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| ALEXKOR LIMITED |
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Alexkor is a state-owned diamond mining company with marine and alluvial mining operations on the West Coast of South Africa. FinFive was approached to fulfil the Chief Financial Officer role in the restructuring process of the company. Our first objective was to guarantee the smooth completion of the year-end audit and the compilation of an IFRS compliant Annual Report. After working closely with the external auditors the Annual Report was approved and submitted to Parliament prior to the due date. FinFive is also responsible for submitting quarterly management reports to the Department of Public Enterprises, quarterly reports to the South African Reserve Bank and Statistics SA and annual reports to National Treasury and the Auditor General. Presentations are frequently required by the Board of Directors, as well as the Audit, Remuneration, Rehabilitation and Parliamentary Portfolio Committees. Alexkor has had unqualified audit opinions ever since.
FinFive was also instrumental in the facilitation of the restructuring process. In addition to this, various cost-cutting strategies were proposed which contributed to a substantial decrease in the operating costs. We are responsible for ensuring that all procurement procedures and policies are compliant with the PFMA. Due to these strategies , Alexkor made its first operating profit in 5 years, the balance sheet has returned to solvency and future prospects indicates that Alexkor is starting to make a slow but certain recovery after it has been under immense pressure due to the land claim settlement, market challenges and political uncertainty on the entity itself.
As part of its initial appointment, FinFive was instructed to research, plan and implement a new financial reporting system. The process, from procurement to implementation, was overseen and managed by FinFive. Subsequently Finfive was also instrumental in assisting with the outsourcing of the pensioners to Alexander Forbes as well as the settlement of its post-retirement medical aid personnel to Momentum Specialized Services. Finfive successfully managed and implemented the transition process of the Alexkor operations into the operations of the Pooling and sharing Joint Venture in accordance with the Deed of Settlement that was made an Order of Court (Biggest successful land claim case in the history of South Africa). Part of the Settlement, was the establishment of the Alexander Bay Town that was upgraded to municipal standards. This project amounted to more than R130 million and all funds and expenditure towards the projects was managed by Finfive.
Finfive was then asked to act in the capacity of CEO of Alexkor in September 2011. As part of our responsibilities we are required to explore new business ventures to enable Alexkor to be sustainable in future. As part of the development of Alexkor the CEO will have implement a new accounting systems, create and implement new business strategies and design new systems and controls to ensure successful continuous operations at Alexkor and its new business ventures. These new operations entailed capital raising and Finfive was again active in negotiating with Treasury, the Department of Public Enterprises, IDC and the DBSA.
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