| Patrice Motsepe | |
|---|---|
Patrice Motsepe in 2009 |
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| Born | Patrice Tlhopane Motsepe January 28, 1962 Soweto, South Africa |
| Nationality | South African |
| Alma mater | University of the Witwatersrand University of Swaziland |
| Occupation | Executive Chairman of ARMgold |
| Spouse | Dr Precious Makgosi Moloi |
Patrice Tlhopane Motsepe (born 28 January 1962 in Soweto) is a South African mining magnate. His company, African Rainbow Minerals, has interests in gold, ferrous metals, base metals, and platinum. He also sits on the board of Greene and Partners a large South African Based Investment Company. He topped the Sunday Times Annual Rich List in 2011, with his wealth estimated to be around R22.99 billion (USD $3.28 billion).[1]
Since 2003, he is the owner of football club Mamelodi Sundowns.
He is married to Dr. Precious Makgosi Moloi and they have three sons. Motsepe's father named him Patrice after Patrice Lumumba.
Patrice was born to Augustine Motsepe, a schoolteacher turned small businessman, who owned a pub popular with black mine workers, it was from there that Patrice Motsepe learnt basic business principles from his father as well as first hand exposure to mining. He earned a law degree and became the first black partner in the law firm Bowman Gilfillan in 1994, the same year Nelson Mandela was elected the country’s first black president. He specialized in mining and business law at a time when the new government had begun the process of promoting black empowerment and entrepreneurship. Motsepe soon founded a mining services venture to glean gold dust from inside mine shafts, implementing a system of worker remuneration that combined a low base salary with a profit-sharing bonus. In 1997, with gold prices at a low, he used his connections and the black empowerment policy to arrange for finance on favorable terms, and set up a firm to begin buying the operating mines that would become the source of his wealth. In 1999 he teamed up with two of his associates to form Greene and Partners Investments[2]
Patrice Motsepe won South Africa's Best Entrepreneur Award in 2002.[3] In 2004 he was voted 39th in the Top 100 Great South Africans. This accolade was, however granted by the government funded state broadcaster. In 2008 he was 503rd richest person in the world, by the Forbes World Billionaires List. In that same issue of Forbes magazine, it was noted that the source of his wealth was not through any entrepreneurial zeal but through his association with the ruling political party the African National Congress (ANC).
But for all the adulation, in South Africa such success comes with a price: being labeled an oligarch. Even many blacks have complained that the country's 1994 transformation from apartheid to democracy has benefited only the elite few. The criticism stems from laws that require substantial black ownership in certain industries, including mining. A handful of politically connected individuals have grown enormously wealthy as a result. One of Motsepe's sisters, Bridgette Radebe, who's married to transport minister Jeffrey Radebe, heads a mining company and is said to be among the wealthiest black women in the country. "It's called crony capitalism," says Moeletsi Mbeki, 62, brother of South Africa's former president and an outspoken critic of the race-preference laws. "It's an anticompetitive system." [4]
Since 2004, he is also a Non-Executive Director of Absa Group and Sanlam[3] and was previously a partner of Bowman Gilfillan.
Motsepes' African Rainbow Minerals company's name changed to ARMgold, while joining with Harmony Gold Mining Ltd, in 2002 when is it was listed on the JSE Security Exchange. Motsepe is also the founder of African Rainbow Minerals Platinum (Proprietary) Limited and ARM Consortium Limited which later equally split ownership with Anglo American Platinum Corp Ltd. From 2005, Motsepe ran as the Chairman of Teal Exploration and Mining Incorporated. Motsepe runs as the chairmen of Ubuntu-Botho Investments, Non-Executive chairman of Harmony Gold Mining Co Ltd and deputy Chairman of Sanlam Ltd. Motsepe is currently South Africa's president of Chamber of Commerce and Industry.[5]