I will miss your wise counsel, friendship
Peter Matlare’s passing is a huge blow to all of us at Absa in countries across the African continent. To many of us he was not just a colleague but a counsellor, mentor and brother who always made time to lend an ear. The outpouring of grief across Absa campuses, and indeed the country, shows how much respected and loved Peter was.
I had known Peter for many years, and he had become a close friend before we became colleagues. He was an amazing human being, known for his generosity, always being engaging and able to hold his ground on a variety of topics. His infectious laugh and humour made it a pleasure to be around him. He exuded passion for everything he did on the work front and in his personal life. I admired him for the devotion he had to his family — his wife Nomvula and his daughters. Our hearts go out to the family at this time.
Peter joined Absa Group board as an independent nonexecutive director in 2011. In August 2016, he was appointed group deputy CEO as well as CEO responsible for Absa regional operations, covering our operations outside SA.
In the past year I had the privilege of working closely with him in the executive team. He had deep passion for his work and was a consistent advocate for the advancement of the African continent.
Peter made an immense contribution to the Absa Group, as a nonexecutive director and after he joined the executive management team. His most recent success at Absa was overseeing the finalisation of the separation from Barclays plc, which included the rebranding of the group’s operations across the continent. Through his leadership, we were able to complete it successfully.
Peter was respected by clients and regulators. He was a visionary leader and brought insight and depth of experience to our leadership team. His contribution to the company will be missed. Those who worked with him describe him as an inspirational and caring leader. I will miss his friendship, collegiality, guidance and wise counsel.
More than three years after Steinhoff shocked investors who had stood behind its transformation from a small furniture retailer into a global retailer straddling four continents, prosecutors in Germany have built a strong case to finally file charges against former managers.
The wheels of justice move painfully slow, but move they do. Though the prosecutor’s office in the German city of Oldenburg, near where Steinhoff’s European business is based, has not named the executives, it would not be a stretch to think Markus Jooste, who resigned as CEO after the company found a more than R100bn hole in its accounts in 2017, and has said his hands were clean, is one of them. The prosecutor’s office, which started its investigation in 2017 with the seizure of data and documents at the company’s regional office, accused three former managers of manipulating the balance sheet by including fictitious transactions worth more than €1.5bn. The trio are also accused of overvaluing real estate by €820m.
The charge sheet confirms the modus operandi behind the biggest accounting fraud in the history of SA as outlined in 2019 in the truncated investigation report by PwC, which was hired by the company to get to the bottom of “accounting irregularities” after auditor Deloitte refused to sign off on the 2017 results.
PwC found that eight people, led by an unnamed senior executive, had been involved in a complex scheme where potential intercompany transactions worth more than R100bn were fraudulently recorded as external income to prop up profits and hide costs in money-losing subsidiaries.
Sure, the indictment does not necessarily mean those implicated will be convicted any time soon, or even be in front of a German judge to face the charges because there is a strong likelihood Jooste, whom Bloomberg, citing sources, named as among those facing charges, will fight any extradition attempts. But it is a big step towards reassuring the public, which has legitimate reason to complain that the rich and powerful too often escape justice for their misdeeds.
For Shamila Batohi, whom President Cyril Ramaphosa named in December 2018 to lead the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), the German indictment turns an unforgiving spotlight on her office, which is yet to charge anyone relating to the fraud that wiped out more than R200bn of shareholders’ value.
To be fair, Batohi is rebuilding the capacity of the agency, which did not escape the corruption cancer that corroded every layer of the government during the state capture years. Not only did she have to root out those bent on undermining her efforts to fight corruption and deliver justice, she inherited an ill-equipped agency unsuited to prosecuting high-level financial crimes.
But it is hard to accept that the Hawks, which bring cases to the NPA for prosecutions, has no money to investigate anyone implicated in bringing this once high-flying retailer down.
Steinhoff has since agreed to pay forensic auditors at PwC to help the law-enforcement agencies investigate itself. The conclusions that can be drawn from this arrangement are disturbing.
By accepting the R30m from Steinhoff, the Hawks are not trying to avoid even the appearance of conflict of interest despite the company having chosen to hide the full PwC report behind the cloak of so-called legal professional privilege, the undertone of which is that Steinhoff does not want potentially embarrassing details about itself to be exposed.
The arrangement cements the perception that the government has an eerie tolerance for private sector corruption, and could also give foreign investors the impression that without a functioning crime deterrent, corporate scams can spread unchecked.
It behoves our law enforcement agencies to prioritise the investigation into Steinhoff, the near collapse of which not only embarrassed the country but further tarnished its image as one of the friendly investment destinations in emerging markets.
IT BEHOVES OUR LAW AGENCIES TO PRIORITISE THE INVESTIGATION INTO STEINHOFF