FUEL and transport businesses have always been male-dominated but Lomera Investments has broken the jinx.
This is a company where women pull the strings in the provision of fuel and public transport.
Their transport arm is known as The Voyager with buses plying the Harare-Beitbridge and Harare-Bulawayo routes.
At the helm of the company is founder and director Daisy Rusere.
She works with about five women in the top management of the company that include her daughter, Yvonne.
Yvonne is the company’s finance manager and she holds a degree in busi-ness administration and finance from Solusi University.
She comes in to enhance her mother’s hard-working character with academic know-how.
For her mother, it has been a matter of passion and experience that saw her rising from a mere telex operator to a business director.
After doing a secretarial course at college, Rusere joined a local bank as a telex operator and rose steadily through the ranks to join the human resources department.
She did not wait to rise to a senior managerial position before starting her own business but got into the transport business when she was still working as an officer in the human resources department.
“I bought a Mazda T35 truck when I was still at the bank.
“The truck was available for hire and I saw a good business opportunity in that venture.
“It was this small venture that broadened my dream of starting my own company,” explained Rusere.
In no time, she resigned from the bank and used her exit package to begin a serious transport business.
But the hassles involved in the transport business saw her diverting to commodity broking, which she felt was easier to manage.
“Transport demands much time and work but I found commodity broking as an easier way to do business.
“I pursued it for about two years before I ventured into fuel imports in 2004.
“Lomera has been a company of many faces but it was the liberalisation of fuel imports that really put us on our feet.
“During the first days, it was a complicated industry that would easily find one on the wrong side of the law unknowingly.
“I spent a number of nights in cells because of such complications but that was a learning process for me.”
As the business grew, she began supplying numerous service stations in the capital with fuel and she has since started running her own stations.
Rusere did not forget where she came from hence she re-opened the transport business to complement fuel imports.
It is now fuel and transport for Lomera Investments. Rusere is now working on setting up an official picking point along Beatrice Road (at Mbudzi) round about as a major initiative.
Although she has successfully made a name in these sectors, Rusere admits that it has not been a rosy road for her.
The sleepless nights in police cells and see-sawing between the different businesses has been a challenging journey for her.
It meant being steadfast and focused. Such attributes have paid off for Rusere.
Growing up in Domboshava where she was born, Rusere, like many of her contemporaries had a dream to become a doctor, pilot or lawyer because they were regarded as the best jobs in the country.
But after completing her A’ Levels at St Paul’s Musami Mission, fate began unveiling a different chapter in her life.
Most of the girls of her age were doing secretarial courses and she saw herself joining the train.
Little did she know that this was the beginning of a road to self-sustenance and independence.
She got married while she was still working at the bank and had two daughters before divorcing. Single-handedly, she started mapping her own way to success.
Now she can boast being one of the few female entrepreneurs in the transport and fuel businesses.
She took up many other female professionals to beef the company in her quest to promote women in the industry.
Despite leading such a successful crusade, Rusere remains a very sociable character who wants to travel and mingle with people whenever she is not at work.
Like a mermaid, she enjoys being in water most of her leisure time which makes boat cruises and lakeside braais her best hobbies.
“I am not a hotel person. I enjoy being outdoors. I just go to hotels and splash indoors for business meetings.
“When it is leisure time, I just want to be with my friends outside, mostly near the water where I feel very relaxed.”
For shopping, her destination is South Africa because her business demands that she is always on the ground.
“I sometimes go to Dubai and other countries but that would be for business.
“I am a very busy person and I cannot afford to go for holidays overseas.
“SA is just a good destination for me.”
She wants to be with her family most of the time and she feels her cook, Bob, can work the magic in preparing food such that she does not need to be in a five-star hotel or up-market restaurant to get her favourite dish.
She gets the best at home.

BY GODWIN MUZARI

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