Denel chairman Daniel Mantsha resigns
The board chairman of state-owned arms manufacturer Denel‚ Daniel Mantsha‚ has resigned.
Director-general of public enterprises Mogokare Richard Seleke confirmed Mantsha’s resignation on Friday afternoon.
"The CEO of Denel [Zwelakhe Ntshepe] has confirmed that its chairperson has resigned. The letter is en route to the department‚" Seleke said. "Minister Pravin Gordhan has convened an urgent meeting on Monday with the outgoing chairperson and CEO of Denel."
Mantsha‚ appointed as chairman in July 2015‚ has been implicated in allegations of state capture at Denel‚ and his tenure has been marked by financial troubles at the state-owned entity.
In September 2017‚ the Organisation for Undoing Tax Abuse (Outa) laid charges of corruption against Mantsha for his role in the Denel Asia project‚ an ill-fated joint venture between Denel and Gupta-owned companies to supply arms to the Asian market.
“Mantsha’s role was to try to sell this joint venture to the National Treasury and Ministry of Public Enterprises. They claimed the joint venture had the potential to do business in Asia to the value of $9.2-billion over five years‚" Outa's Ben Theron said at the time.
TimesLIVE understands that the process of formulating a new board has been underway since January following comments made by former public enterprises minister Lynne Brown. She stated that new names had been submitted for vetting.
On Friday‚ the Department of Public enterprises refused to be drawn on questions of where the process to appoint a new board stood.
In December it emerged that Denel was facing a liquidity crunch and doubts rose over its ability to pay salaries.
While speaking to the portfolio committee on public enterprises in Parliament late in January‚ Ntshepe said Denel's expenditure was about R600-million a month for payments to suppliers‚ loans from banks and salaries.