ROB ROSE: 448-million reasons to pursue Markus Jooste
If anyone will ever set a precedent for clawing back bonuses, the retailer where the CEO magicked up R106bn in revenue over a decade is it
So, we now know that during the time when Steinhoff was cooking its accounts, from at least 2009 until 2017, its CEO Markus Jooste was taking home R448.3m in salaries and bonuses from the very shareholders he was fleecing. Of that rather tidy sum, the "bonuses" paid to Jooste for his exceptional diligence during that time amounted to more than R205.8m. Thankfully, Steinhoff has now indicated it plans to go where only a vanishingly small number of SA companies dare go: it plans to "claw back" this money from Jooste. In one small corner of its immense and wholly impressive 344-page annual report for 2017 (only 18 months late), the furniture retailer Steinhoff details the immense amounts it paid Jooste last year. Then it adds: "Both the current management board and supervisory board confirm their respective commitment to make use of their clawback rights where appropriate." You can see why the board, chaired by Heather Sonn and run by Louis du Preez, would want to reclaim Jooste’s swag...
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