NATIONAL NEWS - Former chief executive of the Public Investment Corporation (PIC) Dan Matjila signed his approval for the investment of R3 billion in Iqbal Survé’s Sagarmatha Technologies prior to the deal going through the PIC’s investment committees.
Survé’s Sekunjalo Investment Holdings had approached the PIC to participate in its listing of Sagarmatha on the JSE. The company was hoping to raise between R3 billion and R7.5 billion at R39.62 per share.
The PIC was expected to subscribe to R3 billion of these shares while the rest would come from other investors.
On Monday, during his submission to the judicial commission probing issues of governance and impropriety at the state-owned asset manager, senior market risk analyst Tshifhango Ndadza confirmed that Matjila had signed the deal on December 13, 2017.
Irregular process
It appears from the timeline of the documents presented to the commission by Ndadza that the deal had not been through any of the appraisal structures of the PIC prior to Matjila signing it.
The portfolio monitoring committee for listed investments only got sight of the deal in January 2018, while the investment committee, which is the senior approval committee before the board, only considered it in April 2018.Dodgy dealing. A senior market risk analyst at the PIC says Iqbal Survé attempted to bring an impaired investment to the state-owned asset manager, and corroborated what others have said about then CEO Dan Matjila signing off on the deal months ahead of the investment committee having sight of it.
“The way it had been presented, it would have been a foregone conclusion,” said Ndadza.
