Budding Soweto enterprenuers ‘invade’ Alex event
ALEXANDRA - A group of budding business people from Soweto 'invaded' an Alex event meant to empower local entrepreneurs.
A meeting in Alexandra, meant to be an empowerment workshop for aspiring black entrepreneurs and emerging Small, Medium and Micro-sized Enterprises (SMMEs), turned out to be an all- Soweto affair.
The ‘invasion’ of the event happened last week when delegates, mostly from Soweto, attended the Altrek workshop and dominated discussions on how budding Alex entrepreneurs will be empowered to participate in the mainstream economy.
When asked how Sowetans came to dominate an event in Alex, national executive director of the South African Black Enterprise Forum, Matsi Modise, said entrepreneurs from neighbouring townships were free to follow the seminars as they are rolled out in various communities.
“Those who follow us on Twitter and Facebook know where our next seminars are happening and if they are keen to come and learn new tricks, they are free to do so. We do not close the door on people simply because they come from Soweto or elsewhere. So far, we have been to places such as KwaThema, Soweto and Diepsloot; and Alex entrepreneurs were also free to join us in those sessions too,” she said.
Modise said that her organisation, in partnership with the Department of Trade and Industry, has a programme called ‘Kasi to Kasi’ which is an SMME development tour of the townships where the Forum hosts outreach and information workshops – such as the one at the Altrek Hall in Eastbank, Alexandra – to promote, inspire and grow entrepreneurship.
“The Forum brings the best business minds into our townships to capacitate aspiring entrepreneurs and SMMEs, and to open the access doors to funding and opportunities in this sector through information sessions such as this one,” she said.
The department’s Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment chief director, Nomonde Mesatywa, said the ‘Kasi to Kasi’ sessions show small enterprises how they can “leverage on the benefits of the empowerment policy” and how to position themselves to participate in companies’ supply chains and in enterprise development initiatives.
“We are committed to this because we believe that having a growing number of sustainable small, micro- and emerging enterprises is an effective way of addressing the scourge of poverty, under-development and unemployment which currently confronts our country,” Mesatywa added.
