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VISIONARY LINCOLN MOTSA CREATES 120 JOBS IN 2 WEEKS

16/12/2018 10:30:00 BY WELCOME DLAMINI

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EZULWINI – The entrepreneurship acumen of Linac Investments Director Lincoln Motsa is proving to be a catalyst to lowering the country’s unemployment problem.

Having provided permanent jobs to 70 emaSwati by opening OK Foods Mathangeni in Matsapha, Motsa has provided 50 more jobs to locals by opening the OK MiniMark Ezulwini on Friday.

This brings the total number of people he has secured permanent jobs for to 120 in a space of two weeks.
In the bigger picture, this brings the number of people employed by Motsa’s Linac Investments to 500.
Linac Investments began its retail business journey in 2007 at Logoba with a small counter store that had five employees and a capital investment of less than E50 000.

Today the Linac group has nine outlets available and easily accessible along the main corridor of the Kingdom of Eswatini.
With the latest addition, the group now has outlets in Manzini, Matsapha, Ezulwini and Mbabane.
On Friday, stories were told of how he has been able to develop the OK Foods brand locally.

bold in taking decisions
As he opened the 8th branch of the OK Foods franchise in Ezulwini on the day, Motsa was described as someone who had a vision and was bold in taking decisions.

Muziwandile Dlamini, the Director of MA Dlamini Consulting Engineers – the owners of the Mbabane and Ezulwini properties on which OK Foods operates, said he had not envisaged that a store would be accommodated in these buildings.
He said even though he was classified as a visionary alongside Motsa, it was the latter who led the way in this aspect.

“I just follow behind him all the time. On the land in which I built the shopping complex in Mbabane, I had earmarked it for office space but when I showed the property to Motsa he told me that I should instead build a supermarket. He had quickly done a head count of the vehicles that passed by while he spoke and made the decision that a supermarket would be more appropriate,” Dlamini said.

I told him that changing my plans was impossible because I already had tenants lined up for the office space but he asked me how much the tenants would pay and he said he would match that amount.

“I then had to build the OK Foods complex and that was the beginning of a very interesting journey. Even here in Ezulwini, Motsa had come to visit me in my office on business-related issues when he noticed the vacant land and quickly suggested that I should build a shopping complex and he would bring OK Foods on board as tenants of the property. So you can see that this man is a visionary and I am now also seen as being in that category. That is why they say you are as good as the company you keep,” Dlamini stated.

He said working with Motsa and the Linac was easy and enjoyable even though they sometimes did not agree on certain things but their friendship blossomed. He thanked government for creating an enabling environment for indigenous business people to open and operate businesses.

challenge those in govt
“There is a big question that if retail business and land is owned by foreigners, how will we claim to own the country we live in. I challenge those in government to continue supporting indigenous emaSwati,” Dlamini said.
Meanwhile, Lincoln Investments Manager David Litchfield told of how he has had to watch in awe the decisions taken by both Motsa and Dlamini in developing the business.

He said he was skeptical when he heard that Motsa wanted to open another branch in Ezulwini because they were still trying to settle down after having opened the Mbabane branch.
“But I was soon told that the deal had been signed and I must begin to work and I had no choice but to agree,” he said.

Even though he was skeptical at the time, Litchfield said his mind had been completely changed by the success that the business was turning out to be.
“Those that are scared are not ready to be entrepreneurs. An entrepreneur is someone who is ready to take risks. I must highlight that this is visionary. If you don’t look through the eyes of an entrepreneur you don’t see what the entrepreneur sees,” he said.