Words by Smiley Team
When Strive Masiyiwa and his family fled to Zambia to escape the turmoil in Zimbabwe - then known as Rhodesia - in 1968, he was just seven years old.
Now aged 60, and after battling the Mugabe regime for years to be allowed to expand his telecoms business, he was named this weekend as Britain’s first black billionaire.
Masiyiwa was educated at school in Edinburgh and at university in Cardiff, but headed back to Zimbabwe to set up an engineering firm. He decided to expand into the rapidly growing field of mobile phones but was blocked by the state’s leadership.
After a five-year battle which left him almost bankrupt, Masiyiwa won but moved to South Africa.
In addition to his telecoms empire, his other business interests include stakes in mobile phone networks in Burundi and Lesotho, and investments in financial services and power distribution firms in Africa.
In 2010 Masiyiwa, a father of six, and his family moved to London, and together with wife Tsitsi he founded the Higherlife Foundation aimed at improving lives and prosperity across five countries in Africa.
The Masiyiwas, now worth £1bn, have donated millions of pounds to good causes through the foundation, including £50m to fight cholera.
One of their most recent projects helped young children in Zimbabwe to continue with remote learning while schools were closed during lockdown.
More than 65,000 youngsters at the foundation stage of learning were affected, and the foundation helped to fund initiatives including a bespoke textbook, online learning for those able to take part, and recorded videos and voice notes from teachers for those unable to attend live sessions.
Masiyiwa is also the African Union special envoy on vaccines and is leading the drive to get Africa’s 1.3billion population vaccinated against Covid 19.
To find out more visit the Higherlife Foundation’s website or follow them on Twitter.
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