adminH-Metro Reporter
TEN years ago, South Africa-based businessman and entrepreneur, Moreboys Munetsi, was just a mere herd boy with no clue where he was going to get his next meal.
He survived on menial jobs and school was out of the picture with his parents sometimes failing to raise fees for him and his seven other siblings.
Moreboys then escaped to South Africa where he was to work double shifts at farms and construction sites.
He would get R200 and later trained as a security guard where he used to get R1 500 per month.
His driving force was to try and change the situation he left back home in rural Kadyamadare, Murewa.
“Growing up in poverty actually motivated me to be focused here in SA.
“The situation back home was really stressful. Sometimes I was struggling to eat food thinking kuti mai vangu vadyei kumusha nema siblings.
“I took the responsibility of making sure that I had to sacrifice staying in a shack so that I would send money every month.”
He decided to go to night school but he dropped out after being mocked for learning with students half his age.
He joined the insurance business through a Zororo Phumulani initiative, during its infancy in SA, in 2012 and left in 2017.
This is when Munetsi developed the passion to start his own empire.
Unfortunately, things didn’t go as planned, forcing Munetsi to go back to the farms and reverting to being a security guard.
He then started saving money to support his dream of running a successful insurance company.
Today, Munetsi runs Great Hope, a repatriation expert which is registered in Botswana, South Africa and Zimbabwe.
“I started with only one vehicle (a pickup bakkie) that I was using to carry dead bodies and drive to Zimbabwe and I was doing everything from removing, dressing and driving the hearse.
“I would also hire cars and even the mortuaries, where I would store the bodies, were a hustle.
“I didn’t have an office to operate from.”
The company has, since 2021, been trusted with handling the repatriation of bodies to more than 15 African countries.
He is also enjoying partnerships with established companies like Discovery, 1Life and Maksure.
His company employs more than 50 people across the three countries with an aim to grow and create more opportunities for young people.
Great Hope has a clientele with more than 7 000 members and has pursued other business ventures like life insurance, car insurance, disability covers, dread disease, retirement annuities, investment, education policies.
“We make more money on funeral policies than repatriating bodies. When people see our services they all want to join or take policies.
“We had two incidents where our car failed to move after removing a dead body from a scene, when we removed the trailer mota yaibva yatotanga kufamba, pataidzosera trailer yairamba kufamba.
“We only managed to remove the body after the mother of the deceased was told what to do by some elders.
“During the second incident we removed a body from a hospital, the next day the body yakatanga kufuta zvisingaite everyone was shocked.
“The next day the body of the deceased had scratches on the face and was bleeding. The family had to use a very big coffin to bury the deceased,” he said.
Munetsi says he has plans to expand his business back home.
Mathew Masinge
Online Reporter