A new eye on the art of the deal
Arriving in his post on the back of a scandal involving his predecessor, the youthful acting head of the statutory body is looking for cases that will have maximum impact. Adele Shevel spoke to him
PIGALLE restaurant in Sandton is the place to be if you are a businessman hoping to clinch a deal. So it is perhaps the right backdrop to meet Tembinkosi Bonakele , the acting competition commissioner, who is in charge of identifying anti-competitive deals and nailing those responsible for them.
Bonakele took the hot seat after competition commissioner Shan Ramburuth resigned hurriedly following allegations that he had spent taxpayers’ money watching many hours of pornography.
Bonakele is a youthful 37 years old. He has an earnest way about him that breaks into lightness when he smiles and he has an infectious laugh. He also has a long history at the commission, having worked there from 2004 and became deputy commissioner in 2009. Soon after this he left to start his own consultancy — and it is no secret that he and Ramburuth did not get on. He says he left the commission because there were “management challenges” at the time.
Bonakele has just returned from giving a talk at aHospital Association of South Africa conference in Cape Town. He was surprised at the level of misconception he picked up while there, he says, citing questions about the independence of the competition body’s impending inquiry into the medical industry.
“We must not assume people know . . . You must always engage with stakeholders. I said things that I thought were quite obvious, but these were things that people thought were a revelation.”
Businessmen at the conference expressed two concerns. First, whether the change at the Competition Commission meant that its independence was being undermined, and second, that the agenda of the fiercely passionate minister of health, Dr Aaron Motsoaledi, would undermine the health industry.
“Maybe people think the minister will use the commission as a tool, but it’s just not possible. This is a legal process we are talking about,” says Bonakele.
He does not plan big strategic changes at the commission, but he does plan to clear the decks on existing issues such as construction industry collusion and healthcare. His view is that the commission should concentrate on a few “highimpact cases” rather than pouring resources into smaller ones.
“I want impact. For me it might be a little case, but if the impact is huge I love it.”
The emphasis will be on getting the commission equipped internally by focusing on areas such as succession and filling some senior vacancies.
(What I discover about Pigalle, as the afternoon drifts on, is that the kitchen is open straight through from lunch to supper. The waiter suggests langoustines. Bonakele goes for a fillet and I choose seared tuna.)
“I’m really passionate about improving the quality of life that people are living. I think that as a society we come from a particular past. Our people still live under conditions that would be found unacceptable in any normal society. It’s not sustainable,” he says.
Bonakele studied law at the University of Fort Hare and Vista University in Port Elizabeth, now part of the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, primarily because a lot of leaders he looked up to had a legal background. “I thought it was a good thing to arm yourself with,” he says.
He studied for an MBA at the Gor-
We’ve learnt that people do take risks, and we have learnt you have to constantly up the ante
don Institute of Business Science while at the commission. “We really have a learning culture at the commission . . . they really support it.”
He is as at home in a township as he is in a corporate boardroom. But he did not know much about competition law until he started working in this field while at the law firm Clifford Chance in New York in 2002 as part of a programme for young and up-andcoming black lawyers.
Although Bonakele was meant to be doing work on deals, there was a surge in antitrust legal work that year, which chewed up most of his time. When he got back, he got a call from the Competition Commission.
The year in the US made him realise how closely intertwined competition was with growth and development. “For me, it’s part of the overall effort to develop South Africa and its people, part of the overall economic policy agenda to grow the economy in a way that can sustain its people.”
Bonakele grew up in the Eastern Cape and was raised by his mother after his father died. His mother was a sometime domestic worker and supported his three sisters and a brother along with him.
When he made it to Vista, his studies were partially funded by a scholarship. After his first year he was given a bursary from MercedesBenz. He was president of the students representative council at Vista University and very involved in politics.
What bodes well for his tenure at the commission is that captains of industry do not intimidate him. “If ever there was such a stage, it has passed,” he says. “I have a lot of respect for what some of the captains of industry have achieved. People have established great businesses. But I know my responsibility. I do it with all the humility I can muster, but I have to assert the mandate of the Competition Commission and I do that without fear.”
At the same time, Bonakele says, business can be something of an oldboys’ network. “You only have to look at the construction sector. People know each other — have worked with each other at different stages in their careers. There are no surprises. It’s common to find that a complainant used to work in the company he’s laid a complaint about.”
Which cases is he particularly proud of? The competition probe into the fertiliser industry, for one. Another is the maize price-fixing that rocked Tiger Brands and Pioneer in 2008. “We achieved a fantastic precedent for bread and maize meal. Nobody in the world has a cartel on basic foodstuffs like that. We did fantastic work there.”
Does he plan to increase penalties? “Penalties will be constantly increasing. We’ve learnt that people do take risks, and we have learnt you have to constantly up the ante. There’s a case for higher penalties until people have actually stopped. Penalties are a very important deterrent,” he says.
As for the new role, he is looking forward to it. “I’m having sleepless nights because I’m thinking of the decisions . . . We’re trying to achieve something great here and I’m into it.
“I will be hands-on. I will be present. I will not be an absent manager or leader. I’m there with my team in the trenches. I like that — it’s how I am.”