Robert Hersov On State Of South Africa, Malema, GNU, Elon Musk, Billionnaires - Posties Podcast #78 — Posties Podcast

A lot of people don't have or will never have the opportunities I had from day one, and I still have today. So life is unfair in the sense that, you know, we want to get to a world where everyone has equal opportunity, not equal results, equal opportunity. And what you make of that opportunity is up to you. But I'm in my echo chamber. So I try and avoid Daily Maverick. It's a bit anti-business. And I love Business News, pro-business. And I'm in my echo chamber. Everyone's in their echo chamber. The lefties of doing, you know, CNN, and the other 15, 16, 18 million don't. Answer: Elon Musk. Starlink.

Starlink.

Yeah.

Boom.

And you know, that's BEE nonsense. Elon's just not going to put Starlink in South Africa and give someone 30%. Bullshit.

Welcome to the, the, the—

Welcome to the Posties Podcast. That's the best intro. I'm sorry, Alex, that's the best I've been defeated.

I've been defeated already. How you doing, brother?

I'm good, I'm good. I want to say hello to the Posties family. Thank you for liking, commenting, subscribing. We made a promise to you guys that we're going to give you bigger and better guests. Alex, please introduce us while we're here at beautiful Zuni's.

Timber, it's like you're trying to make jokes because you're making an alliteration thing going on, right? Bigger, better.

I rap sometimes.

You guys are setting me up. Yeah, a little bit.

A little bit. But ladies and gentlemen, this is the face behind the country's movements, if I had to say so myself. We're talking about business mogul, we're talking about media mogul, we're talking about lifestyle mogul, we're talking about rock star.

I love that baby. I'm going to do that thing.

How's that go?

Is that good?

Is that good? Is that good? Yeah? Yeah? It's almost it. I'll get it.

I'll get it. I'll get it, man. Yeah!

He's a part of the person's crew.

So guys, ask me anything.

No holds barred. No holds barred. Temba, go first.

The first question I wanted to ask is I wanted to break the ice, but to settle it nicely.

Go deep. Go deep.

OK. Let's see if you find it deep or not. But if you were a chess piece, what chess piece best describes you?

Wow. I love chess, and that's a great question. A little bit of research done there. So I don't want to be queen or king.

Okay.

So I think I've got to be a knight.

Okay.

Because a knight doesn't move up and down, diagonally. A knight goes 2 forward, 1 left. Backwards, forwards. And I think in life, if you can pivot, if you can be flexible, if you can not go too far ahead, but stay connected with life on the ground, with other people, but be able to pivot. I'm the knight.

I love that. I love that.

I don't mind whether I'm black or white.

Clarity.

It's clear to see.

It doesn't matter who moves first. It doesn't matter who moves first. A knight is interesting because from my experience of chess, it's not great. It helps the setup, you know, comes in for the rescue sometimes. And I'm trying to find out if that's something you already resonate to. Like, do you like that rescue? Do you like that setup? What's your story?

So I love chess, played it all my life. And at age 8, I beat my father, my grandfather.

Wow.

And so I always thought this was my game.

Yeah.

And then my second son, Luke, who's now 25, when he was 16, he beat me for the first time.

Wow.

So he's got the mantle. Passing the torch.

Yes.

So, you know, setting up the board, life's not like that.

Yeah.

Because life's not like, you know, black and white, one moves first, everything's equal on the board. It's the most equal game in the world. The only difference between you and the competitor is somebody moves first. Otherwise, equal. And life's not like that.

The funny thing is everyone always says life is like chess. And now you're like, whoa, whoa, not really.

Not really.

Yeah. Well, just because of the different advantages that you have. White moves first, you know, and that's no pun intended.

And a lot of people don't have or will never have the opportunities I had from day one and I still have today.

Yeah.

So life is unfair in the sense that, you know, we want to get to a world where everyone has equal opportunity, not equal results, equal opportunity. And what you make of that opportunity It is up to you. That's not chess.

But I love how you touched a little bit about, um, a little bit of your background there. Like, I wanted to get into like having a family business like Anglophile back in the day and like growing up in that world. What do you— how do you think that actually like molded you as a person?

So positives and the negatives. The positives, you know, I grew up with never worrying about the next meal, or never worrying about anything really. You know, I was just trying to do the best in life. And a lot of other people who had similar wealth and opportunities have not done much with their lives. Yeah, because that's the negative about it, you know. You feel like, okay, I've got this safety net, I'm not going to try.

Comfort.

To me, it was the opposite. I've got a safety net, let's just try as hard as I can and everything I can, because I can always fall back on the safety net. And so it's given me huge motivation, and I think I've You know, I've done— I've failed in many things, but it's given me the chance to absolutely try. Not everything yet. Yeah, you're gonna ask me what haven't I done, but try a lot of things. And yeah, I know what I like, I know what I don't like, I know what I'm good at, I know the many things I'm not good at. Yeah. And you know, I'm at an age of 64 where I'm gonna—

64 years young.

At some point I'm going to work out what I'm going to do with my life.

I love how you touched a little bit on, um, the, like, the process there. And like, would you say it's nurture or nature? Were you born with it, or did your circumstances kind of like push you onto, I've gotten this, but I want to take it to the next level?

Because you really don't have to, you know, and you, you don't have to take out a lot, sometimes to your detriment.

I don't have to do anything, so I shouldn't tell you this, okay? You should never have a Springbok rugby game on a Sunday night. Sunday night's for going to bed early. I went to a Scottish friend's house. Bright place. Buddies of mine, Springbok shirts, him in his Scottish shirt.

Is this yesterday?

Last night. Okay! And he said to me, he said, "I'm not drinking at the moment." But he said, "You gotta try this brandy." Yeah.

I'm gonna drink with you guys.

So he gave me— I had about 4 brandies. And then things went pear-shaped.

Of course.

And the reason I'm not on Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram is because I'd be dead by now.

Yeah.

I would say something, I'd be assassinated. I mean, I'd piss someone off. And last night I was on this business channel. Yeah. And I just got pissed off and I was in a fired-up mood and I got into this like name-calling. And eventually I went night-night. Yeah. I went to sleep this morning. The next morning I woke up with a hangover and I saw that thing, 'Thank goodness the foul-mouthed brat went to bed.' Oh, like, that's me. Regrets. Like, regrets.

I wouldn't say it's the first time that you sort of find yourself in trouble with perception of society or whatever, and it goes back to that lack of fear that you have to, first of all, say what you think. It gets all of us sometimes. I don't really like it when I say something, but you guys are saying But you learn, but you learn, you learn. And it's like, why do you continue doing that? There's obviously people behind you, I'm assuming, being like, don't say that, chill.

My wife.

Yeah, one person.

4 nights ago, like Wednesday night, I was sitting at my desk, open plan house, sitting at my desk working hard, and she could see me like focus, focus.

Yeah.

And she wandered up and she— I was like, didn't have time to like flip my notes over, and she walked She looked up and she could see Trump, Harris. This is the night— Yeah. The night after the election. Okay. And I was going on Biz News. And she said, "What are you doing?" And I said, "Well, I'm just doing some homework." She said, "Are you going on Biz News?" I said, "Yes." Tomorrow morning. And she said, "On the election?" I went, "Yeah." She said, "Please don't. Please. Can I ask you?" And I went, "No." I wanted to do it. And, you know, my poor wife, she sees this coming. Anyway, it went live 4 days later. It's like 115,000 views in 4 days.

Wow.

So maybe this can go 200,000. Let's do it. But I got to say some wild stuff to get there.

I mean, like, why not? Because first of all, you felt like you had something to say.

Yeah.

Right. And you felt like people needed to hear it.

Yeah.

Do you want to say what that was?

No, I just, you know, I always felt Trump would be a better president than Kamala Harris. And for 10, 15 years, okay, it's been really hard for people like me, not me, but people like me to say anything public and political. Because the left just says, you're racist, you're a misogynist, you're anti-green, cancel, cancel, cancel. And the tide has been turning and turning But a lot of people are still scared. And the reason I knew Trump was going to win was because a lot of people asked, who do you think will win? I don't know. I'm not sure I'm going to vote for— well, they say Harris. And you know a lot of them are telling nonsense. They're going to vote Trump. And I just knew Trump was going to win. Knew it. Because a lot of people wouldn't admit to it. Because they just felt this woke ESG, DEI, blah, blah, blah. Great words. Black Lives Matter, great acronym. You know, DEI, diversity, equity, inclusion, great acronym. But the reality is, I hate to say, those are racist, socialist, and leftist. The actual implementation of those are terrible, destructive. They don't work. And that's the world is swinging away from that, anti-woke. So I knew Trump was going.

With those trends, when did you see it as it might be tending a little bit anti-woke now? What do you think the trigger was for it swinging into like the woke movement?

Way too far left.

It's way too far left. And the world always does this. You know, the pendulum swings. Everyone's like, good thing, it's a good thing, it's good. And then it goes too far. Yeah. And then people turn it into cancel culture, aggression, racism, all the bad stuff. Fascism. The left are fascist.

Yeah.

The right are more gentle. It's swung the other way.

It's crazy because I just listened to someone speak recently and They're like, the right are now the new rebels, you know? We're the rebels, guys. 100%. The right are the new rebels. Because back in the day, it would be the hippie guys and the free guys. And they'd be the ones who'd be the rebels.

All the way.

Away from where most people are.

100%.

But now most people are this way. And if you're right, you end up being outside.

And they call the right fascists. But actually, the right are more centrist. And the left has gone so far left.

What are those right people? What are they?

It's conservatism. And by the way, the majority of South Africans are Christian, conservative, you know, don't want change too quickly. And, you know, they want stability. And that's what the right represents. Because the left is like completely out of control.

They want shifts really radically in no amount of time.

Yeah.

And in this country, the social cohesion is actually way stronger than you think. Yeah, it's not a very— it's not a racist country. I really don't believe it is. I think people actually getting on well and working together, and the politicians who want to stir things up create this stuff and say, oh, racist, racist, racist, but it actually isn't really, you know. People want— a majority of people of all colors want the same thing. Yeah, a job, peace and security, to work together, to you know, have a— have their children have a better life than themselves. The vast majority, they don't want jukas. They really don't.

It's radical because it's scary too. Yeah, like, why would you want all of those things when Maslow's hierarchy of needs, the basic ones, aren't even covered yet?

Correct, correct.

And to get there, yeah, we need one thing: economic growth. Yeah. And everyone goes, oh, trickle-down is It does. You know, if we allow for— if we make our country investable and foreigners say, okay, we like South Africa, we're going to invest in it, they then stop flying back and forth, they hire local taxi drivers, they stay in our hotels, they, you know, they hire people. The country lifts, lifts, lifts. It's that basic. And, you know, the ANC in the last 10 years have been chasing investors away. It was crazy shit.

I think speaking about investment there, I actually wanted to touch on, because your passion for South Africa and Africa on a global scale is very evident to see.

Yeah.

So how do you think that like propagates into Invest Africa on your side?

Well, I just sold my last stake in Invest Africa. Really?

Yeah. Okay.

Only because it's other people now to take it on. You know, I loved it, but yeah, it's time. I'm also tired of traveling, you know, all my life, every day I'm flying somewhere. No, I just want to like—

okay, I wanted to look at it at a micro perspective, right? Because, um, you're involved in media somewhat, and as an individual, you also have your own individual voice. Now, we're discussing left, right, and the directions that tend to get pushed, and most of the times, the, the ideas that are pushed into each direction are pushed through media. Now, that synergy between your own individual voice and the voice that goes through media, right? You see where I'm going with this? Yeah, let's talk about that.

So where the world is right now, you know, it's gone from— let's talk America. It used to be ABC, CBS, NBC. That was it. That's where you got your news. Then Fox came in back in the day. Fox had a look and went, they're all center-left, there's big space on the right. Yeah, dive in. Boom. And then social, then multichannel television. TV came in, and I was heavily involved in that in America and Europe. You know, you had— we were looking at cat channel, dog channel, you know, like, where's it going? And then internet came, and then social media arrived. And where the world is today is, you know, I have never— I never look at SABC ever unless there's a sports game. I've never— I haven't looked at SABC News for years, probably years now. Yeah, but I follow podcasters I like. And you can imagine who they are. Joe Rogan, Dave Shapiro, they're all center-right conservatives. And Bill Maher. Bill Maher has suddenly become a centrist. You know, I've come like, wow, he used to be really left, he's in the center, I'll follow him. And Russell Brand.

Russell Brand.

He's loony.

Very recent.

Actually quite interesting, he's balanced. But I'm in my echo chamber. Okay. So I try and avoid Daily Maverick. It's a bit anti-business. Okay. And I love business, pro-business. Okay. And I'm in my echo chamber. Everyone's in their echo chamber. The lefties are doing, you know, CNN and— Yeah, yeah. And MSN, very left-wing. And I'm— And you get your information in your echo chamber. Yeah.

Which is wrong.

I should try and follow a couple of lefty organizations.

Just to see—

But I just don't know which ones. And they're not funny. The lefties are cancel culture, so all the stand-up comedians are righties. They're all funny ones. So the lefties have no sense of humor.

But now, because I'm like—

I love David Cowe. My fave, David Cowe. And Steven Gacy.

Yeah, 100%.

He's actually really funny.

He's better looking as a man though.

Sorry, Steve.

Fair.

Fair opinion.

I haven't heard that one before.

But he's a good paddle player.

Yeah? Have you played with him before?

I have.

Is he good?

Playing with him tomorrow.

Oh, geez. We should run a game. I'll teach you a few things.

Let's do it, baby. You want to play tomorrow?

Let's do it. When?

12th. 2:30 to 4:30.

2:30 to 4:30. An Americano. Let's do it. An Americano. Done. Just because you'll need the energy afterwards. Yeah, I know.

Listen, but I've lost 12 kilos.

Oh, no.

So I'm fucking faster than Ed. So don't underestimate me.

Guys, the competitive nature is coming out here for real.

That's how it goes.

Sorry, I interrupted you.

Let's just— let's just— so I wanted to like just stay on that media and opinion voice, right? In America, we've obviously gotten to the point where we see that business so much influences the messaging that gets out. You brought up how the creation of the different channels— you pulling a face?

Well, I'm not entirely convinced, but keep going.

Okay, okay. Because I was going to say, now, uh, the business influence on the things that are discussed on the platforms, and I wanted to interpolate that onto Africa. How is our economy? How is our society? Because it's so clear and obvious to see with them, like they've made it such an easy game to like be able to see. And with us it's a bit more obscure. So I wanted to like take a peek behind the veil a little bit. How does it work in South Africa? How does our news sort of like—

So internet connectivity, who has it in South Africa? The electros, the middle class, the aspirational, the You know, not the vast majority. No, of the 60 million South Africans, let's assume 30 million adults, probably 25, but depending on the adults, how many of those 25 million have, you know, unlimited Wi-Fi or at least access to one of their Wi-Fi plans? I was going to say, so let's say 5, let's say 10, let's be generous and say 10%. That's 2 million people, and the other 15, 16 16, 18 million don't. Answer: Elon Musk. Starlink.

Starlink.

Yeah.

Boom.

And you know, that's BEE nonsense. Elon's just not going to put Starlink in South Africa and give someone 30%. Bullshit. He's going to—

and how it's going to work and be done.

By the way, they're changing the rules. Starlink's coming.

Wow.

So what happens in the, you know, in the poorer areas and villages, towns, people have had we haven't had, and we're going to have it. Yeah.

This phone is like a box, you put it down, put it forward.

And then you have internet, which is such a resource to have for like anyone in any demographic.

You no longer rely just on SABC. Then you have access to the world. And it's not just news media information, it's education. Yeah. You know, if you're a kid that doesn't have money for food every day, and it's a long journey to school, and you skip school, or you're a teenage girl and you have every month, you know, girl issues and you skip school and your education is not in good shape, here's the answer: homeschooling. And it's gonna just be the greatest thing ever. And I think that will shift people's perspectives. It will be a big thing for South Africa.

It'll change Africa, it'll change South Africa by crazy degrees, just depending on the way he puts it, who gets to have it.

And people will experiment, they'll play games. And do silly stuff. And then there'll be the curious ones will say, well, hang on, what is capitalism and socialism? Let's find out. What is, you know, what is Russia doing in Ukraine? Exactly.

And then you can actually build your perspective and your opinions on actually what's happening in the world.

100%.

So you spoke about Elon coming in and obviously encountering a few barriers to entry. You know what I'm saying?

If that's a mild way, it would be—

Elon is— he's a cool cat. Yeah, I mean, people go, I don't like him.

Why?

So my wife's— okay, she's from New Zealand.

Okay, okay, okay.

Her dad, my father-in-law, who's the greatest dad in the world, yeah, is— was the top lawyer for the medical profession, and he had 4 daughters, 2 doctors, 2 lawyers. 3 of the daughters married nice New Zealand lawyers and one capitalist.

This guy, this guy.

I know, can you imagine the horror? Yeah. And I was on holiday with them, uh, 6 weeks ago. Yeah, in Fiji, New Zealand. And the one daughter, I mentioned Elon Musk, she said, oh, terrible man.

You—

I said, why? Because he supports Trump. I said, hold on, Put the Trump thing aside. He's created PayPal, Starlink, Tesla, SpaceX. He's the richest businessperson on the planet. How unbelievably cool is that? Amazing. I mean, you've got to at least give him that.

No, come on.

Just the screens dropped down.

Isn't that interesting? I mean, isn't that interesting? That's how a lot of people just like— there's a barrier to how they can perceive someone.

I know. Why don't you look— and Trump. Would I like to have dinner with him? No. I don't actually think he's particularly my guy. But I said to my wife, just look past him at the policies, who's around him, and what he's going to achieve. And that's what the American voters did. They said, okay, Trump's kind of— some like him, some don't.

He's kind of sus, but he gets things done.

But look what he's promised to do. I mean, it's pretty incredible.

Let me ask you something. Say 5 nice things about Kamala.

Carmela. Okay, I think she's legitimately a good person. I think she actually wants the right things for the world. I think she's kind. I'm gonna run out of— I don't know if I'll get 5.

You have 2 more.

I said 5 is so far away.

I'm a bull in the mud.

She's like a 5.5 out of 10 attractive. Okay.

Fair enough. Fair enough.

Okay, I'm right. That's it. I can't do any more.

It's true.

I can't do any more. Let's get 2.5.

I'm gonna challenge you now.

Yeah.

Give me at least 2.5 for Julius.

He's intelligent. I've met him.

Oh, word.

He's super intelligent. Mm-hmm. He's high-energy dynamic. Mm-hmm. And I actually don't think he really is a racist, communist, fascist lunatic. I think he— thinks the only way to get elected is to occupy that space. But he's so far down the line, that's his reality. But I actually think if you asked him if he couldn't live in South Africa, where he'd live, it'd be a Western country. He'd live in London or the south of France or the south of Spain.

I think you and him share similarities.

Me and him?

Like the high energy. Hey! Well, the high energy, the living, living crazy.

I'd beat him in a cage fight.

Oh really? You think so?

Destroy him. He's 20 years younger than me. You wouldn't see it coming.

Hey, Vietnami, what?

I definitely got a Vietnami.

Drikus will train me.

Drikus will train me.

But I love how we've started to touch on politics a little bit now.

And we spoke—

oh, sorry guys.

Hey, a long time.

Literally. Just keep running.

Where you need to be.

No way, this is the place I need to be.

Zuni. Zuni's the best.

By the way, the best. Meat in the country. The best burgers. I agree. And Jabu is based here. He's the coolest cat on the planet. I love Jabu.

They did win Burger of the Year in a year of existing.

And this year they literally won Burger Joint of the Year.

Burger Joint of the Year as well.

Shout out. I think that's part Jabu. That was also part Jabu.

100%. Shout out Jabu.

Shout out Jabu all the time. I wanted to touch a little bit more on the political side of this because we've spoken about how South Africa is quite conservative and pushing the boundaries, whether it's socialism or whatnot, may not get the results here.

I think you're right.

Where do you see a prominent short-term future for us going?

So, you know, I've started writing articles and speaking about capitalism works, socialism doesn't. But it's not going to resonate deep enough into the country for people to say, "I don't know what he's talking about. He's born rich. I mean, why should he?" I'm the wrong spokesman.

Are you going to title it that, though?

Yeah. I've written some articles. I've done a few recently. But people go, "Well, he's rich. He would say that, wouldn't he?" And they're right, I would. I've seen it in action. So I'm not the right spokesman for that. It needs to be someone else. So what should I be speaking about? At this point, you know, the election's over, the GNU's in place, it's the best option we had. Where's it going to go? I've got some views on it. I think we're fine for 2, 2 and a half years. We've got to get economic growth, otherwise GNU will fail. But what should I be talking about? Maybe nothing. Nothing. Maybe I should just shut up.

I don't agree. I don't agree.

What should I say? Why don't I ask you guys everything?

Um, because interesting enough, you've— this idea of the GNU, you've had a similar idea in the past, right?

Yes.

So like, that already is an idea that you could have been discussing, and now it's been correct.

Correct.

Now there's also knowledge of business. This knowledge, we're gonna get there, giving the homies some, some ideas. Um, but just to stick on that GNU and your version of it, what's the difference between what we currently have and how you would have implemented something like that?

So I was trying to do a GNU without the ANC. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

You meant specifically—

It wouldn't have worked.

Yeah.

Because if you look at what MK got from nothing, 15%, and where ANC dropped to, 41, you add those two together, it's 56.

They would have won. Yeah.

And the DA went from 21 to 22. ActionSA, zero. Musi Maimane, zero. ZB, zero. Gaten, zero to three. It wouldn't— what I was trying to pull together would not have worked. Okay. So, yeah. So, you know, well done Cyril and Enoch and, you know.

But you obviously had an idea when you excluded certain parties and you excluded certain people. What is the idea to protect?

Well, just to try and get the sort of center right, conservative, pro-capitalist, pro-democracy guys together. But the country's not quite ready for that.

I think capitalism is actually one of the basic ways that humans interact when it comes to trading. Yeah, 100%.

The townships are the most capitalist, more capitalist than Joburg and Cape Town. I mean, they're there. Every day we're starting businesses, creating shit, buying, selling, saying I don't need a license, I'm going to build businesses. I mean, Africa is naturally capitalist.

I think it's the word that you're using, man.

Yeah, and also the structures aren't in place for these amazing entrepreneurs to get to the next level, to build big, scalable, perpetually successful businesses, because take the rest of East Africa. In Tanzania, the minute you get to a certain size, the previous government, Magufuli, would tax you. Oh, you're now worth 50 million, we're going to tax you. So people, there was like a disincentive to build a scalable business. Let me stay under the radar. And in the townships, you know, you've got unbelievable entrepreneurs. I mean, I'm so impressed. They don't want licenses. They go like, well, what? I'm not paying tax. I mean, the government gives me nothing. Water, electricity, I have to do it all myself. So why should I bother? But if you empower those people, if you give title deeds to people that have lived in a tiny shack for 3 generations, give them a title deed. They should own the land. Why isn't that happening? That's a whole other discussion.

That's for part 2.

But I came back to South Africa, brought my New Zealand wife, and I was not going to invest, not going to say anything political. That's been out the window. But she is in love with this country. My wife doesn't want to leave.

We appreciate her.

She digs this country. Yeah, you know, she loves it, and then somebody's dog gets hit by a cobra. She's like, you know, it's like, Africa's not for pussies, you know. But The people are— I mean, I'm so impressed with people I meet, you know. You guys, Jabu, etc., etc., etc. The talent here is ridiculous.

It's stupid.

And Gaitan, there's always a joke that came out of Drikus. Like, Drikus may be the number 1 in the world, but he's number 4 in Benoni. Which is a great joke, but it's true. It's true. If you had the talent in the townships, the small towns, the villages, coming into sports business, this country would win everything. But everything. I mean, look at our music and art talent alone.

Tyler winning awards just last night. I want to take you a little bit back in time and like get what you think were the biggest influences when you were living in New York and starting at Goldman Sachs.

All business people. Politically, it was Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan. I would say that, wouldn't I? But they were big disruptors. Ronald Reagan was an actor, no one believed in him, and he was a great communicator, and he cracked Russia. He's like, we're going to nail you, and Russia collapsed. Margaret Thatcher took a destroyed country and economy, cracked the unions, and led the thing take off like a rocket. So they were my political influences. The rest were business people. You know, people like Rupert Murdoch, Johann Rupert, and the equivalents of that era. And today it's Elon Musk and people like that, you know. I look at business people and say, we should build statues about business people, not politicians from 200 years ago.

I mean, come on. You think about it, they're creating jobs.

Those should be our heroes.

Yeah, they're creating jobs all the time, they're building.

And from nothing. Now some business people born with wealth have a better opportunity. But Steve Jobs wasn't. And look what he created. Elon wasn't, look what he created. So Jabu, billionaire in the making.

Come through, come through.

Come on, baby.

Jabulino.

Come on.

It's funny because the Ghanaian president recently erected a statue of himself. Because of an ongoing project that he hasn't completed yet.

I like it.

But interesting question though, I want to get back because you clearly love business people as a business person yourself, influenced by them, and you see the value for them. Do you think we should have more leaders in society in general who come from the business life?

Absolutely, absolutely. You know, Gaten McKenzie came from jail and then came from business, and he said to me, I'm taking This is before he got elected as minister, and he said, "You know, I'm taking so much shit here, I might just go back to business. I don't need this." And that's what you want, is someone that doesn't need to be a politician, 'cause then they don't need to steal, be corrupt, stuff things up. You know, they go in and say, "Right." I'll give you a good example. Mteto Nyati, Dan Marokane, you know who they are? Chairman and CEO of Eskom for 2 years. People say to me, how come load shedding's all of a sudden disappeared? Thinking like an ANC conspiracy theory. I said no. 3 reasons. One, the economy's not growing very much, so it was not a huge pressure. Two, we've introduced a ton of solar and wind, which has reduced the pressure. But the real answer is chairman and CEO of Eskom, both black business guys, have In 2 years, done an incredible job. They've fired a lot of the cadres, they've refocused on coal-powered fuel stations, they've kicked production and distribution back into gear. In 2 years. These are heroes. And there are more and more and more of them, you know. Not only white guys, tons and tons of all-coloured South Africans doing incredible businesses, and those are the real heroes.

What characteristics do you look for in someone that you're trying to get into business with?

To hire or to be a partner? Both. Okay, to be a partner, somebody who's going to do all the work and I don't have to do any. So Nick Ferguson, Nick Ferguson, Stafford Marzi, I can name quite a few. These, these are the— Mike Lum, you know, Craig Stanley, Hans Ossling. These are guys, let's start this business. And they do all the work. And they're cleverer than me. And I sit back and go, yeah baby. And then hiring people, I like people who, I like people who have a natural ability to sell. 'Cause what is sales? It's enthusiasm, dynamism, energy, confidence. And I like salespeople 'cause whatever business you have, you know there are lots of finance guys you can hire, Engineers, you know, good engineer. But somebody that moves the needle is somebody that gets up in the morning and says, this is my product, this is my company, I'm gonna go and bring in customers. Those are the people I love.

No matter what.

And not so much PR and marketing, but sales. Like, eat a piece of metal and then go and sell stuff.

One-on-one, I'm telling you this.

And there's so many talented people I meet that aren't in sales, And I say to them, you should be in sales. And they go, I don't think a salesman— I go, it's the greatest skill on the planet.

I agree.

And AI is not going to replace creative sales.

AI is going to sell windows.

Correct.

You think there isn't an algorithm someone could cook up to sell—

You have a window. Buy this new window that you don't really need.

I love it.

But now it's saying every language in the world.

How does the language convert to you?

So, you know, what happened in the Industrial Revolution?

Yes.

Mainly Britain was the, you know, guys in Liverpool and Manchester built businesses exporting to the world, made wealth beyond their wildest dreams. And they all of a sudden had time on their hands, like I do. But they didn't sit in a rocking chair and lie on the beach. That's when all the sports were invented. Rugby, cricket, skiing. The Brits invented all the sports. And these guys were called gentlemen of leisure. But gentlemen of leisure didn't lie on the beach. They backed expeditions. They backed scientists to discover new things. So, you know, all these boats going out and exploring the Antarctic and the Arctic were funded by these wealthy philanthropists.

Business ventures at the end of the day.

And being outside—

They were— you're right. They were business ventures. And many of them— gave the developments and breakthroughs to man and womankind and humankind. But they were incredible philanthropists. Their money went to make the world a better place.

Speaking of the Industrial Revolution.

Go for it.

I was going to say, speaking of the Industrial Revolution, clearly something is happening in 2024. Oh, sorry. AI is accelerating.

That's what I was getting to. Thank you. The internet created something extraordinary, and mobile phones. But everyone's going AI, do we fear it or do we welcome it? Do we— AI's not going to replace humanity. There's no way.

To what extent?

Yeah. It'll replace—

Something's going to happen in real life to some—

No, it's going to make the world a better place. It's going to make people generally infinitely richer and infinitely richer, not just in money, but in ability to do things, education, understanding, you know, simplify things, shorten the time to do things. And there will be more and more and more people with time on their hands. Guess what? Those are the people, having made money, time on their hands, who will do incredible things. So Gates created the— Gates and Buffett created the Giving Foundation, where you give a third of your wealth when you die to charity. The first African to sign, South African, Patrice Motsepe.

Oh, wow.

I mean, shout out to Patrice.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Big shout out.

So with immense wealth comes responsibility and to do great things.

Yes.

And I think it's going to make the world a much better place. I'm one of the 8% of the world that thinks today is the best day the world's ever had, and tomorrow's even better. I'm the optimist.

Yeah, I think you need to have that mentality to be able to keep pushing.

Yeah, there's not many of us.

There's not many of us.

Everyone's so sad and depressed and just waiting for the world to explode. It's like, guys, it's your tomorrow, do something with it.

And you know, every day, yeah, if you believe what I believe, that 90 8% of humanity want a better life for themselves and everyone else and just want peace, security, and given a chance, okay? There are people all over the world, not just Silicon Valley anymore, inventing, creating, developing incredible stuff for the betterment of humanity and themselves. If they make money in the process, good for them. If you guys become— if you overtake MacGene, I'm the biggest podcast in America. And sponsors are diving all over you.

You deserve it. You deserve it.

I'd say used to.

Yeah.

Yeah.

The email post used to be what?

It was, we're coming for you, MacG.

Yeah.

I love it. I love it. Yeah. So I think we're in such a good place in this world. And I think South Africa is trending in the right direction. I just worry a little bit about MK, and I worry a little bit about— stuff going on, but in reality, the majority of South Africans and voters are not stupid. They want the good stuff, and we just need to communicate the good stuff better.

So as a businessman, surely you've used some sort of AI solutions and the different things that are happening in your life, right? We will do it for you. We will do it for you. We will do it for you.

Do you know, this is completely random. There's something that— It interests me.

Sure, sure.

So I'm told that all the young people being born today are gonna live to 150.

Let's do it.

'Cause of these breakthrough drugs and meds.

I'd love to die, but shout out, 150 is close enough.

But what about 200 or 200, whatever? Yeah, but what happens to marriages? Let's not talk about that. What happens to families? So there's a matriarch or patriarch with 7 generations of—

Wow.

You know, is that a corporation? Of the future? Is that a company? What is it?

Interesting question.

Yeah, I haven't worked it out yet.

I'm not saying—

yeah, I like how you spoke about a family of that size becoming a corporation. You, you yourself work in a family where I would say a lot of business decisions are made. How is that like when you say you get into a bidding war with someone else? You need to crowdfund from home source?

Okay, so very interesting you raise this. In America, in Europe there are angel investors, seed investors, Series A investor, Series B and off you go. And it's established. If you got a great idea write down a piece of paper—

Exactly!

You know, you can go to an angel network crowdsourcing an angel and potentially if you've got a good idea and you've got a tracker track record and potentially raise the money.

Yeah.

Doesn't exist in Africa. This is where Africa is missing. So there are African venture funds, Series A, Series B funds, but venture only invests in a business that is established. It may not have revenues, but it's got a product, got a service, got a team, and there's proof of concept. But the angel network are people that put in $10,000, $20,000, $30,000, $50,000. Most people at that level are thinking, ah, I need to pay off my mortgage, or I gotta pay for my kids to go to university. And they don't have that history of putting in a 50K into 20 businesses and one hits. So, AI. I've met a guy, and you're gonna meet him tomorrow at Paddle. You gotta come. Come and meet him. Toby Hannington. Bayabab Capital. I want to invest in his business, so don't put this out till he's agreed.

Yeah, it's coming right off the page.

He gets 1,000 people a month coming to him and saying, I've got an idea, please invest in it. Wow.

Wow.

And his AI, he puts into the AI machine, they've got to fill out a little, you know.

Yeah.

And the AI looks at the concept looks at if anything exists in Africa or that country, competitors, corporates might be doing it, other investors that are looking at this area, bang. And then maybe no one's looking at it. Then it looks at his or her background, the potential, la la la la, and it prioritizes the 1,000 deals. It says, these are the 20 you should invest in. And he puts between—

That's ridiculous.

And he puts $25,000 to $50,000 in those companies. Ingenuity. Like that. And his hit rate is ridiculous. AI.

Yeah, yeah.

Toby, let me invest.

Hey Toby, let's talk tomorrow. Let's talk tomorrow. So it's clearly, uh, that's another opportunity where you see AI cutting down time, cutting down the decision-making process. Cuz, uh, one thing you said that was interesting is that, uh, we don't have the history of making those kind of decisions, not the capacity.

Correct.

You know what I'm saying?

It's just too new.

Yeah. So if we give more people the opportunity to see the realm of possibilities, that hey, your 15,000 can—

Could be. But here's the problem.

Okay.

And I've made it for a long time. You know, you like someone, you like the idea, you put in money.

Yeah.

But there's actually a model portfolio. So at the venture capital level, That's not seed, it's venture. You need to have at least 32 investments. Magic number. For a third of them to blow up, a third to be the living dead, and a third to hit. So if you just do 2, 3, 4, you've got no chance. Unless you're really lucky. So 32. How many people are going to do 32 and manage them?

Wow.

So isn't that interesting? So here and there, you know, chances are you're going to write that money off, which I've done more times than I like.

In other words, at different levels of the same problems we're facing.

Correct.

Yeah. And I could lose as well.

I know, I've written off a lot of businesses. I've lost a lot of money on the way.

Yeah, yeah. And I like that, that we're going to lose, because before we started, we were talking about failure and being in love with failure.

So you learn way more from failure. Way more, way more, you know.

Seek the failure?

So along the way, you've got to accept failure and learn from it and have a look at why did it fail, try not to do it again. Maybe you were unlucky, maybe you were too early.

Timing.

Timing, yeah. And you can't blame everything on timing. I did that, I used to do that. We were too early. Now I just say, okay, stupid.

Yeah, that's it. That's it. Okay, let's take it to business, guys. Uh, clearly you've done a lot, you failed a lot, you've learned a lot.

Yeah.

All right, and at this stage, you're in— at the stage of your life where you're letting things happen for you, letting things work for you, right? Let's take it back 20 years. Let's take about 15 if you can. Yep, if you can.

You can.

Let's put yourself in those shoes again. At this level, you're sort of in the middle there, it's like trying to do something, right? What are the lessons, and what is that one thought that's running through your in your mind that's keeping you going to get to here?

So I was doing too many things too often. So I would have 10 meetings a day, 10 phone calls, because I thought maybe this is the one that I'll, you know. And, you know, the payback today is that I'm incredibly well connected and liked and things like that. Cost me a lot of money, but, you know, I've got a massive network and I'm good at networking. But I was doing too many things, and I was— if I'd focused more on the one or two things that were building and doing well, I would have been more successful.

You think so?

Yes.

Wow.

But you've got to get to a point where you actually think this has got a shot and not then do three more things as well. So in retrospect, and I know what they were, I could have focused better on a few things.

Yeah.

Today I'm much better at that. I've got five things, four of them run by great partners. I just sit back and look, and one that I'm hassling. And I'm not having every meeting where, you know, people call me up, you know, "Could I meet? I've got a great idea." I say, "Well, tell me now on the phone." And they go, "Here it is." I say, "It's not for me, but I can introduce you to someone." Bang, 5 minutes. And it's— I'm much better at that.

Please can you touch a little bit more about the power of networking? Because it's something—

Crucial.

We think is everything.

Networking is how we're sitting here with you today. Yeah, crucial. Crucial. So, you can get caught up in networking and go bananas. You've got to develop an instinct and a judgment of this is a good person versus a bad person. This person isn't just trying to sell me all the time. You know, they're doing something interesting in their life, I should keep in touch with them. Or you run into a really cool, like you run into Adrian Gore or Yanny Durant, you go, wow. And then you've got to actually say to them, and say to them, I've always, always, always wanted to have a chance to call you once in the next year and ask your advice on something. May I have your number? Or something like that, and get their number, save it, keep it, and then just gently keep in touch. This is where you met me, at Zuni's, with Jabu. You know, let me know if I can ever help you. This is what I do. And just build it gently over time. Don't immediately pounce on them. Keep in touch. And even write in the notes of their address, met at this place through this person. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, in this context. Yeah, she's called Annette. She's been with me 30 years. Thank you, Annette. Thank you, Annette.

We wouldn't be here.

That's my sister. Yeah.

Um, they say, um, a master— give me that, that quote— a master of all— oh, give me that, give me that. And then there's the— you cannot be him. Because it apparently finishes through AI.

No, no, it's not through AI.

Apparently we just never knew the full quote. A master of all tastes must have none. But something about a guy who does more is still better than that one guy. Do you share that view?

100%. So at a certain point, you've got to actually focus on what you're good at and what you can do. So I learned— I spent a lot of time in the world of finance, and I I was never gonna be the best investment banker, best investor, best finance guy. But I actually at some point knew I knew enough to talk the talk and then moved. Operationals, running a business. I don't have the attention to detail to be a good chief executive. I learnt that painfully by losing money. But I know I'm not the CEO. Africa Paddle, Mike Lum, unbelievable. But I'm good at selling and marketing and getting in front of someone and persuading them this is the thing to invest in, or this is the thing to buy. And you, you've got to try and say, this is what I'm good at, or I need to be good at this, I'm going to learn enough to get to that position. But you can't be— you can't do everything.

Yeah, I mean, you can't do everything, and you should do one thing.

Yeah. And some people are actually very good at a whole raft of things, but it's actually almost better to be the best the best engineer in this field, the best salesperson in this field, the best networker, because then you can be huge.

What was the first thing you ever sold?

Yeah, that's a good question.

Probably myself, myself, like, yeah. Was that through belief or was that like—

Just belief, yeah. Nothing red tape?

So boys, I think you're onto something. I'm happy to help you. Tell me who you'd like to interview, you know. But cool, man. Is that— I love it, man.

Guys, thank you for joining us. We bring you bigger and better conversation, as we have said.

Bigger and better.

Oh, the best. We done.

We did say it, guys.

We done.

And as always, thank you, Portuguese family.

The journey continues. Yes, sir.

Thank you for this, guys.

Thank you so much.

I really enjoy