In the most egregious breach of corporate governance, the Board of Directors of Botswana Railways (BR) has controversially appointed one of its own as a P66 000-a-month head of a subsidiary on a three-year contract with a 24 months extension option.
Under a clear blue sky on December 1, Lesedi Moakofhi started work at the Gaborone Container Terminal (Gabcon) offices as Managing Director. However, there was a huge dark cloud hanging over her appointment. Not too long ago, Moakofhi was a member of the BR Board of Directors, only resigning on November 31, 2016 through a letter that is oddly dated November 23, 2016. All along she was the Deputy Chairperson of the main BR Board of Directors. Sitting on the same board is Legodile Serema who is also the Chairperson of Gabcon’s own board of directors. Moakofhi’s appointment letter is signed by Serema whose last high-profile appointment was Lobatse mayor.
For some time now, the position of Gabcon MD has been held by Patrick Masikara on an acting basis and on August 18, 2016, Gabcon’s Board of Directors resolved to headhunt “a high caliber candidate” to fill the post on a substantive basis. Prior to this, some three candidates had tried their luck but were all deemed to have “developmental needs.” A report from Gabcon says that on account of the industry changing and the uniqueness of the container industry, “there is a need for a great leader.” After three months, such leader has been identified within BR itself and under the most unusual of circumstances.
The consultant earlier used to assess the three candidates who were deemed not great, was asked to headhunt suitable candidates. At least as far as Gabcon’s records go, two names turned up: Moakofhi and a South African man called Luvuyo Hobo. Moakofhi holds a University of Botswana MBA and is the former Acting Chief Executive Officer of the Botswana Public Officers Pension Fund (BPOPF) while Hobo holds a BCom in Economics and Information Systems from the University of the Western Cape and currently works for Bidvest Freight as a Regional Manager.
Oddly for a process in search of a great leader and one in which three candidates had been offloaded because they had developmental needs, the candidate who got the job herself has developmental needs. Both Moakofhi and Hobo underwent a psychometric test as part of the selection process. The results summary of the test indicates that while Moakofhi has certain strengths (“demonstrates high levels of self-regard, self-actualisation, flexibility, assertiveness and stress tolerance”), she is lacking in some critical areas: “she has a tendency to be opportunistic rather than strategic in defining problems and choosing goals” and “her business reasoning result shows she may not anticipate the long-term business problems and opportunities.” Her assessor found that “there is scope to develop her overall managerial judgement at senior management level and considerable scope to improve her insight into managing the organisation’s people issues.”
Moakofhi completed the emotional intelligence questionnaire twice “since her first attempt rendered invalid results.” Sunday Standard learns from HR professionals that “rendered invalid results” means that she failed the first time. We further learn that ordinarily candidates get only one chance and the managing director of the company that administered the psychometric tests worked with Moakofhi at the Botswana Telecommunications Corporation. The latter condition has set some tongues wagging. Using a term that ordinarily has an unfortunate literal meaning in a railways context, the results summary shows that the second attempt only served to prove that Moakofhi has developmental needs.
“The second attempt revealed a higher risk of derailment as she received a lower result in Impulse Control, i.e she may show a tendency to jump to hasty conclusions and appear impatient in decision making,” says the summary adding in another part that “she could improve on her impulse control and influence, especially in situations where people are not immediately in agreement with her.”
Moakofhi’s average score across the five competencies of “Analytical and Strategic Thinking”, “Resource Management and Planning”, “Leadership, Business and Results Focus” and “Influence and Impact” was 3.1. In terms of the scoring system, below 2.8 is a weak match, between 2.8 and 3.3 is a moderate match and above 3.3 is a strong match. The assessment report says that “Overall, Ms. Moakofhi is a moderate match against the requirements for the position.”
Likewise, Hobo had his weaknesses but emerged as the better candidate for the job. Noting that he performed well in the psychometric assessments, minutes of a special Gabcon meeting say that the “only disadvantage” with him is that he earns a lot more at Bidvest Freight than Gabcon can offer him.
“The current approved structure of the lower quarter is between P790 328.00 and P1, 129 040.00 per annum. Gabcon’s starting point is thus P65 860.00 per month. This is well below what he is currently earning, as well as his expectation with having to relocate to Botswana,” read minutes of the special Gabcon meeting.
On the other hand, Moakofhi’s “current salary expectation” happened to fall “within the range Gabcon can offer” and she was deemed “able to commence employment as soon as possible.” Another consideration was that her appointment “is in line with the drive for the empowerment of women in business.”
Thus it was that on November 4, Moakofhi received an offer-of-employment letter from Serema. In addition to the P65 860 a month salary, she will get a communication allowance of P1500 and at the end of her three-year contract, a gratuity calculated at 30 percent of her basic salary.
The issue gets even more intriguing as documents in Sunday Standard’s possession show that there was a third candidate whom Gabcon records don’t mention at all. Minutes of the board meeting only refer to Moakofhi and Hobo but there was a third candidate whose name is not revealed. Independently, Sunday Standard has established that this candidate is a former CEO of a parastatal organisation whom a professional colleague describes as a “star performer.”
While the Gabcon Board ended up giving the job to Moakofhi, Hobo is not completely out of the picture. On the conviction that “his expertise and skills can play a role in Gabcon’s roadmap for the future”, the BR subsidiary plans to “capitalise on his knowledge and expertise by engaging him as a consultant as the need arises.” There is no indication of how such relationship will be contracted given that Hobo has a full-time job at Bidvest Freight and his employer may not permit him to do consultancy work on the side.
