It has been a year filled with drama, agony and headaches in the world of business in the country.
The business sector had its own fair share of scandals and dramatic events that have taken place in the year.
January
Disgraced economist Thabi Leoka was exposed by Business Day in January, where her claims to be holding a PhD appeared to be a figment of her imagination. She claimed to have obtained her fake PhD in economics from the London School of Economics (LSE). Leoka was in November issued with a fine of R500 000 and barred from serving as a director or officer of any JSE-listed company for five years.
March
The former CEO of Steinhoff, a multinational luxury goods company, Marcus Jooste, took his own life near the beach at Hermanus in the Western Cape after he was fined R475 million by South Africa’s Financial Sector Conduct Authority for publishing false and misleading Steinhoff annual financial statements and annual reports for the 2014 to 2016 years and the 2017. Steinhoff that was dual listed in Germany and South Africa were liquidated in October 2023.
May
A five-story high-end residential apartment development in George, Western Cape, collapsed, burying 34 workers. Even today, the collapse of the building on 75 Victoria is still covered in mystery to establish what could have caused the tragedy. Three of the directors of Neo Victoria Developments, a construction company responsible for the project, resigned from the business. All three directors, such as Dylan Brockway and Alwyn Gey van Pittius, resigned from the company just a week after the George building collapsed, and they were followed by Johannes Swanepoel, who left the Neo Victoria Developments on 18 June. The incident that shocked the world brought questions on how inspections and accountability are carried out in the construction business.
June
In June last year, Sunday World broke the story about how the directors of the white-owned company, NJM Heat Treatment & NDE Services (NJM), had allegedly used black people as fronts for Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment (B-BBEE), where the company had scored contracts worth R400 million in tenders at Eskom and Sasol.
Five white male directors, such as Mark Douglas Smith, Alexander Elias Roditis, Raymond Crozier, Guy Phillip le Roux, and Ronald James Hoy, and one black woman, Vanessa Chungu, were arrested in October and hauled to court the same day to face the music. This after a black woman director, Baleseng Zinyana, blew a whistle on the financial shenanigans of the company. All six directors are still attending the case, which was postponed to next month after they had made their second appearance last month at the Palm Ridge Magistrates Court.
The business world in the country was never spared on any controversies surrounding spaza shops that are mostly operated by foreign nationals from Pakistan, Somalia and Bangladesh in townships and rural communities.
August
ABSA Bank board announced that the group chief executive, Arrie Rautenbach, will take early retirement effective April 2025. Arrie will cease to be the Group Chief Executive Officer and an Executive Director of the Absa Group and Absa Bank with effect from 15 October 2024, followed by a 6-month contractual notice period that will be served as garden leave.
September
Food retail giant Spar announced plans to finalise its exit from Poland. The company said it signed the deal to sell its Polish operations to a local retailer for R185 million.
October
Former Reserve Bank governor and Minister of Finance Tito Mboweni passed away following a short illness. He was 65.
November
The Constitutional Court heard Please Call Me inventor Nkosana Makate’s request for Vodacom to compensate him R9.4 billion for the idea. Vodacom stuck to its guns, offering him R47 million as compensation. President Cyril Ramaphosa gave spaza shops a 21-day deadline from November 15 until December 13. This was after at least 23 kids died and scores others fell ill across the country after ingesting snacks laced with poison they had bought at spaza shops. The incidents resulted in large-scale protest actions across the storm in various communities where foreign-owned spaza shops were forced to shut down and the owners being frog marched from the affected areas. Organisations such as Operation Dudula and community leaders spearheaded the closure of spaza shops.
These incidents also resulted in the presidency convening a family meeting where President Cyril Ramaphosa had ordered the immediate closure of all spaza shops linked to child deaths as food poisoning cases grew. Ramaphosa also urged that all the operators of spaza shops should be re-registered, and he only gave those who wanted to register their business 21 days. Then another war that closed off the business drama was a war between the Black Business Council (BBC) and Business Unity South Africa (Busa) over issues of the B20 business summit and the G20 intercontinental government business summit.
December
The BBC accused Busa of hijacking business representation in the country for both summits. Busa stated that it was not representing any business but was acting as a host of events for B20 and G20. The Exxaro board suspends CEO Nombasa Tsengwa pending an independent probe. Her suspension came after allegations related to workplace conduct and governance practice” surfaced.
