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MTN announces Rob Shuter, former Vodafone boss as CEO

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MTN announces Rob Shuter, former Vodafone boss as CEO

Africa’s biggest telecommunications operator, MTN Group on Monday announced the appointment of Rob Shutter as its new chief executive officer.

The announcement came after months of hunting for a new head.

MTN, which has operations in nearly two dozen countries across Africa and the Middle East, expects Shutter to help oversee the company’s growth in other lucrative markets.

Shuter, who will start no later than July 2017, replaces Sifiso Dabengwa, who resigned last November after a $5.2 billion fine in Nigeria exposed corporate governance flaws at Africa’s biggest mobile phone operator.

Ripples Nigeria monitored the price and shares movement of MTN on Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE), which rose by 3.8 per cent to close at 150.19 rand in early trade, outpacing by 1.7 per cent gain the blue-chip JSE Top-40 index .

Shuter, an accountant with experience in managing risk, inherits a company in the middle of overhauling its corporate governance standards and in search of new revenue streams as tough competition hit profit margins in its key markets.

“MTN is confident that Rob will bring experience and new insights to the CEO role having had many years in the telecoms sector both in Africa and Europe,” MTN said in a statement.

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Phuthuma Nhleko, who temporarily took over as an executive chairman following Dabengwa’s resignation, will revert to his role as non-executive chairman as soon as Shuter starts his new role.

Shuter has been CEO of Vodafone Netherlands since April 2012 and in October 2015 his role was expanded to include the other European countries excluding the four large European markets, UK, Italy, Spain and Germany.

Meanwhile, the Minister of Communications, Adebayo Shittu, has said that the $5.2billion fine slammed on telecommunication giant, MTN, was reduced to encourage foreign investments into the country.

Mr. Shittu stated that the Federal Executive Council, FEC, decided to reduce the penalty against the telecommunications giant after realising the negative impact the burden could have on the nation, its people and the economy.

The Nigerian Communications Commission, NCC, had slammed a $5. 2 billion fine on MTN for violating the directive of the regulatory body in Nigeria.

The NCC had directed all telecom providers in the country to register subscribers and disconnect erring subscribers. MTN did not meet the deadline to do so.

The South African telecommunication firm was thus fined $1,000 for each of its 5.2 million affected subscribers, totaling $5.2 billion.

Mr. Shittu said there was pressure on the FEC from different quarters, which later agreed to reduce the fine imposed on MTN to N330 billion to be paid within a period of three years.

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