September 2016
The journey of the
Matamela family
Mr Matamela and his family take us on
a journey of how they started in the
Construction Industry.
uation and subsequently started his
company called Muma construction in
2006. The company yielded positive
returns but lost all its wealth and was
forced to seek formal employment. He
then found formal
employment
at the age of 26,
He then worked for two years in an
architectural consulting firm after grad-
HOW DID IT ALL START AND BUSINESS
What drove you to start your own
buness?
Honestly, I hated the business world, I
thought it was capitalistic and the
thought of making more money was
just wrong. I was a community builder,
a church mouse, famous for the
infamous organisation JAMCT
(Jesus and Me in Creative Talents), which hosted annual
talent shows in Hillbrow and
worked with homeless shelters, churches and Christian
welfare organisations in and
around Johannesburg, which
took the best part of my university life. So I would rally to
raise funds in big corporations
such as Coca-Cola, Shoprite,
KFC, Johannesburg Water, etc.
Some of them would make me
feel like I was raising money for my
own survival. I once snapped and said
that “I am an architectural graduate
for God’s sake” which led me to
seek God through prayer
Mr Matamela was born in a small village called Tshitomboni Tsha ha
Mbumbana in Venda, to a single
mom, Emily who was 17-year-old at
the time. She therefore, left him
with his grandmother to be raised
together with his cousins in an extended family setup. He has two
siblings, Rito and Thendo. He
grew up heading goats and
cows like a typical rural village boy.
Mr Matamela sort to find
himself in a better living
environment, just like
many African children who
grew up in a challenging
living conditions he lived
with 14 other people
under one roof and
walked barefooted to
school, and all he needed was someone who
would believe in him. That
person was his primary
school teacher, Mr Luvhengo,
who took him home every
Friday and exposed him to a
different lifestyle. This teacher taught him that when he
finds himself in trouble he
should just clinch his fist
against his chest and say
“Mudzimu nthuse” which
means God help me in
Tshivenda. Thereafter, he
went to high school, passing
with a matric exemption but
later decided to upgrade his
maths and science, before
starting at Wits University in the year
2000 where he enrolled to study Architecture. His journey in tertiary was
challenging, as he even faced expulsion
but by the grace of God he was given
yet another chance to finish his degree.
We asked him the following questions
to enlighten ourselves on his journey,
including the influence his family had
on him.
I prayed to God from that day that
He would help me go into business
and make it so that when I come back
to community work, people will not
associate it with my line of survival or
inadequacy. So the journey began in
2006 with the official closure of
JAMCT, as I wanted to prove to myself
that I can be a successful entrepreneur/business man with a social conscious.
where he became a CEO in the social
housing industry, working for Yeast
City Housing for 3 years. During this
time, the company graciously grew its
stock by 46%, doubling its asset value,
which took 13 years to build. In 2011,
he resigned to focus more on his business.
Based on your experience thus far,
what would you say are your top three
key success factors for an entrepreneur
There are many things that have been
spoken regarding the subject, but
these few three I am convinced are
key:
Innovation, what spark an idea of an
entrepreneur is innovation, forever