The Department of Public Enterprises and state arms company Denel on Monday dismissed as speculation media reports about a board reshuffle.
According to Business Report newspaper on Monday, rumours are rife that Denel chief executive Victor Moche and human resource director Eugene Martin have been suspended or dismissed or have resigned.
Johan van Niekerk, an official of the United Associations of South Africa (Uasa), a trade union, confirmed to the paper that Uasa is aware of the rumours and has unsuccessfully tried to confirm them with Denel.
Van Niekerk said Uasa believes an extraordinary meeting of Denel’s board has been called for this week.
”One item on the agenda deals with discipline,” he said.
City Press newspaper speculated that Minister of Public Enterprises Alec Erwin will appoint Shaun Liebenberg, chief executive at Grintek, a private sector defence and electronics company, to the top Denel job.
The paper added that the move has ”unsettled many people in government and the public enterprise department who see it as an attempt to flush out black executives in the state’s parastatals”.
Erwin’s alleged move apparently followed complaints by the ”white-led” Uasa and Solidarity trade unions to Erwin that Moche was involved in purging their members from Denel.
This was after Moche had last year dismissed six senior white managers after they were found guilty in separate disciplinary hearings of charges including corruption, fraud, theft, financial misconduct, misuse of company property and collusion, City Press said.
The contract of another senior white financial manager was terminated after he was found guilty of financial misconduct.
But Uasa said many of the findings made by the disciplinary hearings were not in accord with the facts of the case, raising suspicions that Denel had predetermined the outcome of the hearings.
City Press said sources told it Erwin intends to meet Denel’s board on Tuesday and seek approval of his intentions from the Cabinet on Wednesday, after which he will make the announcement in his budget speech in Parliament on Friday.
The paper claimed the move against Moche comes barely a month after ”he suspended Sipho Thomo, senior executive manager of Armscor, and two of his senior managers”.
In fact, Thomo was Armscor’s chief executive and was suspended by that state agency’s board, which in turn answers to Minister of Defence Mosiuoa Lekota.
However, the two are known to be on bad terms.
The paper said senior individuals in parastatals have expressed concern that the pending removal of Moche from Denel ”could be part of the pattern to replace black CEs with white CEs that could set the country’s transformation back”.
”There is a belief among a few of these officials that most black CEs were being set up to fail.”
Another source said the move proves that ”Erwin did not believe in black executives running government parastatals. His axing relates to the question about who should control state assets in the country.”
The paper went on to say that Maria Ramos, the former Treasury director general, who — like Erwin — is also white, has sacked a number of black managers since taking over South Africa’s largest parastatal, Transnet.
Erwin’s spokesperson, Gaynor Kast, said on Monday both reports are speculative.
She also took offence at City Press trying to portray Erwin as a racist.
”I think it is absolutely ludicrous to play the race card on this one. If there is one person who is committed to transformation in this country, it is Minister Erwin,” Kast said.
Denel spokesperson Sam Basch said the company is not aware of either Moche or Martin being suspended or dismissed or having resigned.
Van Niekerk said it is Uasa’s impression that Denel’s board is not being accurately informed of events company by management.
The union is also concerned about loss-making Denel’s financial position and the parastatal’s ”disrespect for the law”, particularly labour legislation. — Sapa