SHOPRITE, Africa’s retail giant, has appointed veteran chartered accountants and board members to serve as independent non-executive directors.
The group said yesterday that Nonkululeko Gobodo and Linda de Beer would serve as members of the group’s audit and risk committee.
The appointments, effective May 11, followed the appointment of Wendy Lucas-Bull as Shoprite’s chairperson last November.
Gobodo had an affinity with Shoprite’s culture of respect and being customer-centric.
“This is a great opportunity for me to work with a group that has been going through major innovations in the last few years, doing exciting things that are changing the experience of its customers,” Gobodo said.
Gobodo said she was eager to work with a group that “is committed to its purpose of feeding the nations of Africa and catering for all people, including poorer communities, with affordable products such as bread below R5 and affordable sanitary pads”.
Gobodo, a chartered accountant, founded her own accounting and audit firm that grew to become SizweNtsalubaGobodo, the largest black accounting firm in South Africa and the fifth-largest overall, which in 2018 acquired the Grant Thornton South Africa licence.
De Beer, also a chartered accountant, is on the boards of Aspen, Momentum Metropolitan Holdings and Tongaat Hulett.
Commenting on why she accepted the role, De Beer said: “I believe that good, well-governed companies form the backbone of value creation for everybody – including shareholders, employees, suppliers, customers and the community at large.”
She said Shoprite is the perfect example of a company that contributes to the community and touches the lives of so many South Africans (and beyond) on a daily basis. “Who wouldn’t want to be a part of that and play a role in such an iconic company,” she said.
