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Wal-Mart launches site dedicated to Massmart deal
Retail group Wal-Mart on Monday, 9 May 2011, launched a website containing all pertinent information regarding its proposed R16.5 billion acquisition of consumer goods distributor Massmart (MSM).
Wal-Mart said the website - www.walmartinfo.co.za - was created in the interest of ensuring South Africans were informed accurately.
"All of the talk about Wal-Mart coming to SA has understandably created a lot of discussion.
"We have set up a website to answer questions that have been raised about this transaction," the retailer said on its new website.
The world's largest listed company by revenue wants a 51% stake in Massmart, the owner of DionWired, Builders Warehouse, Game and others.
Wal-Mart said that, should the Massmart transaction proceed, it expected the creation of new jobs in SA and support for the development of South African exports.
The deal entered its final stages earlier on Monday as the Competition Tribunal hearing got underway in Pretoria. This comes after the Competition Commission's thumbs up, in February, that the merger be approved without conditions.
In his testimony on Monday, Massmart CE Grant Pattison said the deal would not lead to a flood of cheap imports on the South African market, a major concern raised by the intervening parties, who include the Departments of Economic Development, Trade and Industry, and Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, the SA Commercial, Catering and Allied Workers Union (Saccawu), the SA Clothing and Textile Workers Union (Sactwu) and the SMME Forum.
"Ultimately, Massmart's procurement philosophy is driven by consumer choice. Other than for the purposes of diversity of supply and B-BBEE (broad-based black economic empowerment) considerations, it is irrelevant to Massmart whether a particular product is locally manufactured, locally assembled with all or some foreign components or fully imported," Pattison's witness statement said.
The intervening parties have also raised objections over possible job losses.
According to documents posted on the tribunal's website last week, the government said that as many as 4,000 jobs could be lost by Massmart shifting just 1% of its procurement from local to imported sources.
The hearing will continue until 13 May, with 16 May reserved for legal argument.
Source: I-Net Bridge
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