Phindi Kema's response to John Freeman

Punter this thread is titled

"Phindi Kema's response to John Freeman"

go read the John Freeman piece again and ask yourself if this is a response or something else...

Phindi Kema, stud farmer extraordinaire
10

Angela Zachariasen

8 July 2008

At just 36 years of age, the Eastern Cape's inimitable Phindi Kema is the first and only black person to breed thoroughbred horses commercially in South Africa. To top it off, she also grows lucerne and runs a citrus farm, a small dairy and a popular adventure camp.

"You have to push the boundaries and learn how not to impose any self-inflicted limitations on yourself in order to achieve your dreams," said Phindi, who owns the Iph' Intombi stud and citrus farm in the heart of Addo, outside Port Elizabeth.
Go to Eastern Cape Madiba Action After having bought the stud farm in May 2007, Phindi made headline news only three months later when she sold six yearlings at the National Yearling Sale at Gosforth Park in Gauteng, with Mary Slack, daughter of well-known South African business tycoon Harry Oppenheimer buying her best filly, Midnight Queen.

"Midnight Queen was sired by one of the Eastern Cape's great stallions, Lecture, owned by Parker's Ascot Stud in Port Elizabeth," said Phindi. "She's apparently doing very well, according to Durban-based trainer Dennis Drier, who is one of South Africa's best."

The other five yearlings also went to excellent trainers in Johannesburg, Cape Town and the Limpopo Province.
A passion for farming

As if destined for the job, Phindi's phenomenal journey began when she bought a citrus farm in the area in November last year. Although she knew nothing about citrus farming a year ago, Phindi defied her sceptics with her first sale of 20 000 cartons of export quality produce recently to Europe, the Middle East and Asia.

Farming may seem an unlikely profession for a black woman, especially even more so for someone so sophisticated, eloquent and elegant, but for Phindi, who was born in Komga and grew up on a farm in Frankfort near King William's Town, it's a passion she cannot deny.

"My grandparents were farm labourers and my parents bred pigs and supplied Karoo Osche abattoirs. At high school (the Zigudu Missionary School near Cofimvaba) I was one of two girls who chose agriculture instead of home economics," she said. "During the school holidays I would have to help on the farm and that meant feeding and cleaning the pigsty. I hated that with a passion as a teenager ... but now I realise how profound an effect my upbringing had on my love for farming today."

And so it came about that Phindi approached the Department of Land Affairs with a proposal for a loan to purchase a farm. The department agreed to assist Phindi in buying the Addo citrus farm, stipulating a stringent list of requirements and conditions that she has to fulfil.

"It took nine months of blood and sweat to put together the citrus deal. The process was complicated because of funding," she said. "Becoming a farmer was an adjustment I was prepared to make because this is where I wanted to be and I owe my being to the Eastern Cape."
A serious challenge

By the time Phindi took over the citrus farm, the orchards had deteriorated into quite a poor state.

"It was a serious challenge as I started without any working capital," she said.

Today the farm boasts 40 hectares of planted citrus of different cultivars, including lemons, navels, caracaras (a red orange), turkeys (a type of naartjie), novas and valencia types.

The citrus farm employs eight full-time staff and about 25 seasonal workers during the picking and pruning seasons. Phindi explained that the cultivars are seasonal workers throughout the year, ensuring a steady flow of income.

"One has to nurture your trees continuously. You have to chase the season because that is when the market pays top dollar. If your crop is late you miss out."
Leaving a legacy

So how does a citrus farmer become a respected horse breeder?

It started through a friendship with Phindi's neighbour, celebrated breeder, the late Elwyn Phillips, whose Elandskraal stud farm was up for sale.

"Elwyn was one of the founder members of the Thoroughbred Breeders Association," she said. "He told people who had offered him double the price that I offered for the stud farm that it was 'not about the owner or money, but about leaving a legacy'. That went straight to my heart."

Eight of Phindi's mares were recently transported to the Western Cape where they are being mated with some of the country’s top stallions.

"One of my mares is standing at Gary Player's stud farm in Colesberg. She has been covered by Manshood, sire of Iph'Intombi," she said. "I believe that Iph'Intombi was the best filly Africa has ever produced and she was voted the best filly internationally in 2002. I named my stud farm after her."

Mating her mares with top commercial stallions does not come cheap. Not only are there transportation costs, but the actual mating exercise costs up to R250 000 per mare.

"I can't wait for my first crop," she enthused.

When Phindi bought the farm she inherited eight mares, six yearlings and eight foals. She then purchased two more mares to add to the stable.

"I didn't have a stud manager as they are very expensive, so I had no option but to do it myself, along with my staff."

While running the farm is a full-time job for Phindi, she still prides herself most on being a mom to her daughters - aged 10, 12 and 17 - who are attending Eastern Cape boarding schools.

"Although I don't want them to lose the big city way of thinking, I like to bring them back here to keep them grounded," said Phindi "Grounding is so important - and the Eastern Cape does that."

This article was first published in Eastern Cape Madiba Action, winter 2008 edition. Republished here with kind permission.

Read more: www.southafrica.info/business/success/ip...2fwqK0#ixzz2AD9JTQMn

What I have read about Phindi.

ersistent complaints to the Competition Commission sparked an inquiry into alleged collusion between the major players in the horse-racing industry.
Click here to find out more!

Persistent complaints to the Competition Commission by Phindi Kema, South Africa’s only female African racehorse breeder, have sparked an inquiry into alleged collusion between the two major players in the horse-racing industry, Phumelela Gaming and Leisure and Gold Circle.

Some industry insiders claimed that the two companies have undermined transformation and the growth of horse racing in the country, whereas Phumelela said it is keeping afloat a sport that is unprofitable and in decline not just in South Africa but also worldwide.

Kevin Weeks, divisional manager of enforcement and exemptions at the commission, said that it had decided to push ahead with a full inquiry after a preliminary assessment.

Weeks said a major concern was the “mere fact of competitors making joint decisions as opposed to competing”.

Gold Circle and Phumelela, although two separate entities, operate several racing and betting partnerships.

“We’re very concerned that there are only two players in the whole country and that it is so difficult for a new person to enter the field — We would want to investigate that,” Weeks said.

The commission would also investigate provincial and national gambling authorities and their role in giving newcomers access to the sport, he said.

Provincial gambling boards issue licences to racetrack owners permitting them to operate tracks.

Kema, the chief executive of African Racing International, said she had decided to approach the commission after trying to buy the Arlington racecourse in Port Elizabeth from Phumelela. She said she was willing to pay the R50-million asking price and was going to sign the deed of sale, but Phumelela told her that it would oppose any application she might lodge for a totalisator licence.

Phumelela told the Mail & Guardian that it had applied to the Eastern Cape Gambling Board for permission to stage races only at Port Elizabeth’s other course, Fairview. Kema was shocked by this and said that she had been under the impression that she would continue staging the 36 races that take place at Arlington each year.

In effect, she would be buying an empty shell.

“I accepted the R50-million offer in good faith,” she said, “but they imposed ridiculous terms, demanding that I don’t apply for a totalisator licence.”

The big fish
Phumelela and Gold Circle own all the major racecourses in South Africa—the former owns and operates five racetracks in Gauteng, the Free State, Eastern Cape and Northern Cape and the smaller Gold Circle owns and operates five courses in the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal. They hold totalisator licences for each province in which they run racetracks, allowing them to take tote bets, for which they alone are equipped.

There are different betting systems. Phumelela takes a cut of the tote, which pays out according to the total sum bet by punters and does not offer odds—if a punter’s horse wins, the size of the dividend paid out is proportional to the size of the bet, with bigger bets making more money.

The alternative betting channel—the bookmakers (or bookies)—operates independently of Phumelela and Gold Circle. Bookies provide fixed odds and can refuse bets if the odds are such that paying out winnings could wipe out their cash reserves.

Phumelela chief executive Riaan du Plessis said that it and Gold Circle alone should hold totalisator licences, which he claimed was international practice and the only viable system in South Africa.

“If the government permitted the province to issue stand-alone tote licences without a similar funding obligation to the sport [as Phumelela and Gold Circle have], there would be wholesale job losses in a sport that is already struggling to survive,” Du Plessis said.

But Phumelela also owns Betting World, a bookmaking operation with about 200 outlets nationally.

Joint ventures and partnerships
Phumelela and Gold Circle’s influence in the industry goes further. In theory, they are competitors but they have forged partnerships that control tote betting and race-industry broadcasting in South Africa.

They have joined forces to commingle all tote bets in South Africa, creating a national betting pool. Under this operation, called the Totalisator Agency Board (TAB), bets can be taken online, by telephone or at one of TAB’s 400 outlets. In addition, they have formed Phumelela Gold Enterprises (PGE), which holds the domestic and international broadcasting and information rights to South African horse racing, according to Phumelela’s website.

Phumelela manages PGE, which also owns Tellytrack, the only local horse-racing channel on television. It also owns TV channel Racing International, which broadcasts South African horse races internationally.

PGE also sets the fixtures for all racecourses owned by Phumelela and Gold Circle—in other words, all South Africa’s major courses.

Case of the bookmakers
In 2006 the Constitutional Court ruled that bookmakers should be allowed to take “open bets”—in effect, to run their own individual totes.

Phumelela tried to stop bookmakers from using its racing results and tote dividends to lay the foundation for open betting by taking bookmakers André Gründlingh and Ulrich Osmond Shüler to the North Gauteng High Court. Phumelela won this case but the Constitutional Court ruled against it, determining that the bookmakers’ actions did not amount to unlawful competition.

But Shüler said this week that taking legal action against a large company such as Phumelela was costly, which smaller operators could not afford.

This year Greco Capital obtained a totalisator licence in Mpumalanga, where no racecourses operate, making it the first operator other than Phumelela and Gold Circle to hold a licence since the industry was corporatised in 1998. But Phumelela has won a court interdict against Greco, preventing it from operating totes in the province.

National Horse Racing Authority
The National Horse Racing Authority is the primary regulator of horse racing and its rule book makes it clear that it can grant, refuse or renew jockeys’ licences and those of trainers and apprentice trainers.

The authority also monitors routine drug testing of horses after races and can impose fines if a horse tests positive for dope. Most importantly, it has the power to cancel or suspend the licence of any racing operator or racecourse. It can also suspend a horse from racing or disqualify it from a race.

According to the authority’s 2010 annual report, the authority is funded “to a substantial extent” by the racing operators—in short, Phumelela and Gold Circle, which also have access to the authority’s budgets and approve them before they are submitted to the authority’s board. The annual report says that meetings to discuss expenditure are held with the operators, which give input on cost items.

Du Plessis said that the operators contributed about R40-million a year to the authority, which Denzil Pillay, the authority’s racing control manager, said amounted to 70% of its budget.

But Pillay said that the authority’s rules and constitution ensured its independence. Contradicting the 2010 annual report, he said that the operators did not approve the final budget but acted only in an advisory capacity. They also had only one member each on the authority’s 14-member board, so they could not wield undue influence over board matters.

Du Plessis said that, although the authority was funded primarily by the two entities that it was set up to regulate, “they don’t dance to our whim. They’re an independent board and independent organisation. Although we provide the funding, they act independently.”

Responding to Kema’s allegations, he said that she was free to apply for her own racing licence at Arlington.

He said: “Miss Kema has made absolutely no effort to join the sport from within — In fact, she has decided to establish a rival sporting code, much as [broadcast baron] Kerry Packer did in Australian cricket in the 1970s. In this regard we wish her the best of success.”

I have never met Phindi neither am I friends on facebook or any social media.

Simply know that she has a plan and sticking to it. Some may call her ambitious and doing this for all the wrong reasons but I say we all KNOW that change is needed so let go ahead and fight with the boys, maybe she will win, maybe not but at least she took them on.