12 Apr 2018

Mr Jabulani Mahlangu is a 25-year-old man who completed his BGCSE in 2010. Upon completion, he worked as a barber for two years.

He said this was because he had not done well in his studies and therefore settled for the available job.

“Working as a barber taught me discipline because I had to wake up every morning and go to work and do my best to please customers,” he said.

Mr Mahlangu said although he did not earn much, he was grateful for the job as it kept him busy. He said it was at the barber shop that he met a man who told him about a messenger job at a private company.

“I gave the man my phone number and before long they contacted me,” he elaborated. Mr Mahlangu stated that he got the job as a messenger at the company in 2013 and worked there for three years.

“I was happy working there and I did my job diligently,” he said. He explained that in his third year of working there, he was fired from the company as the management thought he was a liability. It was in 2016 when he was jobless that he decided he would wake up everyday to go to a parking area in African Mall to watch over people’s cars just so that he could have money for airtime and other small items.

He said it was during his days at the African Mall that the idea of general cleaning dawned on him. He then registered a company for cleaning services with the hope that he would then get tenders from government to clean their properties. He said he was currently looking for a place where the council could assess and grant him a trading licence. He also said the PPADB certificate was also in the pipeline.

Meanwhile, Mr Mahlangu explained that he operated a mobile car wash whereby he carries cleaning detergents in his backpack and goes to the parking area at African Mall everyday from Otse to clean people’s cars.

“Sometimes the cars have scratches and sometimes it is just dirt then I wipe it out,” he said. He stated that although he was mainly based at the African mall, he was not restricted to it as he could do his business anywhere.He said he charged according to the make of the car. He further explained that he made around P150 to P200 a day.

Besides cleaning vehicles, he said he sold vehicle air fresheners which he highlighted that they were got bought like fat cakes.

 “I sell the air fresheners at P20 each and I make a lot of profit as I buy them for P2,” he said. As with any business, Mr Mahlangu’s business is not spared from challenges. He said one of the challenges was that he would clean a person’s vehicle when whey had gone into the mall and when they come back, they would give him a hard time before paying.

However, Mr Mahlangu maintains that he was not discouraged because he knows where he was going in life. He said his goal was to acquire all the necessary documents so he could implement his tendering business.

He has encouraged young Batswana like himself to look out for business opportunities and start businesses, adding that it was better to do something with your hands and make income instead of sitting and doing nothing. ENDS