African Bank has appointed Given Bhutana Mabena as acting group CFO, following the resignation of Anbann Chetti to pursue other opportunities.
Mabena has been appointed to the position until a permanent successor is named, African Bank said in a statement on Friday
Mabena has more than 13 years’ experience leading financial transformation, strategy and governance across the banking and multinational sectors, African Bank said.
He is a chartered accountant (SA) and holds an MBA from the University of Witwatersrand, complemented by executive education at IMD Switzerland and London Business School.
“Given brings a robust set of technical financial and governance competencies, anchored by his chartered accountant qualification and eight years of audit and assurance experience at Deloitte. He is technically proficient in financial reporting and accounting under IFRS, consolidation, taxation, and financial planning, management and analysis,” said African Bank.
Business Day’s sister publication Business Times reported in June that African Bank is reviewing its retirement age to pave the way for a prolonged stay by veteran banker Zweli Manyathi, as he leads a painful turnaround that might involve a consolidation of branches and a loss of jobs.
The move by African Bank to waive its retirement age to accommodate Manyathi raises questions around its succession planning and leadership stability
— Zweli Manyathi
Manyathi has been African Bank’s CEO since August, after serving in an interim capacity since March, when Kennedy Bungane was ousted after he fell out of favour with the board over the bank’s performance and regulatory filing missteps.
Manyathi turns 65 in July, the official retirement age for executives at the bank. He said plans were afoot to keep him at the helm of the loss-making lender for “much longer” than July.
“The retirement age is 65, which is next month,” he said. “All I am going to say is that I am going to be a CEO in this business beyond that.”
Manyathi said work had been done by the board to extend his tenure, and the bank had engaged with the South African Reserve Bank’s Prudential Authority.
“We have already put to them a motivation for the approval to be a group CEO as opposed to interim CEO,” he said. He said the change of retirement age was an internal matter and was the responsibility of the board.
The move by African Bank to waive its retirement age to accommodate Manyathi raises questions around its succession planning and leadership stability. When appointed to the role in March, Manyathi became the group’s fourth CEO in eight years under the Thabo Dloti-led board.
African Bank has been 50% owned by the South African Reserve Bank and 25% by the Government Employees Pension Fund, with the remainder owned by a consortium of banks, including Standard Bank, Absa, Nedbank, FirstRand, Investec and Capitec.
It was placed in curatorship in 2014 after African Bank Investments Limited (Abil), its former controlling shareholder, collapsed due to high debt levels and a liquidity crunch.
Under Bungane, the bank initially announced plans to list on the JSE in 2025, but this was later pushed to 2027/8.
Manyathi said the bank had again deferred its listing to 2030/31, as it depended on three years of a solid financial performance.
This article has been updated to reflect that Zweli Manyathi has been CEO since August
Business Day
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