Billionaire Christo Wiese’s advice for President Cyril Ramaphosa

Billionaire Christo Wiese said the President should view all his decisions through the lens of whether they will create jobs or destroy jobs. 

The first President to receive this advice from the retail giant was Jacob Zuma, and the same applies to President Cyril Ramaphosa. 

At the 9th BizNews Conference in the Drakensberg, Wiese recalled giving Zuma this advice, which was ignored.

Having played an instrumental role in making Shoprite and Pepkor the businesses they are today, Wiese is well-versed in building businesses and creating jobs. 

South Africa has a serious unemployment problem, with Stats SA’s latest data showing that 33.6% of the working-age population is unemployed. 

This means that one in three South Africans is neither productively employed nor participating in the economy. 

Wiese explained the root cause of the problem as a lack of entrepreneurship in South Africa, particularly a shortage of entrepreneurs capable of turning a small business into a large operation. 

Entrepreneurs in South Africa face an extremely tough set of regulations and requirements to start and operate a business. 

This prohibits risk-taking and prevents the creation of new businesses that employ people, Wiese said. This is directly linked to government policy and inefficiency. 

Wiese said that for many years, the government did not understand this. He recalled how he had given Zuma advice and been flatly ignored. 

“Years ago, before Jacob Zuma delivered one of his State of the Nation speeches, he invited a few business people to the Cape Sun,” Wiese said.

“I went, and somebody told me to say something. So I said that I would give the President some advice for his speech, in all modesty.” 

Wiese told Zuma two stories, one of which was about how his mother told him that when you spend money, it must be only on things you cannot do without, not on what you need. 

The other story came from Wiese’s early years as a lawyer, where he learned that it does not matter how much work you do if it is answering the wrong question. 

“Then I said, ‘Respectfully, Mr President, here is the advice: From tomorrow, from the speech onwards. Make a statement and make a promise’,” Wiese recalled.

“‘Make the promise that everything the government does from this day on will be put through the screen of: Will it create jobs or destroy jobs?’”

Wiese said the audience liked it, and he received an invitation from Zuma to attend the State of the Nation Address in Parliament. 

He was ushered into the President’s box and was moved from the fourth row down to the front row. “I thought it was possible that the miracle happened and Zuma would make the promise,” he said. 

“We were finally going to ask the right question and begin to get the right answers. Needless to say, he did not do that, and nothing was done. But, I did have a front-row seat.”