Nespars Defend Its Corporate Governance
Africa’s largest multinational media company with principal operations in electronic and print media, Naspers, on 31 August 2009 defended the composition of its board and its remuneration policy, following criticism centering on its corporate governance. In a report by Avior Research, Naspers scored 1,5 out of five for corporate governance, saying some board members had been with the company too long to be sufficiently independent, and its remuneration policies did not comply with best practice.
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“We maintain our concern over the composition of the Naspers board and insufficient independent directors and believe that Naspers can strike an improved balance,” reported Avior.
Naspers CEO Koos Bekker said that their pool of directors is by nature long-serving, because there are limited people with appropriate experience available and that Avior got some things completely wrong when it made its pay comparisons. Six of Naspers’s 11 non-executive directors were appointed more than 10 years ago, according to the company’s annual report.
Meanwhile, Bekker said criticism was justified that the company had not done enough to publicize its social responsibility programs and what it was doing to mitigate the carbon footprint of its South African printing business.“It’s partly stupidity on our part, and partly that it will take us some time to collect the information,” he said. Bekker further promised, Naspers would “sit down with Avior” and address these concerns.
Reagan Malumo
Programme Officer: Media Freedom Monitoring and Research
Media Institute of Southern Africa (MISA) Regional Secretariat
21 Johann Albrecht St
Private Bag 13386
Windhoek
Namibia
Phone: +264 61 232 975
Fax: +264 61 248 016
Mobile: +264 81 311 2626
E mail: reagan@misa.org
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