SOUTH AFRICA – Telkom’s group chief financial officer, Tsholofelo Molefe, has resigned with immediate effect to take a new role of chief financial officer at rival MTN Group, where she will take on CEO Ralph Mupita’s former position.

Molefe will take up the position as soon as possible in 2021, but by no later than 1 October, MTN said in a statement.

Presumably, the lengthy delay is the result of restraints of trade that Telkom has in place and that she will now be on “gardening leave” until she is freed of them.

Prior to working at Telkom, Molefe was finance director at Eskom and CFO for First National Bank’s Personal Banking division.

She will join the MTN Group board and take over from Sugentharan Perumal, who has been acting in the position of CFO since 1 September.

Perumal took on that role following the appointment of former Mupita as MTN’s new president and CEO, replacing Rob Shuter.

MTN has made various other appointments, including naming Yolanda Cuba, the group’s chief digital & fintech officer, as vice president of its South and East Africa cluster and Serigne Dioum, group executive for mobile financial services, will join the executive committee as group chief digital & fintech officer.

Kholekile Ndamase, group executive for mergers & acquisitions, will assume the new exco role of group chief M&A and business development officer.

Openserve CFO Dirk Reyneke will take over as acting group CFO at Telkom.

Reyneke is a former CFO of Telkom Mobile and Gyro, Telkom’s property and towers business and also led the integration process of BCX and Telkom Enterprise.

“Reyneke, who has been working with Molefe for the past two years, will continue with our financial strategic objectives, which include building financial resilience through sustainable cost management, cash preservation, disciplined capital allocation and mitigating financial risks,” Telkom said.

The group said it will appoint a permanent CFO “at the end of a comprehensive process.”

It wished Molefe well in her future endeavours.

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