Global South Africans

From China to Northumberland, Iceland to Paris, Tanzania to South Africa… you can see it all with the NICRO UK Trust!

Whatever your New Years resolutions for 2009… Commit to getting fit, Be more adventurous or Do some charity work… you can do it all with the NICRO UK Trust Open Challenges! Experience exciting destinations, achieve amazing personal goals and in the process help NICRO raise much needed money for their Youth Diversion Programmes in South Africa – and there is something to suit everyone!

Choose from nearly 100 different challenges worldwide and your fundraising efforts could change the life of a child in South Africa forever. Sign up today, and challenge yourself to make a difference!

If you would like to know more about NICRO Charity Challenges, please email Loetitia@nicro.org.uk or contact the NICRO Team on +44 (0) 207 953 80 31 and they will help you choose a challenge that suits you.

NICRO’s Youth Programmes successfully channel young offenders away from the formal criminal justice system, offering them alternative sentencing programmes and rehabilitation, ultimately diverting them from a life of crime. With a 93% success rate NICRO has proved that this method works and effectively reduces the number of children in South African jails. It also contributes significantly to the reduction of crime in South Africa.

Global South Africans is now on Twitter, looking to follow and be followed by anyone interested in the project. You can find us here.

In an important address at Chatham House in London on January 23, Michael Spicer, CEO of Business Leadership South Africa, International Marketing Council trustee  and former executive vice president of Anglo American plc, gave a candid of assessment of the state of play in South Africa on the eve of elections. Here is the full text:

In giving a pre-election 2009 report on the country I will try to give a clear eyed assessment of the country’s politics and economics from the perspective of a business leader which neither underestimates the challenges and reasons for concern, of which there are many, nor ignores the country’s strengths and achievements which continue to baffle the pessimists.   Read the rest of this entry »

The Sunday Times reports on the Global South Africans initiative.

Ian Goldin, director of the 21st Century School at Oxford, spoke at GSA launch in London last month. Here are his speaking notes:

The South African Diaspora played a major role in overcoming apartheid and sustaining the anti-apartheid struggle, as well as providing support to the ANC and others in exile.  The return of South Africans and the engagement with ideas from around the world has greatly strengthened the constitution as well as policy in a wide range of areas. The return and engagement of global South African’s ideas, skills and capital was a vital part of the ‘miracle’ of transformation. Read the rest of this entry »

“Once a South African, always a South African,” Moeketsi Mosola, Acting CEO of the International Marketing Council, told guests at a dinner to launch the GSA initiative in London organised by IMC’s UK country manager John Battersby and hosted by the SA High Commission. Here is SABC’s report:

For stills of the event, Read the rest of this entry »

Please welcome Ruth Lewin who is taking over from Lee Gillespie-White as GSA’s US Manager.  Ruth has had a rich and varied career in SA’s private, public and NGO sectors, most recently heading up CSI at Discovery, the SA health insurance company.  She has also held posts with the Independent Communications Authority of SA, the Independent Electoral Commission and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. Her husband, Goolam Aboobaker, was deputy head of the policy unit in the presidency and now represents SA at the IMF. Ruth will be an  invaluable asset as we work to raise the profile of the GSA network at home and around the world.

Lee, having worked tirelessly to get the GSA initiative off the ground in North America, passed the New York bar exam and was recruited by Special Olympics as assistant general counsel. We wish her every success. She remains very much a member of the network.

Global South Africans was officially launched  in Mumbai on August 26 at a dinner jointly hosted by IMC and First Rand. Thirty South Africans and ten Indians with strong links to South Africa attended the dinner at the Four Seasons hotel. The agenda also included a discussion on the establishment of a South African Business Forum in India. Read the rest of this entry »

GSA Andre Shearer, founder of Cape Classics, the largest importer of high-end South African wines into the US, is profiled in Financial Mail. As the article notes, Andre has “for years acted as an unofficial ambassador for SA, using the wine industry to showcase the country as an investment destination through wine-tasting dinners at top New York restaurants in collaboration with US fund managers.”

If you consider yourself a daughter or son of KwaZulu-Natal, and you want to be part of the province’s success story, you’re invited to a reunion at the Harvard Club in New York on October 2.

The reunion is part of the KZN Ebandla initiative launched by the province’s premier, S’bu Ndebele, to enlist successful KZN “alumni” in support of of the region’s economic development.

Ebandla parallels what the GSA project is attempting on a national scale, so we naturally think it is a terrific idea and strongly urge our members to attend the New York event, which follows successful gatherings in Johannesburg, Cape Town and, most recently, London. Even if you can’t attend, please spread the word to anyone who might be interested.

You can learn more about Ebandla here. Contact Andrzej Kiepiela (SA Cell: +27 82 653 2522) or Kim Foxon (+27 82 603 9319).