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Phindi Gule-Burley is accused of giving Angela Casara run-around. x TRENDING Businesswoman Angela Casara , who was married to internationally acclaimed producer and composer Lebohang Morake (Lebo M) for five years, has come out to blast media personality Phindile “Phindi” Gule-Burley as an alleged “scammer”. Casara told City Press this week that she wanted it to be known that Gule-Burley was not empowering women as she had been claiming.
The businesswoman said she won a competition in August 2022 called YoungStar Entrepreneur in which she was meant to win prizes including a car, a laptop, an iPad, free data for a year and a smartphone. According to her, she has received none of the prizes and one story after the other from the former radio presenter. READ: 15th Feather Awards nominees revealed, public sector told to 'do better' Asked what kind of a car she was supposed to win, Casara said it was supposed to be a Baic, but Gule-Burley then said it would be an entry-level Suzuki.
YoungStar Entrepreneur is defined as a women empowerment initiative aimed at arming women with business skills and affording them access to mentors aligned to their respective businesses. A statement from Gule-Burley’s company at the time revealed that the programme would run for five months and, at the end, one woman who had grown in terms of business would win prizes valued at more than R500 000, including a R100 000 cash prize and a brand-new car. Said Casara: I have been communicating with her for the past two years, and even reporting her to the ombud to allow her to give me the prize, but nothing has come forth.
Essentially, they have been running a scam, so I am not happy with that. She added: “The sponsorships have probably given her the prizes, but she has not made sure to deliver the prizes to the winner.” Casara said, since she won the competition, Gule-Burley has been dishonest and making empty promises.
She added that the media personality gave all the little prizes but left out the big and important ones. The prizes would have helped her business, she said. She explained that having transportation would help with attending meetings, and it was going to be valuable as she would not have to pay instalments.
She would use the laptop, iPad and phone for other work needs, she said. HOW SHE WON Casara, who owns Chuze Juice, said that, to win, all contestants had to raise funds, and she had raised R150 000, which was much more than other contestants earned. She added that they had to get sponsorships for Gule-Burley’s nonprofit organisation.
“The last one was a gala dinner, so we had to raise funds. Each table cost R8 000. For that gala dinner, I raised R90 000.
For the other assignments that we were given, I won. I was able to raise more funds, the other contestants were able to raise [between] R5 000 and R10 000. From all of us, in a nutshell, she was able to get the funds, on top of the sponsorships that she had, but she hasn’t paid,” said the businesswoman.
Casara explained that they were given a letter that they would present to their potential sponsors, adding that she approached mostly private companies, and that was how she managed to raise more funds. READ: Lebo M calls it quits on nuptials The former real-estate agent, whose business promotes a healthy lifestyle, said Gule-Burley further promised that the money the contestants raised would sponsor a programme called Teach Them Young. With this programme, they were meant to teach young girls in township and village schools about entrepreneurship.
She said, although they raised the funds, they did not know for sure whether they went into the programme because they did not go to any schools. Said Casara: The money that we raised, we would send to the main account, YoungStar Entrepreneurship. We don’t know what happened to that money.
There was no transparency, and this Teach Them Young programme never materialised. There have been a lot of questions about what she has been doing because people can use these kinds of things to raise funds, but they take the funds and don’t deliver prizes. She said Gule-Burley was supposed to be helping women in business and empowering them, but she was doing the opposite.
On 31 January this year, in an email, Gule-Burley asked Casara to give her a week, as she was concluding a few things. She said delivering all Casara’s prizes remained her top priority. She added that she had put the programme on hold until she had handed over all of the businesswoman’s prizes.
The Johannesburg businesswoman said she still wants her prizes. City Press called Gule-Burley who said she was in a meeting and never returned the call. She ignored text messages sent to her.
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