Manning the barricades

While most of corporate SA has greeted the questionable antics of our political overlords with the “lie low and say nuthin’ ” approach endorsed by Brer Rabbit, Sygnia’s Magda Wierzycka appears to be taking her inspiration more from Henry V.

She’s given up on modest stillness and humility, started to “imitate the action of the tiger”, and clearly has no fear to “disguise fair nature with hardfavoured rage”. In simpler terms, she’s clearly had it up to the gills and is fighting back.

In its results announcement, Sygnia acknowledges that this is an unusual approach for a corporate, but in a paragraph on its activism strategy it explains why it thinks that, unless corporate SA stands up and flexes its muscle, we will head down an economic abyss that will make all South Africans progressively poorer.

The company believes that the parlous state of the country’s economy is entirely caused by the unstable political environment, and that a stance has to be taken on corruption and business ethics.

Meanwhile, away from the sound and fury, the business is ticking along nicely, with assets under management and administration growing to R184.3bn. It is a feature of the lowcost product that Sygnia is flogging that this lump of loot produced revenues of only R333.1m. But as other industries have discovered, the consumer has a propensity to jump ship when he spots how he has been gouged by low-performing, highcharging legacy alternatives. Paperthin margins may well be the way of the future.

Wierzycka has clearly had it up to the gills and is fighting back