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DiData execs flagged for conflict of interest in office park sale

Staff Writer
By Staff Writer, ITWeb
Johannesburg, 20 Jan 2022
Werner Kapp, CEO of Dimension Data Middle East and Africa.
Werner Kapp, CEO of Dimension Data Middle East and Africa.

Systems integrator Dimension Data has flagged a potential conflict of interest among its top executives when it sold its upmarket office park, The Campus, in 2019.

In a statement today, the company says a business review by Dimension Data found certain executives did not disclose their personal financial interests in the sale of The Campus, the group’s business office park in Bryanston, Johannesburg.

This, after IT publication TechCentral reported that several former executives at Dimension Data are caught up in a fraud scandal following a forensic probe into the December 2019 sale of The Campus.

However, the company did not disclose the names of the executives involved in the transaction.

According to the systems integrator,  The Campus was sold to Property Co (Identity Propco), a majority black women-owned company, led by Sonja De Bruyn, as part of a significant B-BBEE transaction.

It notes De Bruyn was a long-standing director of Dimension Data at the time. On 21 May 2021, De Bruyn and all other non-executive directors stepped down when Dimension Data aligned its governance structures to that of NTT, it adds.

While serving as a director, she recused herself from matters relating to the transaction and has not been implicated in the review, Dimension Data notes.

“The executives’ failure to disclose their personal financial interest in the transaction as required under the Companies Act could affect the validity of the transaction.

“Dimension Data is currently working closely with Identity PropCo to find a solution which achieves the original objectives of the transaction while preserving the interests of Dimension Data and Identity PropCo,” it says.

In 2019, Dimension Data, which was still under then CEO Grant Bodley, said the sale of The Campus was part of a wider restructuring exercise to enable the company to focus on its core business.

At the time, the firm occupied less than 50% of The Campus – an office park in Bryanston which has housed it since 2003. However, it said it would will continue to occupy The Campus, which remains its head office.

Bodley was replaced as the company's CEO by Werner Kapp in March 2021.


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