Our Team

RAYMOND BOOYSE

Raymond Booyse, founder of Expand into Africa, studied Political Science and African Politics at the University of South Africa (UNISA). He attended various postgraduate courses in logistics, financial and personnel management.

He has been working for over thirty years in more than fifteen African countries:
Raymond has set up timber harvesting and exporting projects, trading, mining and agricultural companies in Africa. He managed his own import and export company in Angola for a number of years and has been instrumental in establishing South African Airways in Angola. He has also assisted in setting up several mining companies and corporates of the food and beverage, retail, steel, oil & gas and manufacturing industry. He has a working knowledge of the local laws, tax regimes and foreign exchange control system of a great variety of African countries as well as extensive experience in dealing with African administrative systems, national and the local authorities.

Raymond is fluent in English, Portuguese and Afrikaans.

WAYNE HERMANSON

Wayne Hermanson studied Strategic Management at the University of South Africa and attended postgraduate programs in business management and leadership. During the 30 years of professional career he has been working in 18 different African countries.

Wayne has a background in security consulting services across the full physical risk life-cycle, hostile environment protection programs, counter-terrorism, security risk assessments, travel security, integrated physical protection system design and implementation projects. Through his work in the security industry, he got involved in setting up companies all over Africa, and especially in volatile markets within regions where security is a special concern. While working with notable audit and advisory companies, Wayne gained substantial experience as a management consultant. He has successfully participated as part of the Greenfield team for Heineken to establish a mega brewery in Nigeria. In Angola, Wayne acted as a consultant during the start-up of a mining operation at Lumuanza.

Wayne is our expert on Northeast and West Africa. He has lately been involved in various projects in Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, Sudan, Zimbabwe, Somaliland, Somalia, Pakistan and the UAE.

Wayne speaks English, Afrikaans, and Portuguese.

IRIS KUBINA

Iris Kubina holds a Master’s degree in Economics of the Free University of Berlin, Germany. She was previously employed by a major German consulting and project management company for traffic, transport and infrastructure and by GFA Consulting Group. Iris has managed projects for private companies as well as bi-and multilateral organizations (e.g. European Commission, German Technical Cooperation, United Nations Conference on Trade and Development) and has been working in Africa for the past six years. She headed the Finance and Marketing departments of agricultural manufacturing and trading companies in Mozambique and Botswana.

She has consulted entrepreneurs in business start-ups especially in Southern Africa. She has a good working knowledge of the business, investment, and labor laws of various SADC countries and has assisted in setting up organizations and businesses in Mozambique, Angola, Malawi, Botswana, Namibia, Tanzania and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Moreover, Iris has lived and worked in the USA, Brazil, El Salvador, India, and Bangladesh.

She is fluent in English, Portuguese, Spanish, and German and speaks French well.

PROF. DR. ANDRÉ THOMASHAUSEN

Prof. Thomashausen is a professor of international law at the University of South Africa in Pretoria, and also Director of the Institute of Foreign and Comparative Law, at the same University. He is a qualified German barrister, and holds the degree of doctor iuris of the Christian Albrechts University in Kiel, Germany. He is also a sworn translator of the Supreme Court of South Africa, in German, English, French and Portuguese.

Professor Thomashausen acted as legal counsel for the Lesotho Highlands Water Project (1984-1986), for the establishment of the transitional Government of National Unity in Namibia (1984), in the Rome Peace Negotiations for Mozambique (1989-1992), and as Special Advisor to the Special Representative of the Secretary General of the United Nations Operation in Mozambique (1993-1994).

NEIL DE VILLIERS

Neil de Villiers holds a Master of Science degree in Agriculture with a specialization in Agronomy. He has been working in Southern African countries for over 20 years.
He has previously worked for the South African Agricultural Research Council as well as South African and International input suppliers where he served in Management on National level.

He was a manager at the South African Agricultural Union where he worked in a close relationship with the South African Ministry of Agriculture. He has been involved in agricultural research, but has also acted as a consultant on sales and marketing of agricultural inputs, namely seeds, fertilizer and agro-chemicals. Some of his recent assignments involved the consultation and distribution of agricultural inputs in Lesotho, Swaziland, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Malawi and Angola.