Johannesburg | Wednesday
A LOAN to help Saambou staff buy shares in the company may have been the largest factor in the bank’s crisis forced into curatorship on Saturday Finance Week and Finansies & Tegniek reported on Wednesday.
The financial weekly estimates Saambou’s loan exposure as a result of the scheme could be as high as R200-million, or even higher.
Saambou itself even started becoming concerned about the controversial scheme at the beginning of November or earlier.
On November 30, Wessel Wessels, chief executive of group support services, wrote to personnel who qualified for the scheme as follows: ”In the light of the current debt situation inter alia caused by the drop in the share price as well as the accrual of interest on the loans of participants and the financial pressure caused thereby, the human resources board committee has approved amendments to the scheme at the meeting held on November 23, 2001, in an attempt to lessen the financial burden on participants.”
Wessels’s letter was followed by a letter from Marissa van Straaten –the employee financing national manager — on January 11 in which she confirmed that no interest would be levied on the loans in future, and that tax was payable on the interest benefit.
These developments place the upheaval of the past few days around Saambou’s curatorship in a completely different light. It was widely accepted that Saambou’s problems were due to negative impressions of the microlending industry. The microlending subsidiary Thuthukani in particular was mentioned as an example.
Now it looks as if the share loan scheme is a far greater culprit.
Meanwhile, it seems that certain Saambou account holders can start drawing money from ATMs from 1pm on Wednesday, the bank said on Tuesday night.
The Saswitch ATM withdrawals would be subject to the daily limit of R1 000 while the banks and the Saambou direct call centre would reopen on Thursday at 8.30am.
The statement said all depositors, excluding those with certain accounts, with balances of R4 000 or less, would be able to withdraw the full amount of such deposits.
Depositors with ”Money Manager” or ”Q” card (ie transmission accounts) and savings-type accounts (”Carry On”, ”Tempo”, ”Kolskoot” and ”Savings”) could withdraw up to a maximum of R4 000.
Depositors would be allowed to withdraw the full amount of all monies deposited after the curator’s announcement of February 9.
Account holders can have funds electronically transferred to another institution.
The curator Johan Louw would decide no later than February 20 whether interest on certain deposits would be paid.
The bank provided the following numbers for queries: home loans: 0860-688-688, personal loans 0860-996-633 and investments 0860-139-555. – Sapa