This might come to some, Elon Musk was born and bred in South Africa, though you won’t tell, given all his good works, he does them primarily in the US. Take Tesla Dealership for one, they are hardly any in his home country, but they are available in the US, Germany, Australia, and China.
The biggest challenge Tesla Dealership faces in Africa is that there is hardly any support infrastructure for electric vehicles. You will drives for miles after miles and not find one ‘electric recharge station.’ If you own an electric vehicle, you will have to make do with charging it at your home or place of work; and nowhere else in between.
There is also the big problem of lack of adequate and affordable electricity supply. The continent has an acute shortage of power supply. People need electricity to do basic things such as lighting their homes at night and powering electronics. So to think about charging a car is somewhat not among the priorities.
South Africa might have it better than most African countries, given it is the continent’s most industrialized economy. Nonetheless, it is not immune to the challenges facing the rest of Africa such as the ones mentioned above in addition to lack of enough people with purchasing power to acquire the Teslas with their premium price tags.
Musk lived in an Apartheid South Africa
Elon Musk, now 47, left South Africa for Canada soon after graduating from high school in 1989. That was five years before the abolition of apartheid in the country. So the South Africa Musk knew, and the one current are two different things. Much has improved in terms of integration.