Filling the Financial Literacy Gap in South Africa with 2CEE Holdings
Entrepreneurs have different stories of venturing into business, ranging from personal experiences to a passion, for Thusi Sabelo, his journey of entrepreneurship started back in 2011. “I resigned at Old Mutual Finance and started my own marketing company Walking Tall Communications. Unfortunately the company didn’t succeed due to a lack of clients and was running out of cash to sustain it. In 2012, I went back to the job market and was hired by Credit Clear where I only worked for 3 months and went back to business.” This time around Thusi tried his hands in a different sector, after seeing a deterioration of people who are blacklisted and helpless because of the bad economic status of the country and bad financial decision, he decided to form 2cee Holdings with an aim to address the financial literacy issue.
2CEE Holdings which come from his surname Thusi is based in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa and has its main services are ITC Clearance, rescission of administration order, illegal garnishee order removals. On the business consultants side they focus on company registration, business plans, business profile, business proposals, tax returns, CIDB registration, bookkeeping, BBBEE and financial statements.
With a target market for Para-legal services and South African consumers who were unfairly blacklisted, illegally garnished and those over indebted. Statistics have shown that 49% of active consumers have impaired credit records. This means that out of 19 Million active consumers 9.3 million consumers are struggling with their accounts. Further statistics also show that 61% of garnishee orders (Emolument Attachment Order) in South Africa are illegal, hence consumers are being exposed to reckless lending which in most cases leads to them being blacklisted and later garnished. This 2CEE Holdings have made as its responsibility to better the lives of South African consumers by addressing the financial literacy challenges.
On the business consultant side of the business, Thusi and his team we target people who want to venture into business. As entrepreneurship is gaining popularity among young people, 2Cee holdings offers business advisory service for these individuals.
With a staff strength of 7, the long term goal for Thusi is to have branches in all 9 provinces and have a call centre that will service these branches and also looking to grow beyond the South African borders as financial literacy issue is not just in South Africa but the whole of African continent is affected.
In 2017, Thusi was selected on the TEF programme and this he says has contributed a lot in the growth of 2CEE Holdings brand as a whole and also to himself as a leader of the business. “The training really opened my eyes in many things and I’m also implementing what I learned. Funding was utilized to grow the 2cee holdings brand. The plan is to continue to be part of more enterprise development programme which will increase our knowledge and also position ourselves in a right way for funding.
On his advice to aspiring entrepreneurs “I always say that when you are an entrepreneur you should not 100% focus on making money although it is part of why we venture into business. When you do what you do because of passion even when not making money, passion will keep you going. It is important to be passion driven rather than money driven. Obstacles will always be there; it is having a clear vision and understanding the bigger picture that makes you push on. Once you get into business, it is no longer just about you, it is about people you servicing, your employees and stake holders.”
Clients can contact Thusi and his team on 033 342 0706/079 904 6345. E-mail: msthusi@2ceeholdings.co.za website: www.2ceeholdings.co.za twitter: @ThusiSabelo : Facebook Page: 2CEE Holdings
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