Alexandra is engine room of Fabcos

Friendships begun at Pholosho Primary School in Alexandra are the powerful glue that has kept the Foundation for African Business and Consumer Service (Fabcos) together in recent years.

The current crop of leaders, president Mxolisi Zwane, Fabcos chief operating officer Allen Campbell, former chief financial officer Abel Mangolele and Fabcos Enterprise chief executive Phillip Usiba went to the school and there became friends.

And both the former communications manager John Mgogodlo and the chairperson of Fabcos’ investment arm,
Fabvest, Muzi Msimang, have links to Alexandra.

Msimang left Fabvest last year, while Mgogodlo left three weeks ago. Now ­Limpopo businessman Ducksy Mkhondo is fighting a lone battle to try to topple the Fabcos Alexandra leadership.

“It is disturbing that a national organisation such as Fabcos has been turned ­into something that benefits only a few people from Alexandra,” says Mkhondo, an ousted Fabcos secretary-general and Limpopo chairperson.

Mkhondo has been criss-crossing the country trying to mobilise support to ­topple the current Fabcos leadership in the November national elections.

At this stage he is the only candidate who is challenging Zwane’s leadership.

Mkhondo has roped in the services of former Fabcos executives who were ­dismissed from the organisation when the leadership of Alexandra took over.

One of his backers is Sbu Mabaso, the former Fabcos secretary-general and trustee of Fabcos Trust, who blames the late former Fabcos leader, Sam Buthelezi, for employing mostly people from Alexandra to run the organisation.

Buthelezi, elected Fabcos president in 2002, appointed Zwane as his adviser in 2004.

Usiba was appointed the chief executive of Fabcos Enterprise, a position he still holds.

Buthelezi single-handedly also made Zwane the chairperson of Premier Foods and Fabcos Trust.

“Bra Sam and Zwane called us as the board trustees for an informal drinks session at Buthelezi’s house in Alexandra and then broke the news that Zwane had just been appointed the chairperson of these organisations,” said Mabaso. “The Fabcos constitution states that the Fabcos Trust board of trustees are the ones who should recruit the chairpersons of Fabcos organisations but in these instances, Buthelezi took all the decisions by himself.”

Fabcos appears to be an anomaly ­because it is a national organisation but its leadership is drawn from Alexandra. Under Buthelezi’s leadership, which started in 2002 and ended in 2007, Alexandra became an even stronger centre of ­Fabcos’s universe.

Credited for being an unorthodox entrepreneur and visionary, Buthelezi’s preference for doing things his way became evident when he used his house in Alexandra as the chamber’s “real” national head office. The chamber’s registered head office at that time was at Fabcos House in the Johannesburg CBD.

In 2007 Buthelezi nominated Zwane to be president of Fabcos. This was the first time that an individual had a significant influence on who lead the organisation.

After Zwane became president he filled other influential positions with former Pholosho schoolmates.

Established in 1988 by James Ngcoya, Sam Ntutubela, freedom fighter Ellen Kuzwayo, Joas Mogale, Andrew Lukhele, Jabu Mabuza, Zithulele Combi, Knox Tsotsobe and Buthelezi, Fabcos has had six presidents.

Ngcoya was the first, followed by Sam Ntutubela in 1990.

Reggy Hlongwane and Cyril Gwala have also served as presidents.

- City Press