Naspers’ Fin24.com reported yesterday that the petition reads: “…we
believe that the acceptance of the Zanu-PF contract constitutes, at the very
least, a very serious lack of judgment and we would hope that Naspers, as
the parent company of Paarl Web, would acknowledge this. We therefore
believe it appropriate that the R3-million that Paarl Web apparently
received for this contract be given to organisations which aims to alleviate
the plight of the people of Zimbabwe.”
Paarl Web CEO Stephen van der Walt confirmed that some funds would be given
to an appropriate charity. “We will find a suitable fund supporting victims
and will make a small donation,” said van der Walt adding: “I cannot
attribute the exact profit figure for the job, ut we will donate in the
region of R250,000 to R350,000 to a suitable fund.” (See “Paarl Web to
donate Zim print money”)
Van der Walt refused to name the broker or individual who brought the job to
his company, citing a confidentiality agreement but stated that work on the
pamphlet was done by a large Johannesburg-based ‘creative house’ which did
work for Zanu-PF.
He added it was a company that regularly placed significant sized jobs with
large printers in South Africa, including retail jobs. He said they were a
well respected business client and that Paarl Web had done print work for
them in the past.
He also said that they were not a retailer, and that retailers at times
place their work direct with printers and not through their creative
agencies.
After speaking to Van der Walt, I received a phone call from a trusted
source who agreed to speak to me on condition of anonymity. This person said
the man who brokered the Mugabe print job was Peter Mancer, and that Mancer
had also originally briefed the job into Caxton, which refused to run the
print. I left a message with Van der Walt to confirm this, but did not hear
from him again.
Peter Mancer is no stranger to controversy. The Premier Soccer League
marketing man was in the news last year when a gravy train story broke about
soccer bosses pocketing millions following a slew of sponsorship deals. At
the time Cape Argus reported that Mancer’s company, Diversity Management,
had “a clause in his contract that gives him 10 percent of any PSL
sponsorship deal.”
A phone call to the PSL revealed that Mancer was in Australia where he was:
“watching the soccer.” The PSL would not provide his mobile number saying it
was PSL policy not to do so.
I was unable to confirm with Naspers whether Mancer was in fact Mugabe’s
man, however there are links between the PSL and Naspers. Touchline Media’s
special projects division custom publishes PSL magazines.
Late last year Touchline (a Naspers subsidiary) was implicated in the
circulation audit scam that rocked Naspers and Media24. Then the PSL struck
a R1 billion deal (over five years) with SuperSport, another Naspers
subsidiary, which gave the pay channel exclusive TV rights to all PSL
fixtures.
The figures don’t add up? (Do the math):
In his interview with Alec Hogg on SAfm’s Market Update with Moneyweb last
night, Hein Brand – group MD, Media24 stated: “It was a R2,6-million
contract, it was 130 tons. Put in context, that plant processes 22,000 tons
a year, so it’s a fraction of their throughput. It sounds like a lot, but I
promise they handle many of these and that group probably handles more than
800 discrete similar jobs every week, so it’s one of 800 similar walk-in
clients.”
If Paarl Web handled 800 similar jobs a week this would be 800 X 130 tons =
104,000 tons a week. Close on five times the print tonnage claimed by
Naspers for the plant in a year.
*A former broadcast journalist, Mandy de Waal spent 20 years in branding
marketing before returning to her first love, journalism. Read Artificial
Intelligence, her blog on new media, current affairs and business at:
http://mdw.typepad.com/
Follow her on Twitter: http://twitter.com/mandyldewaal
Got a story for Mandy to break or a hot news tip? Email her (on or off the
record) at mandyd@mweb.co.za
Post published in: News