The entire board of JSE-listed Casey Investment Holdings has resigned and staff have been told the company does not have enough money to pay their salaries for this month.
The company announced yesterday only that chairman Jeff Molobela had resigned.
Calls to Casey`s offices were unanswered this morning, but ITWeb is in possession of the minutes of a meeting on 1 August, at which MD Lemmy Khumalo said several divisions, including the technical, hardware and software division and control ware divisions, would be closed.
Khumalo also said at the meeting that the call centre, training and infrastructure divisions in the Western Cape would be closed and that no new business should be conducted although existing customers would be serviced. Staff members were to be given liberty to seek employment elsewhere.
Casey is 71.5% owned by empowerment firm Black Information Technology Company (Blitec), which in March announced it was merging the technology services division of Ndizani Technology Holdings with the operations of Casey.
<B>Blitec responds</B>
Black IT Company (Blitec) CEO Thabiso Moerane has since contacted ITWeb to say that while Casey directors Lemmy Khumalo and Sunil Singh had indicated their intention to quit, they have been in talks with Blitec and "we are getting to be on the same page" and thus they had not resigned.
She confirms that the group decided to close several divisions because "we weren`t focused and we needed to focus on what we are good at". However, employees were given the option of making an offer to take over the divisions, which Blitec prefers to closure.
Moerane says employees will be paid, although not necessarily tomorrow. While the group has the resources, it is examining the various proposals to buy the divisions and will be in a position to determine payments once that review has been completed.
Blitec, which also owns 30% of SAP Public Services, said at the time that the aim was to consolidate its various IT interests within Casey.
ITWeb also has copies of various e-mail messages Khumalo sent to Casey staff members. Among other things, he announces his own resignation as well as that of sales director Sunil Singh, which he says are "due to differences in strategy on how to take the company forward".
Molobela`s resignation was also, according to an e-mail from Khumalo, "due to differences in strategy with our major shareholder, Blitec".
Staff were reportedly offered retrenchment packages but asked to stay on until further notice. However, they have been sent another message from Khumalo indicating that there are problems with payment of salaries.
"I would like to communicate to all of you that as you may know, we do not have sufficient funds right now to pay salaries by the 30th of this month but that we are working on it," Khumalo writes. "Blitec expects to know by tomorrow from its funders whether funds will be available for us to pay salaries and to continue our process as discussed with all of you.
"In the meantime, both our Midrand and KZN branches are chasing up on collections and we hope that either way, funds will be available next week."
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