Godongwana: Law must be amended before an outside expert is appointed as PIC chair

CAPE TOWN - Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana said he’s not yet able to appoint a pension fund expert from outside of government to be the chairperson of the Public Investment Corporation (PIC).

Godongwana said the law needed to change first before he could implement a long-standing recommendation by the PIC Commission that recommended that an independent non-executive chairperson be appointed.

Godongwana was responding to a written parliamentary question on how far he’d gone in appointing an outside expert to chair the country’s biggest asset manager.

The PIC Commission or Mpati commission of inquiry examined the period between January 2015 and August 2018, focusing on potential misconduct by PIC directors and employees. 

The commission also made recommendations regarding the governance and the structure of the PIC.

One of the recommendations was the appointment of an independent chairperson who is not the deputy minister finance, but someone with expertise in pension fund funds and financial markets. 

But Minister Godongwana said the appointment of an independent non-executive chairperson who was not the deputy minister of finance or another deputy minister could not be implemented at this stage.

He said this was due to the legislative requirements of the PIC Act that provides that "the minister must designate the deputy minister of finance or, in consultation with Cabinet, any other deputy minister in the economic cluster, as the chairperson of the board."

He said the act must first be amended to give effect to the recommendations of the commission. 

Meanwhile, the Democratic Alliance (DA)’s finance spokesperson, Mark Burke, accused the PIC of potentially misleading Parliament when it stated that all the Mpati Commission's recommendations had been implemented.