Africa’s biggest mobile network MTN Group [JSE:MTN], has finally appointed a new chief executive officer, Rob Shuter on Monday following months of upheaval at the company.
The announcement was made to shareholders on Monday morning, that its board has moved to appoint Shuter as its new group president and CEO, after the company’s former CEO Sifiso Dabengwa quit last year amid a multi-billion dollar telecoms fine in Nigeria.
“Rob may commence as soon as it is practically possible in 2017 but not later than 1 July 2017 after the completion of his current contractual obligations,” the company said in a statement.
“Rob, a South African national, is the current CEO of the European Cluster at Vodafone Group and has extensive experience in telecoms and banking having held senior management roles at Vodacom Group, Standard Bank and Nedbank prior to joining Vodafone Group,” said MTN.
Besides the title of CEO, Shuter will also be MTN’s group president. The statement also revealed several new appointments, including that of Vodacom chief officer for consumer business Godfrey Motsa, who will be joining it as vice-president of its South and East Africa (SEA) division.
“Godfrey was previously CEO of Vodacom DRC Congo and CEO of Vodacom Lesotho. He brings 10 years of experience of telecoms in the region to MTN. He has various other commercial experience,” the statement said.
MTN appointed three new nonexecutive directors: Paul Hanratty, former Old Mutual chief operating officer; Stan Miller, former Dutch telephone company KPN CEO who was part of MTN’s founding management team; and Nkunku Sowazi, Kagiso Tiso Holdings asset manager.
An unnamed person will be joining MTN on June 30 as vice-president of mergers and acquisitions and strategy.
Shuter is set to take the reins at MTN after the company announced earlier this month that it had settled its fine in Nigeria.
In October last year, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) moved to fine MTN $5.2bn for failing to disconnect around 5 million unregistered SIM cards.
The fine was then reduced to $3.9bn with the chair of the company, Phuthuma Nhleko, heading up negotiations with regulators in the country which led to the reduction of the original $5.2bn fine to about $1.671bn
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