Last year, I spent a lot of airtime on this column commenting on the South African Peter Moyo vs Old Mutual highly publicised wrangle that provided a classic corporate governance case study on director conflict of interest, management of board conflicts and the resultant crisis communication.
Just as a reminder, on May 24, 2019 the board of Old Mutual Limited released a statement to the Johannesburg Stock Exchange that it was suspending the CEO, Mr Moyo. A few weeks later, another statement was released that Mr Moyo’s employment was being terminated. The reason given was concerns that had emerged relating to a conflict of interest in a company in which Mr Moyo was the chairman and in which Old Mutual was a shareholder. Mr Moyo took the company to court suing for wrongful termination thus seeking reinstatement, damages to his reputation and asking the court to declare the Old Mutual board of directors as delinquent. In July 2019, Judge Brian Mashile ordered for his temporary reinstatement as CEO, but the company refused to let him into his former Old Mutual offices, leading Mr Moyo to sue further for contempt of court.
