Spescom has appointed Thomas Makore as managing director of Spescom Media IT. He replaces Sean du Toit who will head Spescom's office in Kampala, Uganda, as group executive head: Africa.

Jene Palmer, the chief executive of Spescom, said: ''Makore was the ideal candidate to take over the reins from Du Toit as he has a solid track record within the group and understands the culture, corporate goals and objectives of the organisation .. ." Palmer added: ''Du Toit is a veteran in the broadcasting industry and his expertise will be leveraged to drive Spescom business as a whole into Africa."

Global Credit Ratings (GCR), a leader in African ratings has appointed Alfons Ideler as director of structured finance. In his new role, Ideler will oversee and expand the structured finance ratings service offered by GCR.

"Alfons (Ideler) brings a deep experience to the GCR executive team," says Melanie Brown, MD of GCR. "He is well respected in the market and his specific exposure to public transactions and his well-established relationships will prove immensely valuable to us, as GCR moves to grow this division further."

Ideler has about 14 years of experience in financial markets. He started his career as a tax adviser for Ernst&Young in Amsterdam. He worked as a structured finance banker with Fortis and ING bank before joining Fitch Ratings in London as director of European structured finance.

The board of directors of Kagiso Trust Investments (KTI) has appointed Kgomotso Matseke as group MD. Matseke has served as the head of the Actis Africa Empowerment Fund (AAEF), a division of private equity firm Actis Africa. He joined Actis in 2005 and was instrumental in the establishment of the AAEF.

Matseke has 11 years of empowerment financing and significant emerging markets experience.

He has extensive expertise in black economic empowerment transaction negotiation, restructuring, funding, managing investments across several industries, including financial services, transport and logistics, mining, property, engineering, petrochemicals and infrastructure.

Johnson Njeke, a founding member of KTI, will remain as group MD of KTI until the end of the month.