South Africa’s best-paid telecoms CEOs

The CEO of South Africa’s most valuable telecoms company, Vodacom, earned the highest gross salary of the sector’s executives in the last financial year.

The share prices of South Africa’s listed telecoms companies have also performed remarkably well over the past year.

A recent MyBroadband analysis showed that an investment split evenly across Vodacom, MTN, Telkom, and Cell C parent Blue Label Telecoms in July 2024 would be worth over 80% more in July 2025.

While the high salaries of South African telecoms CEOs often come under fire, these individuals are responsible for delivering shareholder value in tough markets across Africa.

Telecoms revenues and customers regularly show strong growth across the continent, especially considering the hostile economic environment, power shortages, and foreign currency devaluations.

According to Vodacom’s 2024/25 integrated report, Vodacom Group CEO Shameel Joosub received a total remuneration package of R71.1 million before taxes and other deductions.

However, Joosub’s gross salary without additional benefits, at roughly R18.43 million, was a relatively small portion of his total package.

Long-term incentives (LTIs) and short-term incentives (STIs) were the most significant contributors to Joosub’s earnings, adding R46.6 million to his total remuneration.

The LTIs and STIs are determined by an executive’s performance based on metrics established by shareholders through annual general meetings.

In some cases, it may be intrinsically linked to share price performance. For example, Joosub currently holds 300% of the required co-investment in Vodacom shares.

It is important to emphasise that all the figures above exclude tax obilgations. Many of South Africa’s top telecoms executives are paying nearly half their salaries in taxes.

Of the R71.1 million Joosub earned, close to R32 million went to the South African Revenue Service, bringing his net salary to around R39.1 million.

While Joosub’s total salary increased by 15% from the year before, Vodacom’s share price was up nearly 30% between the start and the end of the year.

Below is a summary of Joosub’s remuneration package for Vodacom’s 2024/25 financial year.

MTN execs take cuts as high-performing Telkom CEO earnings rise

MTN Group CEO Ralph Mupita was the second-highest-earning telecoms CEO during the year. However, his total pay package declined from R80.4 million to R64.8 million.

MTN South Africa CEO Charles Molapisi took a more marginal pay cut, with his total package dropping from R26.9 million to R26.3 million.

Several MTN shareholders were not happy with the company’s executive remuneration, with 24.34% voting against the remuneration policy.

The remuneration implementation report saw even less support, with 40.82% of shareholders voting against it, more than the 25% needed to stop the report from passing.

While MTN’s share price has rebounded substantially over the last few months, it dropped by roughly 19.29% during the company’s previous financial year.

Meanwhile, Telkom CEO Serame Taukobong received the biggest pay increase, with his total remuneration increasing from R19.23 million to R33.29 million.

Analysts are highly optimistic about Telkom’s performance under Taukobong, which included the company declaring its first dividend in five years.

Finally, Mark and Brett Levy, co-CEOs at Cell C parent Blue Label Telecoms, were paid R20.84 million each in the company’s 2024 financial year, a substantial cut over the R35.81 million in 2023.

Although the company has yet to report its 2025 financial year results, its share price has continued to rise substantially.

The share is the JSE’s top-performing stock when measured from September 2023, with growth of more than 400%.

Flagship Asset Management global portfolio manager Philip Short believes the share price could double again within the next six months due to major restructuring of Cell C.

The table below shows the salaries of the top executives at South Africa’s most valuable listed telecoms companies over their last two financial years.

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