Marcia Klein

Marcia Klein

Following closely on the appointment of Mike Brown as the chief executive in waiting of Nedbank, two of the bank's top executives have tendered their resignations.

Rob Shuter, who headed Nedbank Retail and was among the top few in the running to take the chief executive position, has resigned, as was widely expected.

The other resignation is that of Pinky Moholi, group executive for strategy, marketing and corporate affairs, who will become chief executive of the Telkom SA business unit, the biggest unit in the group, after she leaves Nedbank at the end of next month.

Nedbank chief executive Tom Boardman said Moholi led the Nedbank brand repositioning strategy, and awareness of the brand was growing faster than all other large financial services brands in South Africa over the past few years.

Before the appointment of Brown, the front runners for Boardman's chief executive position, which he vacates in February, were Shuter, Brown and corporate banking managing director Mfundo Mkuhlu, although many saw Shuter as the frontrunner.

After the appointment was announced, there was some surprise that Brown was chosen above Shuter, with some commentators saying that it was Brown's history at BOE, where Boardman was from, which had secured him the job. Others, however, said Brown was better suited to the job than Shuter.

There was also some concern that the chief executive had not been black. Moholi, in her farewell statement, indicated that Brown would continue the bank's transformation.

"I am confident that the transformation journey we started is going to be in good hands with Mike Brown at the helm from February next year.

"Mike is a highly respected banker under whose leadership I see a great future for Nedbank. The timing of my move is unfortunate as I would have liked to have worked alongside Mike in his new role."

Boardman said Moholi's departure was a great loss, and that it was "going to leave a void on the executive management team".

Shuter will also stay at Nedbank until the end of April and had no immediate plans. Nedbank said he would "pursue personal interests".

Boardman said Shuter's decision was regretted as he had played a pivotal role.