Businesswomen

"I think patriarchy is an issue all over the world, not just in Africa. Men have been running the world for so long that modern women have no choice but to take back their power."

"Until this power dynamic is changed, women will continue to fall victim to violence. Our job as leaders is to push back against the oppression of women in all spheres, and to speak loudly about abuse. GBV will not go away if it continues to be cloaked in secrecy and shame."

"GBV is a huge issue on our continent and in a world where patriarchal power structures still dominate. Male leadership is still seen as the norm, and men hold the majority of power. Patriarchy is a social and political system that treats men as superior to women – where women cannot protect their bodies, meet their basic needs, participate fully in society."

"Regarding representation, I think we have to use our power as consumers. Do your research and support the brands which are serious about representing you and people who look like you."

"I think it starts with telling them they don’t have to change the way they look to be acceptable or beautiful. Young girls don’t have to have straight hair in order to look “professional”."

"I think mentorship is a key component of sharing knowledge and helping young women to reach their goals. There is really no reason why we should not be sharing our lessons to empower the younger generations"

"To be a woman is to be soft and strong all at once, and there is beauty in this duality. We are strong enough to birth children, and nurturing enough to raise them, but we are also fierce enough to be leaders, businesswomen and captains of industry."

"The universe had other ideas for me though, and I now believe that my classroom is wherever I am called to speak, write, and add my voice. There are many ways to Impart knowledge, and my passion is to keep learning, so I can teach."

"When I was a small child, I looked up to my mother who taught at a school in Soweto, where we lived. I have always wanted to be the one standing in front of the class with a black board and some chalk in my hand and this is why my first degree was in education."

"To the Tribe [family] that came to see him off, they say it takes a village to raise a child. Thank you very much. AmaNtungwa [clan name] ayabonga [say thank you]."

"You have given me so many reasons to be proud of the man you have become, but the proudest moment for me is telling others [that] you are my son. Love always, Mom."

"Just go forth and aim for the skies. I may not carry you in my arms anymore, but I will always carry you in my heart."

"To my son – don’t let anyone take you for granted. Always hold your head up high. Never stop believing in yourself."

"I am based in France for the past 12 years, and I have been running Undiscovered Canvas (promoting global investment in and profiling of African Art). My strongest impact has been to identify young and emerging artists from Southern Africa and introduce them directly into a mature market"

"I realised that my vision for the residency was changing. I no longer wanted to cater for Undiscovered Canvas artists only, but I wanted to work with female artists across the African continent. I wanted to create a powerful community of women artists, collectors, gallerists, investors who would consciously support each other."

"I realised how limiting it was to run the residency under a private company. Raising funds was not easy and the residency only catered for artists by Undiscovered Canvas"

"I am strong in the midst of all this because of ONLY one person in my life, my powerful wife, VICTORIA LEBENE MEKPAH now MRS. OSAFO-NKANSAH. I was single and wasn’t finding real love. I never knew I would find a permanent place in the heart of one woman but guess what, I chose to marry the forever beautiful Victoria Lebene."

"I'm facing the biggest public shame ever in my life, but in the midst of the shame, the public ridicule, the insults, the trolls and the judgements, there's only one woman who has found the courage to stand by me and doing everything as a wife. Today I proudly celebrate you Mrs. Nkansah. If this is not an Angel, then I don't know who she is, if this is not every man's dream then I don't know what men want."

"Once the man I am with is okay why I should bother about what others think? Whatever anyone says is no news to me so far as my man is okay with everything I do."

"You can be anything you want to be.......IT IS POSSIBLE! Just make up your mind, get at it, go hard at it, don’t give up."

"Don't say fix and not fix yourself! Change starts with us the youths. The old folks will leave, and when we hold the fort, we will account to everything we do! COURSE- Means the Direction, Route, Way, the journey!."

"Staff were quite probably going to say one thing, do another, and wait for Maseko to pass through."

"The only way to have sustained growth is by building human capability, and the reality is the economy. You know, economists, I guess, confuse people, and we're all trained to think about business, but it's not actually a bunch of businesses; it's actually a bunch of people doing a whole lot of things. It’s actually a human system, and that's how we need to treat it to move on."

"People ask about growth. The only way to have sustained growth is actually to have inclusion. It is physically whatever anybody thinks."

"If you walk away when things aren't going well, I can guarantee you it's a recipe for failure. Participation doesn't guarantee success, but that grip, commitment, and continuation step by step is what's going to make us win."

"I think that the key problem we face is unproductive ways of doing things. I don't think it’s the technical problem."

"Communications is everything for people. It’s the most fundamental thing. And people are getting cut out of communication if they’re not online. It is an incredible enabler, especially when you have an urban configuration like we do, or spatial configuration, where people are very far from opportunity. So it could be a game changer."

"You could see that one of the problems in the company, even though it wasn’t in a competitive market, was that people still had this idea like they were in a monopoly."

"One of the most important ways of growing, expanding and developing is to have easy movement of people between countries."

"The absolutely most important thing for us is that we should be investing in human capability. It is, I think, the most important ingredient to success in any high-growth developing country, and it’s something that we underplay so significantly in South Africa. I think it’s the reason we don’t make progress."

"Young people should leave school with a recognised certificate, be channelled into post-school education and training, and then enabled to access to earning opportunities."

"The fastest route back to economic activity, charted in a way that enables physical distancing, will always be the best one. It is always better to generate revenue, in companies and through tax, than it is to save companies or borrow for the shortfall."

"Performance of tertiary education institutions will specifically need to be targeted. One option is to tie some part of the government’s institution grant to achieving improved governance, capacity, quality and labour market alignment."

"Stuck in a ditch on that lonely Lesotho mountain road, one can try to drive out of it, wait, or walk to the next village for help. One thing is certain. If the truck does not lift out of the ditch, it is going to be a long time before one is back on course to deliver services."

"Eskom will have to convince creditors that there is commitment to good governance and a pathway to sustainability. Eskom’s new board is the most important first milestone. Next steps will be to urgently appoint a permanent CEO and round out the Exco in a way that demonstrates a new beginning. Eskom’s communication needs to be open, humble and give stakeholders a true reflection of the state of affairs whether good or bad."

"Eskom could not build up sufficient reserves to cover the costs of maintenance, replacement or new capacity."

"Leadership instability is the top challenge faced by many SOEs, and this was certainly the case at Telkom."

"when they do understand, I’ve experienced more random acts of kindness in China than anywhere else."

"Learning some Mandarin can really change the overall experience."

"Chinese urban planning is legendary, and great thought has been devoted to public spaces."

"A visit to Shanghai begs an exploration of art, fashion, design, and technology."

"China has moved beyond the stage of imitation and has a growing community of designers and innovators."

"I'm a very driven personality, there's no doubt about that. For success in bringing about this kind of change, you have to be pretty ruthlessly focused. I deal with intense stuff at Telkom and it's an enormous challenge and there's pain and pleasure. It's very exciting, but what if you fail? You can't fail."

"I've learned over the years that leadership is everything."

"It's true that past efforts have failed. There's been a lot of energy and a lot of great ideas, but it's been inconsistent."

"The last three years at Telkom have been intense, challenging, rewarding - overall an incredible and life-changing experience."

"When a lot of other kids during breaks from school were playing or doing other fun activities, I was going to work with my dad, which maybe didn’t seem that fun at the time but I actually thought it was a pretty cool experience. Early entrepreneurship shapens mind"

"Was a teacher in a NYC high school and noticed absenteeism was a huge problem from the first day I stood in front of my students. I realized that parents, an essential partner to help get kids to class, were often uninformed, parents play major role in education besides we teachers."

"For most of my life I knew about women who worked hard. From negotiating prices to dinner table conversations – there was no barrier for women. Women could do anything: They had a place at the table. You have to earn that place – Study hard, work hard and put up your hand."

"In Women’s Month, I will accept one or two speaking engagements, just as an opportunity for people to ask me the questions they never get a chance to ask,” she says. “Some people never see me; they’ll see me only in the newspaper or on television or hear me on the radio, and they have questions all the way from: ‘what was your life like’ to ‘were you always going to be a CEO’ to ‘what does your day look like’. These questions are not things you read in a newspaper, but once you are available as a female leader to answer those types of questions, it becomes aspirational for others. You break down the barriers. It’s not only aspirational, it’s an attainable aspiration. People see that there’s a person there – that person has done the following things to do that, and that person’s life feels and looks like the following…"