User:Nkosinathi Sikhosana/sandbox

Rutendo Matinyarare (born 09 June 1976) is a South African-based Zimbabwean businessman, human rights activist and anti-sanctions campaigner. Matinyarare started his career as sales executive for Tyre Treads in Zimbabwe. He became a public figure as a model and TV presenter on SABC for Africa Within, the Plank (game show) Walk The Plank, and has played roles in a number of TV commercials.

Early Life and Education[edit]

Rutendo Matinyarare was born on the 6 June 1976 in Harare, Zimbabwe. First born son of three sons born to David and Elizabeth Matinyarare. He attended his primary education at Frank Johnson primary school, Harare later transferred to Amandas Junior School, in Mazowe and completed his secondary schooling Lord Marlven High school, Harare. After completing his O-levels earned a Marketing Diploma with the London Chamber of Commerce & Industry (United Kingdom). Further obtained a Marketing Graduate Degree from the Institute of Marketing Management (South Africa) as well as the Chartered Marketer Professional Post Grad with Chartered Institute of Marketing (United Kingdom) and finally a certificate in PRINCE2 (Projects In Controlled Environments 2) Practitioner with Ants Project Management Training & Development: Prince2® Foundation & Practitioner.

Career and Business[edit]

Matinyarare held various position in different industries such as a Sales Executive for Tyre Treads, a Marketing Assistant at Business Equipment Corporation, Sales Executive at Impexo and a Hotel Trainee Manager at George Hotel. He was also part of a team that opened the twin tower hotels called Emirates Towers for Jumeirah Beach and Resort in Dubai as a Sales & Marketing Consultant.

He then relocated to South Africa in pursuit of a career in television. When he arrived in Johannesburg, South Africa Matinyarare worked as a Television presenter for programmes such as Walk the Plank and Africa Within on SABC Africa, which was a program that allowed him to travel the African continent, showcasing and engaging with the people, places, art, culture and entertainment of Africa, celebrating the African experience, interviewing influential personalities on the continent and telling the Africa stories from the eyes of an African.

In 2007 Matinyarare co-founded a creative and design agency called Frontline Studio. Due to the pressure to keep up with the evolving environments and client needs, he founded Frontline Strat Marketing Consultancy as a CEO and Marketing & Brand Strategist.

It is during this period when his marketing consultancy business was thriving, he realised that he was using his skills and expertise for the wrong purpose. He used his skills and expertise to destroy his own people by selling those things they do not need. He was pushing them to consume rather than to teach them to preserve their resources, build their country and grow their economy. Rutendo as the CEO and Marketing & Brand Strategist at Frontline Strat to repurpose Frontline Strat and use its expertise to market, reposition, rebrand, and promote Zimbabwe and Africa.

Where is the best place to start than home Zimbabwe. They say charity begins at home – building MaDzimbabwe. The first step was to identify what was the root cause of Zimbabwe’s problems. It became apparent that illegal sanctions imposed by the US and her allies was the core of the destruction of Zimbabwe; its economy, its education, its health system, its infrastructure, its families and its people. A civil society organisation Zimbabwe United against US War Sanctions was born with the purpose to fight the injustice of the illegal sanctions upon the Zimbabwean people and to redeem the image of Zimbabwe.

He did more research on the sanctions and discovered that not only these sanctions are illegal but they are destroying the normal man on the street.

Anti-Sanctions and Human Right Activism[edit]

Matinyarare realised that the fight against US war sanctions is a huge fight to take on alone. In 2019, He founded a South African based civil society organisation called Zimbabweans Unite Against US War Sanctions (ZUAUWS). As the Chairman, he campaigned and created awareness of the illegality and negative effects of sanctions on the people of Zimbabwe. He was instrumental in lobbying for the government's currently regional and continental publicity campaign against sanctions, mainly asking the SADC regional leaders to stand with Zimbabwe in support of the removal of sanctions. The SADC regional leaders heed the call. The SADC Anti-Sanctions Day was created and is held annually on the 25th October. While his proposals to key government officials pushed for the establishment of the Patriotic Act.

Between 2019 and 2021 Matinyarare wrote numerous proposals to the government officials lobbying his government to stop making the sanctions fight a political fight and make it a legal fight. Because of the effectiveness of his campaign, he attracted the attention of other like-minded Zimbabwean patriots who wanted to join the fight against US illegal sanctions. These like-minded patriots believed that the name Zimbabweans Unite Against US war Sanctions was too aggressive so they created a new entity called Zimbabwe Anti-Sanctions Movement (ZASM) where Matinyarare was appointed Chairman.

Under Matinyarare’s leadership ZASM lodged a court case in the South Africa High Court suing several US and South African banks, together with US President, President of the US senate, Speaker of the House and Treasury Secretary for executing unlawful and unconstitutional sanctions on the people of Zimbabwe. Matinyarare has continued to create awareness, educated, campaign, lobby governments and policy makers to support ZASM in the fight against illegal sanctions against the people of Zimbabwe.

References[edit]

1.    ^ ''"Branding | Frontline Marketing Branding Agency". Frontline2. Retrieved 2023-10-15.''

2.    ^ ''"SADC reiterates call for the removal of sanctions on Zimbabwe | SADC". www.sadc.int. Retrieved 2023-10-15.''

3.    ^ ''"Zimbabwe removed from list of countries deemed insufficiently compliant with anti-money laundering standards-Xinhua". english.news.cn. Retrieved 2023-10-15.''

4.    ^ ''Antwerpen, Matium van (2021-11-14). "Ants Project Management Consultants". Ants Project Management Consultants. Retrieved 2023-10-15.''

5.    ^ ''"SADC reiterates call for the removal of sanctions on Zimbabwe | SADC". www.sadc.int. Retrieved 2023-10-15.''

6.    ^ ''"SADC calls for lifting of all sanctions on Zimbabwe". www.aa.com.tr. Retrieved 2023-10-15.''

7.    ^ ''"About". Simba Chitando. Retrieved 2023-10-15.''

8.   ^ ''Ryan, Ciaran (2022-12-02). "Zimbabweans head to court to stop SA banks and schools being 'weaponised'". Moneyweb. Retrieved 2023-10-15.''

1.   ^ ''Ngwenya, Sicelo (16 May 2022). "The Patriot Bill: A Threat To Freedom Of Expression?". Human Rights Pulse. Human Rights Pulse.''

1.   ^ ''Foreign.senate.goV, Foreign.senate.gov. "THE FUTURE OF ZIMBABWE". Foreign.senate.gov. Foreign.senate.gov. Retrieved 8 May 2023.''