Media Statement by Trillian Capital Partners
23 October 2016
Trillian Capital Partners hereby makes it known that the allegations contained in the report that appeared in The Sunday Times today, Sunday, 23 October 2016, under the title “The dark heart of state capture” are, as far as Trillian Capital are concerned, factually incorrect, grossly misleading and indeed sensationalist. The report demonstrates poor and unprincipled journalism on the newspaper’s part.
Trillian Capital Partners furthermore places on record that it takes serious issue with the contents and tenor of the report. The insinuations and claims that Trillian Capital Partners and its Chief Executive Officer, Dr Eric Wood, are somehow party to the activity that has recently enjoyed many print columns and has been styled “state capture” are quite simply untrue. Those wild and unsubstantiated allegations have extremely damaging repercussions for the reputation of an emerging and growing black-owned Financial Services Group and to that of Dr Wood.
As was conveyed to The Sunday Times before the report in question went to print:
1. The Gupta family has no shareholding or other interest whatsoever in Trillian Holdings. It has no link to Trillian Holdings or to any of the other constituent members of the Trillian group of companies. The shareholders’ register of Trillian Holdings was provided to The Sunday Times senior journalist, Mr Sabelo Skiti. However, he chose not to include this fact in the report.
2. In fact, while, in the course of Saturday, 22 October 2016, Trillian met with Mr Skiti to disabuse his newspaper of a number of fundamental misapprehensions under which it laboured, the account in question to which Trillian was asked to respond was sent to it only at 20:21 on Friday, 21 October 2016. Despite repeated requests to that end,The Sunday Times refused to give Trillian sufficient time to answer. In the course of Saturday, 22 October 2016, the newspaper was told in no uncertain terms that Trillian needed more time to answer fully and properly, including locating documents relevant to the allegations and even to obtain affidavits. The newspaper gave an initial deadline of 14:00 on Saturday, which it later extended to an undefined time. In circumstance where the newspaper would have gone to print later on Saturday, this could never be a reasonable time. In effect, The Sunday Times ambushed Trillian. There is no reason for the report to have appeared today rather than next Sunday, by when Trillian would have had a reasonable time and would have answered fully, as it indicated to the newspaper.
3. In its e-mail message of 20:21 on Friday, 21 October 2016, The Sunday Times indicated to Trillian Capital Partners that Ms MM* had made the allegations in question against it, to whom the report refers as a “whistleblower”. Trillian made it clear that Ms M is a disgruntled former employee, who, therefore, cannot be a whistleblower in the legal sense of the word or enjoy the protection of the Protected Disclosures Act, and that her account contains a web of falsehoods. Ms M has, in fact, committed a number of criminal offences and, as Trillian told the newspaper, a criminal prosecution will shortly ensue.
4. Ms M resigned from Trillian in June 2016 alleging constructive dismissal (her constructive dismissal case is still before the CCMA). The allegations that The Sunday Times has attributed to Ms M were brought to our attention neither during her period of employment, nor at the time of her resignation.
5. What is more, it has subsequently come to the attention of Trillian that, while in its employ, Ms M was (without disclosing this fact) a shareholder and a director of a company competing with Trillian.
6. We reiterate that we indicated to the newspaper that Trillian Capital Partners is able to provide a full and complete answer to the account of Ms M but that it needed a reasonable time to do so. The newspaper chose to ignore that plea.
7. Trillian Capital Partners is satisfied that its considered response would have made the report, were it written fairly, a very different one to the one indeed published today. Accordingly, while Trillian wanted to be as co-operative as possible and while there are full answers to the account of Ms Mothepu, who, we repeat, is a disgruntled ex-employee, we could not provide that full answer on such unreasonably short notice.
8. The Sunday Times chose to ignore our commitment to provide them with all the information required within four business days. We are convinced that its actions in this regard are a neatly crafted attempt on their part to ambush Trillian.
9. The unfair and unreasonable actions of The Sunday Times leads us to believe that it was its intention to publish the story whatever the facts that Trillian provided to it. It seems that it had no intention of properly testing the veracity of the source or the motive that impelled her utterances.
10. The Sunday Times thus chose to publish an article that is highly defamatory in nature, in which raw and untested allegations are printed as fact without even a basic attempt to ascertain and confirm them.
11. The public interest requires that something other than the publishing at great speed of sensationalist and unfounded material, where the subjects have not had the chance to give their full and considered account. Trillian reserves its legal rights in this regard.
12. Trillian reiterates that it is confident that as far as its actions are concerned, all due processes were followed and that it delivered high-quality work and value to all its clients. The company continues to conduct its business in keeping with the highest standards of corporate governance and service delivery, and will continue do so.
Statement issued by Trillian Capital Partners, 23 October 2016
* Name redacted by Politicsweb.
