Johannesburg - Sibusiso Ntuli is a young man who has faced numerous hurdles in his long journey to establish himself as a formidable businessman. But the grandson of Orlando Pirates chairperson Irvin Khoza is a fighter who does not give up.
The 31-year-old son of Khoza’s daughter Sonono is a passionate youth activist whose biggest dream is to have a significant footprint in the business sector – just like his grandfather.
Covid-19 is a deadly pandemic that killed millions of people worldwide, but this resident of Diepkloof, Soweto made money out of selling personal protective equipment (PPEs).
He used the PPE proceeds to form his own online aRISE TV channel in 2020 through his Last Ultimatum Youth Consortium. He uses the channel to deliver inspirational talks. He also works with small businesses in various townships in Gauteng.
“I deal with social entrepreneurship transforming the townships into an actual economic zone whereby we develop (business) ecosystems. The ecosystem starts from the entrepreneur to supply chain to network affiliation groups and to wholesalers and from source to consumers,” he says.
He, however, says he disliked people with negative views of life as they are the ones who are pulling themselves and the whole country down.
After having experienced people destroying his business projects because they were dissatisfied with certain unrelated issues, he started projects of social engineering to bring positive changes in society by fixing psychological problems.
“We got great ideas, we got great projects that can come up but if we don’t transform the minds of the people, every single project that is going to be put in place, every single school, a hospital that you want to try and erect is not going to service the actual need because when people get upset because of the intensity of the demand they are going to end up looking at what you built as something they can destroy,” Ntuli says.
Ntuli, whose life was disturbed by the divorce of his parents and the death of his aunt Zodwa Khoza in 2006, said he represented Small Business Empowerment Unity at Black Business Council (BBC).
He is also the youth director and new business development manager of the YES Kiosk Program, which he says has a relationship with the Department of Education to provide free WiFi connection to 23 000 public schools across the country.
He describes his township as having 50/50% of success and failure.
“We got enough social impact initiatives around and we have got a thriving support system that engages with newly formed businesses. But we equally got an effective drug use environment and we effectively have a lot of criminals that are harboured in our shanty town and there is just a lot of disorder and lawlessness,” he says.
In his drive to find young people who are fighting to have a spot in the business sector, Independent Media was introduced to Ntuli by BBC youth portfolio chairperson Luvuyo Manyi.
Ntuli’s focus right now is to grow his own TV channel, which he uses as his platform to encourage his peers to be innovative and self-sustainable through entrepreneurship. His TV channel is currently broadcast through YouTube and can be accessed at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4FHhBSxVHKI.
“I spent all my money into creating aRISE TV and then I created a leadership program,” he said. He said when he started the channel, he knew little about the reality of the business world and as a result, he was vulnerable to exploitation.
“I was also ripped off by very big media groups because they needed me to pay them (a huge amount of money) for studios, for the expertise which was not really above grade,” he says. This taught him that starting a TV network was no walk in the park.
He turned to the Gauteng Film Commission for funding, and he received R150 000 which he topped up with his own money to get a total of R350 000. He then looked for cheaper studios.
On visiting his channel, one can watch various shows, including the one where he addresses his viewers about business ideas.
Ntuli believes that education alone is not good enough for a person to succeed in the business as he said the system does not provide skills that are practical.
During his journey into the business world, he once partnered with his associates Fanie and Stephanus Buys to open a game farm in northern KwaZulu-Natal, but failed dismally. Their 6000 hectors Mboko Safaris opened in 2014 near Ladysmith and had giraffes and rhinos among other wild animals, but it collapsed more than a year later because of poaching and faction fighting in neighbouring villages.
The poaching, according to Ntuli, was influenced by disagreement among the local community members, some of them were demanding a stake in the project.
“In the period of eight months, we were setting it up, it was not yet operating because we were dealing with poaching. You could not bring tourists there when there was poaching taking place. We set up a game farm for people to view animals and not to hunt animals,” he said.
However, after all the failure he had endured, he is proud that his TV channel is taking shape. He swears that in the next five years he would create a network of 500 people who are ready to transform communities around the country.
“I believe that I will have my TV network enabling every single township with a free-to-air channel that will be provided by our satellite. I believe that I will have a youth fund to empower young entrepreneurs,” he said.
Ntuli’s story documentary, which has been broadcast by the SABC, can be viewed on YouTube.