A tribute to the late Yakub Chaka |22 May 2023

(12.03.1930 ‒ 22.05.2013)

Today marks exactly 10 years since the peaceful demise of businessman Yakub Chaka. He was 83 years old.

Born on March 12, 1930 in Victoria, Mahé, Yakub Chaka (also known as Yakub Mohamed Adam) came from a simple, but hardworking family. He had four brothers and five sisters, all born and bred in Seychelles.

Yakub Chaka was the third eldest of an astute Seychellois citizen, Mohamed Adam Chaka and his wife, Fullibhai Pura Chaka, who both settled in Seychelles in 1918 just after the First World War, and were married at the tender age of 16.

In loving memory of Yakub Chaka, old friends of his generation and close family members are keen to point out that the first ten years have passed so quickly. They reminisce and talk about him often and they continue to pray for him.

During his lifetime, Yakub Chaka had many friends, both locally and internationally. He was of a serious, thoughtful demeanour but he always enjoyed a good laugh and jokes with his close friends.

Yakub Chaka was 13 years old when his father died in February 1944. At the time, the young Yakub was studying at St. Louis College run by the ‘Marist’ Brothers, a Christian order originating from France. In addition to learning Latin, he had a keen interest in the science subjects and maths at the time; he was in the same class as the late Dr Maxime Ferrari. The ex-St Louis School is where Belonie School is currently located; it was the birthplace of the Seychelles College.

Yakub Chaka’s first paid employment at the age of 18 was as an office clerk at the Adam Moosa shop. During that time, Yakub undertook several UK-based correspondence courses in basic accounting, book-keeping, and company secretarial studies.

Then in 1965 at the age of 35 he decided it was time to move on. That was when he established the entity ‘Chaka Brothers’ as a partnership providing a share in his business to his four brothers. The company’s main business activities were import-export, commission agents, wholesale and retail. With the personal hands-on assistance of his brother, Ismael Chaka, right from the start, the partnership traded in imported cloth material, household goods, spices and commodities both on a wholesale and retail basis. Through his business ventures, Yakub Chaka supported all his brothers, while all his sisters managed to get married and most of them settled down in Africa, namely in South Africa, Zambia and Mozambique.

During the 1950s up to the early 1970s, competition for the export of local commodities such as cup copra, cinnamon bark and leaf oil, vanilla and patchouli was rife. Almost single-handedly, Yakub Chaka established a reputation for being a serious, hardworking and self-disciplined businessman.

In 1970, he brought over his youngest brother to Seychelles to join Chaka Brothers, Hassan Chaka, after he had completed his studies in Lancashire, England earlier and got married. In 1981, Yakub converted the Chaka Brothers partnership to a limited liability company which has endured ever since. The company won the Africa Award in 1981 which was presented at a ceremony in Nairobi, Kenya.

Yakub Chaka’s character can best be described as a self-made and self-taught man who was disciplined, straight and level-headed. Over the years, he showed that he was both caring and worldly. He read a lot, and in doing so, educated himself.

People in the local business community liked to consult him on various business matters. He served as chairman of the Seychelles Chamber of Commerce and Industry for several years in the 1970s and early 1980s. Before that, he was on the Victoria Town Planning Committee at a time when the Kingsgate House was being erected over marshy grounds by a British construction firm, W&C French. He also served as president of the Islamic Society of Seychelles for 22 years between 1984 and 2006. He contributed financially to the visit of Maulana Ansari’s first Islamic mission to Seychelles.

In business, he took calculated risks and was an inspiration to the local business community. In 1995, despite adverse comments from business colleagues, he acquired Penlac Company Ltd under public tender. His drive for business led him to maintain a positive attitude amid adverse business conditions. His generosity was well known; he was always ready to give to the less fortunate members of the community. During his later years, he kept an excellent memory of historical dates and events.

When the Seychelles Marketing Board (SMB) took over the entire commodities export business in 1985, Chaka Brothers (Pty) Ltd continued to trade. Yakub Chaka ensured that his business survived in Seychelles, despite the vagaries of trade and the poor economic climate during the prolonged period of foreign exchange hardship that endured between 1993 and 2009.

When the SMB liberalised the export of local commodities in 1995 after ruining the export market for cup copra and cinnamon, Chaka Brothers took over the running of the export warehouse from SMB and, under the leadership of his son, Gafoor Yakub Chaka, the company has been maintaining it ever since. Today, cinnamon bark is among the very few locally produced commodities that are being exported from Seychelles. But it would be fair to say that the scale of such exports are very low.

When presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award in 2005 from the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation, Yakub Chaka’s prominent lifestyle as a local businessman did not dampen. He received showering praise in the presence of Vice- President Joseph Belmont for his dedication to work, good public relations and for offering an example of building his business with the physical help of two of his brothers from humble beginnings and eventually leading it to earn national recognition.

Throughout his life, Yakub Chaka was never involved in local politics. He believed that trade and commerce are what brings people of different cultures together.

Yakub Chaka and his wife, Zubeda, bore nine children – eight daughters and one son – as well as 18 grandchildren. The first child, Sharifa, was born in 1955, followed by Farida, Yasmin, A. Gafoor, Saeeda, Nazreen, Shehnaz, Ayesha and Shamira.

Educating his children was a priority for Yakub, and both he and his wife Zubeda worked tirelessly to achieve that, sending all their eight daughters to Regina Mundi Convent and his only son to Seychelles College at Mont Fleuri, from where most of them later entered into university overseas.

Yakub’s children recognise the qualities that their father has instilled in all of them. They are eternally grateful to him that they have all managed quite well in life. Deep down, the common belief is that true happiness does not lie in achieving worldly fame or fortune but in being honest, respectful, and dignified human beings while upholding good moral values as Seychellois Muslims.

Contributed