South African tech entrepreneurs tackle digital divide in townships

Moss Marakalala sits at a desk at the Tomorrow Trust charity with images of the students the charity has helped pinned on the wall behind him in Johannesburg, South Africa. — Thomson Reuters Foundation

JOHANNESBURG: Moss Marakalala was 11 when he first used a laptop at an after-school programme in Johannesburg, sparking an interest in technology that inspired him to provide young people like himself from South African townships with digital education.

Today, the 21-year-old runs a production company with his brother and tutors students from townships – deprived, urban areas formed under the apartheid government for people of colour – to become more tech-savvy and enhance their job prospects.