The all-things-to-all-people BEE codes are resulting in deals that aim to do all things for all people. Take the two über-deals announced in September: Anglo Platinum and Sasol. Both are geared to bring on board leading business people, empower inside the company and benefit grassroots communities. Both also include employee share ownership schemes as part of the effort to ensure that those who build a company’s wealth benefit.
Let’s start with the Anglo Platinum deal, concluded at lightning speed after the resignation of CE Ralph Havenstein last month. Clearly Anglo American CE Cynthia Carroll meant business when she came into office in July, read the political risk at Anglo Platinum and moved quickly to deal with it.
Anglo Platinum has been at the centre of spats with the department of minerals and energy related to community protests on its mines and its efforts to have its mining licences converted.
The details of the deal are included in the accompanying graphic. It brings on board two highly credible black businessmen: Tokyo Sexwale of Mvelaphanda Group, the holding company of Mvela Resources, and Lazarus Zim, CE of Afripalm Resources. Afripalm is a major shareholder in Mvela Resources.
Pelawan’s Tumelo Motsisi, Harold Motaung and Meta Maponya are also likely to become players in the platinum business, now booming because of Chinese demand. The deal’s intention is to give black mining giants a foot up in the global economy.
The Sasol deal (see accompanying graphic) does not yet feature a big-name partner, but its structure suggests that directors and managers such as Hixonia Nyasulu, Imogen Mkhize and Bheki Khumalo could be the senior beneficiaries.
Both deals seek to empower inside by concluding employee share ownership schemes (Esops).
AngloPlat is finalising the details of its Esop with trade unions. It will, once concluded, include more than 43Â 000 employees and comprise up to 1,5% of the company’s issued share capital, valued at about R3,3billion. It is open to staff who do not currently have shares.
A similar plan is being developed at the different operational levels.
Sasol is setting aside 4% of the shares in its BEE deal for employees below managerial level and with permanent residence in South Africa, as well as for black managers and black non-executive directors. A notable feature of the Esops is that they are for all employees and not just black staff. Sasol has been criticised by the department of trade and industry (see page four) for doing this though AngloPlat’s Esop appears to have escaped political attention.
The reason for including all staff is that it is divisive not to and could make human resource management more difficult than it already is in a transforming society.
Both deals also include external empowerment by aiming at grassroots interventions. This is key to ensure they comply with the broad-based imperative of empowerment.
Angloplat’s broad-based empowerment initiatives are highly complex, with each different structure promising to include community beneficiaries. The deal’s architects claim a beneficiary pool of 55Â 000 historically disadvantaged South Africans. Women entrepreneurs are at the centre of most deals and Zim’s Afripalm includes 30Â 000 poor beneficiaries who are owners of Unipalm Investments Holdings. His consortium also includes the Malibongwe Women Development Organisation, a company linked to the ANC Women’s League.
Sasol’s grassroots empowerment model is innovative and arguably more targeted than the amorphous empowerment groupings of the other deal. It will establish the Sasol Foundation, which will train graduates in maths, science and other technical subjects the economy needs. They will in turn form a talent pool that Sasol can draw on, creating what should be a virtuous cycle.