MMI Holdings Limited (MMI), born from the merger between Metropolitan and Momentum, announced today that it has achieved Level 2 broad-based black economic empowerment (B-BBEE) contributor status for 2012, an improvement on its Level 3 rating the year bef
“I am pleased that MMI continues to demonstrate strong progress in delivering on the promise of the merger. After the healthy set of interim results we posted last month, our level 2 contributor status evidences MMI’s commitment to transformation, which is one of our strategic focus areas,” commented Group CEO, Nicolaas Kruger.
The improvement is significant as it was achieved in the second year of bedding down the merger between Metropolitan and Momentum to form MMI. “It was a challenging time for the group as business was focused on integration,” said Dan Moyane, Group Corporate Affairs Executive. “Despite this integration, transformation remained a priority.”
In 2012 the new DTI targets for employment equity and preferential procurement came into effect. MMI’s B-BBEE performance is achieved against these increased targets.
MMI met its ownership target through its partnership with Kagiso Tiso Holdings (KTH) and other empowerment shareholdings. MMI also met its targets in enterprise development and corporate social investment. MMI attained an employment equity score of 8.9 out of 15 points against the backdrop of the revised targets set by the DTI in 2012.
“Some of the factors that impacted our B-BBEE performance can be attributed to the merger, which necessitated some redeployment and migration of staff. Our skills development programmes are focused on identifying talent within MMI to improve our representation systematically over time,” explained Moyane.
MMI is committed to meeting and exceeding its preferential procurement and enterprise development targets as a meaningful way to develop black companies in South Africa. “We scored 15.9 against a preferential procurement target of 20 points. We are actively engaging with our businesses to build on this solid platform going forward,” said Moyane.
With the gazetting of the Financial Sector Charter (FSC) in November 2012, MMI is set to measure its future performance against the FSC scorecard, which will also include targets for access to financial services and empowerment financing. MMI believes that these are important pillars in transformation as the financial services industry is expected to make a meaningful difference in ensuring the majority of our population can participate in the economy and in making use of the savings of our consumers to build a sustainable future for our nation.
“The sustainability of our business depends on equitable socio-economic development and equal opportunities for all South Africans. The B-BBEE codes and the FSC are frameworks by which we can achieve this, and MMI will continue to work hard to meet and exceed the targets they set for the benefit of our business and of our country,” concluded Moyane.