By Jerry More Nyazungu – The Chartered Vendor**
There was once a man in Lusaka called Mr. Tembo. A true hustler. A man whose dreams of becoming a doctor were crushed not by a lack of brains, but by a lack of Zambia Kwacha. Poverty was so real in his childhood, his school shoes were actually slippers with a dream.
But Tembo was not one to cry forever. He did what many African lions do when cornered he roared into the flea market business. He started selling second-hand clothes. Then opened a small shop. Then another. Then five. Before we knew it, Mr. Tembo was a millionaire with branches in Kamwala. Man was cashing out while speaking fluent “customer is king.”
But Tembo had one dream left:
“My son Mulenga must become what I failed to become a doctor.”
Fair. Noble. Sacrificial.
And so, Mulenga grew up in comfort. He went to the best schools. He never skipped meals or a Netflix subscription. His backpack had an iPad, not tomatoes for resale. He drove to school in a Land Cruiser, while his dad walked to the market with morning hustle dust on his shoes.
Mulenga fulfilled the dream: He became Dr. Mulenga – finally, a Doctor in the Tembo family.
But… here’s the twist.
Dr. Mulenga doesn’t want anything to do with Kamwala.
“I’m too educated to be shouting ‘Come and see!’ in a shop!” he says, adjusting his designer tie in an empty clinic with two patients and three mosquitoes.
Meanwhile, Tembo’s business once booming is slowly dying.
His workers are stealing. His suppliers are owed. His competitors are eating his lunch. And Tembo, now older and slower, is watching his empire crumble like a soggy fritter, because the one person he hoped would take over is busy Googling “how to open a private surgery in Canada.”
Now, Let’s Cross the Road to See How the Indians Are Doing It****
Right across Lusaka, there’s Mr. Kushee an Indian businessman.
His son Hakim was taught how to count profit before he could even spell his name. At 10 years old, he was issuing invoices and checking stock levels. Hakim only did O Levels, but today he’s running the entire operation.
Together, father and son have grown the business to 500 million Kwacha. They sit in meetings together. Travel together. Plot expansion together.
You see, in their world, education is a tool to serve the family vision, not to abandon it.
So What Went Wrong with Us?****
Simple:
We are miseducated.** ** We think success is “my child must never do what I did.”*
- Instead of “my child must build on what I started.”**
So we send kids to Australia while our businesses crumble in Mbare, Lusaka, or Katondo Street. We raise PhDs with no P&L knowledge. We forget that our pain created opportunity, but our kids are being trained to run from it not steward it.
We suffer, hustle, grind… then when we finally win, we tell our kids:
“Don’t suffer like I did.”*
- And so they don’t… but they also don’t learn.
Imagine If Mulenga Had Said:****
“Dad, I’ll go to medical school but during holidays I’ll learn your books, your stock, your tricks. One day I’ll run Kamwala Pharmacy & Supermarket Chain.”
Imagine the Doctor who also owns 15 thriving shops.
But no. Instead, we get an identity crisis: Too educated to hustle. Too broke to build.****
Before you send your child to Canada, ask yourself: Will they inherit your business or restart their life as a lone educated warrior with no army, no system, and no customers?
Stop raising kids to be distance providers and emotional tourists in your legacy.
Instead, raise them to be:
Custodians Stewards Builders of the next chapter
Africans love to say, “I want my child to live better than I did.”*
- That’s noble. But here’s the twist:
If your child refuses to continue what made you successful, they might actually live worse than you did but with WiFi.
Share this with someone before they create a “Dr. Nothing” instead of a CEO of Legacy Ltd.****
Let’s build timeless businesses not just educated children.
