The Businesswomen’s Association (BWA) is set to reach new heights with the injection of renewed energy as celebrated personality, Basetsana Julia Khumalo, and renowned businesswoman Angie Makwetla take over as new president of the association and executive head respectively.
The combined leadership of Basetsana and Makwetla will no doubt take the BWA to another level as mature, energetic youthfulness blends with dynamic, age-old experience to constitute a new era of leadership at the largest businesswomen’s association in Southern Africa.
Angie Makwetla pioneered the emergence of black public relations companies into the South African PR industry. She holds a BA social Work degree from the University of the North, and a management diploma from Arthur D Little Management School in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She has extensive business experience, including 15 years with IBM, an experience which enabled her to start the first black-owned computer training academy in South Africa in 1988. In 1992, Makwetla joined hands with two partners and established Makwetla & Associates, a company specialising in public relations, event management, community development and sponsorships. Makwetla’s strategic work in media and communications was recognised in 2001 when she was awarded the "Women of Strategy Award" for her efforts to develop a better community. She has also been a finalist in the media and communications category of the Shoprite Checkers Woman of the Year Awards.
Basetsana was born in Soweto and started her school years at Thabisang Primary School, before proceeding to Trinity Secondary School where she completed her secondary education. After school, she completed her BA Ed. Degree. An accomplished businesswoman in her own right and a champion of social responsibility, Basetsana entered the limelight in 1990 when she was crowned Miss Soweto and Miss Black South Africa. She gained further recognition in 1994 when she became the second black woman to win the prestigious Miss South Africa pageant and went on to make the nation proud by clinching the first-runner up position in the Miss World Pageant. During her reign, Basetsana gained the respect of the nation and spent time and energy on key issues such as community upliftment projects and fund raising for several charity organisations.
