Telkom’s Molotsane fights for a package
Molotsane’s shock departure from Telkom last month was accompanied by speculation that he had been frustrated and had been pushed by the board to leave.
On Friday, his attorneys, Rosin Wright Rosengarten, refused to divulge details of the settlement talks, except to confirm that Molotsane had chosen to go the legal route to finalise his payout.
Mark Rosin, a partner in the law firm, said: “Things are at a very sensitive stage ” although “we hope we can settle the matter between Papi and Telkom shortly.”
Telkom’s financial reports show that Molotsane earned R5.6-million in the first six months of his tenure at the parastatal.
Last month, the Telkom board issued a four-line statement announcing his resignation.
Signed by the board’s chairman, Shirley Lue Arnold, the notice said: “The company wishes to thank Mr Molotsane for the services he rendered in the last 18 months and wishes him well in his future endeavours.”
But Business Times has established that his abrupt departure might have been sparked by a threat of disciplinary action.
It has been established that his lawyers have sent Telkom’s board a letter about the circumstances of his “resignation” and questioned whether he resigned of his own accord.
Molotsane’s lawyers said they were not aware of action against him pending at the time of his departure.
In January, Business Times reported that he had come under fire from senior managers and investors about the way he ran the telecommunications giant.
He was accused of sitting on a report by international business consultants McKinsey, which was believed to be harshly critical of Telkom’s management structures and technical capacity.
Dismissing the criticism on numerous occasions, Molotsane was adamant that he would not be coerced into leaving the hot seat, despite growing concern in the investment community about his ability to run one of Africa’s premier telecoms companies.
At one stage, he admitted to Business Times that he was aware that analysts, shareholders and other stakeholders were unhappy with his performance.
But, he said, “I was employed to ensure that we have a successful and profitable business and that’s what I’m planning to do.”
There was speculation as early as November that the board was planning to fire him.
He had come under increasing attack from stakeholders for the way in which he had been running the company and for what they saw as his lack of experience in the information, communications and telecommunications sector.
The former Transnet group executive was certainly a relative novice when he took over the reins at Telkom from the highly respected Sizwe Nxasana in September 2005.
Shortly after his arrival, he got involved in a boardroom brawl, which resulted in a number of respected senior Telkom executives abruptly leaving the company.
He has been accused of not providing leadership and of lacking the experience needed to drive Telkom through a challenging period of competition and expansion.
Molotsane said he had “good relationships with all my executives, but in any environment we will have a situation where we won’t agree on everything”.
Last month, after Molotsane’s sudden resignation, the trade union Solidarity appealed to the Department of Communications to mount an independent inquiry into the problems that Telkom is experiencing.
Solidarity’s deputy general secretary, Dirk Hermann, said the trade union was particularly concerned about the large number of senior employees who had left the fixed-line phone operator.
In March, chief sales and marketing officer Wally Beelders, and chief technology officer Thami Msimango, left within a week of each other.
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