doing it for years; I feel it is now my turn to do it for South Africa.
“No one can debate the fact that New York is the hub of the entertainment, and more specifically, music industry, so really one has not achieved global recognition until you have a New York footprint.”
While this is clearly great news for him as a broadcaster, Touch says he won’t be the only one benefitting from this new arrangement.
“One of the main reasons I am this excited about the venture is because the show, even though broadcast from New York daily, will continue to play African music.” For many decades, Africans have been flooded with American music and culture, so it is about time someone takes ours to them.
“I am hoping this will give local artists another avenue to be exposed and “picked up” by the real captains of the music industry—the kind of artists that practically live on the Forbes’ richest lists. And I am hoping this will be an opportunity where collaborations and meaningful partnerships between those artists and African artists can be fostered,” he says.
Music and radio are not the only elements central to Touch’s relocation; television station SABC1 has also commissioned him as an NBA Basketball sport correspondent, which means he will be courtside every week, linking fans to the game and its icons.
“The culture of basketball and the NBA has been continually growing around the continent since the late 90s, sadly though we could only watch re-runs and old games, but now we will stream it to the continent with no serious delays. As a game that I personally love as well, I am also very excited that I will be experiencing it up close and sharing that experience with the sport’s many African fans,” says Touch.
Not only does Touch seem to have the entertainment side of things well-covered. He is also gearing up to become a businessman in the hospitality industry, which may come as a surprise to many.
“My relocation will also coincide with the launch of a restaurant franchise I am opening up in Manhattan with my business partner Jeff Christie. The restaurant will have a special twist—its main commodity will be trading in wine from South Africa, and we will also have a live-streaming camera linked-up to another franchise in Cape Town, so that patrons on either side can have a kind of shared experience,” he explains.
“The restaurant’s music catalogue will also consist entirely of South African and African music. So I am working very closely with the South African Department of Tourism on this project, as I believe that the restaurant will have an impact on more people wanting the actual South African experience,” Touch says. He needed to raise $450,000 to get the business on its legs, which he did subsequent to getting many doors slammed in his face.
Asking him whether he will consider living in South Africa again, seems a bit foolhardy at this stage for a man with his kind of plans, but alas it has to be asked. “My concert production company, called Touch Lives, will continue to be based in Johannesburg. Touch Lives hosts four major concerts every year, and I will be here for each one. I also have a two-year-old son who will continue to be based here, even though his mother and I have come to an agreement that he will spend some time with me in New York. In many ways South Africa is still my home,” he concludes.

Touching African Lives From The Big Apple

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Sometime in 1987 on the streets of the Tanzanian capital, Dar es Salaam, Joe Kusaga had his two feet planted firmly on the ground, but his head was as much in the clouds as Mount Kilimanjaro. The 21-year-old barely had two shillings to rub together, but dreamed of making a vast fortune by getting his fellow Tanzanians dancing to his beat.
More than 20 years later, Kusaga has the ear of East Africans; a multi-million dollar turnover; three radio stations; a magazine; two music ventures; and a promotion company which employs 170 people. His company, Clouds Media Group, turns over $3 million annually and plans to expand beyond East Africa. In a recent national survey, KPMG ranked the company 17th in the top 100 best-performing mid-sized companies in Tanzania.
“In a few years, this turnover should read double digits,” says Kusaga.
Kusaga made his fortune from the liberalization of the Tanzanian airwaves, in step with the freeing up of the economy after decades of socialism, in the 1990s. He decided Tanzanian radio was far too conservative and started to recruit young, funky broadcasters at his tiny
studio in Dar es Salaam in a bid to take the airwaves by storm.
“It was not easy at first. It’s a risky business, and sometimes we had to invest our little funds at the time to make things happen without any sponsorship,” he says.
In 1998, Kusaga took a deep breath and borrowed just over Tsh40 million ($24,660) to start his company with a business plan aimed at reaping the advertising dollars that came with the growing young and affluent middle-class. He founded Clouds FM in the same year and in 2002 added Choice FM, an easy-listening English radio station, and Coconut FM, Zanzibar’s first commercial radio station which is dedicated to Zanzibari music and culture, to his repertoire.
“We offered a platform for our young people to create employment for themselves. It was a take-off for many things musical in this country,” he says.
It was the bend in a long road that began in 1987. “I had just finished school and I began by managing some nightclubs, organizing theme nights,” says Kusaga.
He graduated to promoting shows as far as the Democratic Republic of Congo in a risky business that took timing, perseverance and passion—a perfect grounding for his foray into the tough radio business.
As the new century dawned, there came Clouds TV, which is projected to have coverage across the entire country by the end of this year.
Since then, Kusaga has founded the first digital music recording studio in the country, from where he manages the Smooth Vibes record label in Dar es Salaam and is responsible for authorizing music from Tanzanian artistes for iTunes.
You could say this media group has shaped how Tanzanian youths look and listen to the world. In the last few years, he has brought names like Eve, Fat Joe, P Square, Shaggy,  50 Cent, Kevin Lyttle, Koffi, Jay Z with MTV Base, Ja Rule, Hugh Masekela, Mya, Miriam Makeba and Youssou N’Dour to the East African country.
A little stardust from an entrepreneur with his head firmly in the clouds can go a long way.
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Tag: Radio

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