William Tell aiming at recovery

The chipboard processing firm's board removed Lok in April last year. The official reason given for his suspension was serious illness, but there were also concerns around his erratic behaviour.

Lok now acknowledges this. The sideeffects of antismoking medication he was taking played a big part. "I was hyperactive and a bit aggressive," he says.

Lok's departure from the company was one of many. Days before he left, he suspended MD Wally van Coller and launched an investigation into some alleged financial irregularities. The board later said nothing untoward was found, but Van Coller resigned and left in May.

William Tell chairman Ralph Patmore, who held the reins as acting CEO after Lok was suspended until the appointment of Johan Diederiks in late July, also resigned. He left after Lok had regained effective control of the company at the AGM in November, when Lok used his 60% holding to push through changes to some of its board committees. Patmore was not appointed to the audit and risk committee and opted to leave with immediate effect. Diederiks followed in February this year.

The group is losing its financial director as well. Evan Badenhorst will leave in April after taking over from Nirvana Govender, who resigned in September.

Over the past few months Lok has been reconstituting the board. This led to his appointment as executive chairman a few weeks ago. He says the company is not looking for a new CEO and he is happy with the structure of the current board.

But the changes in leadership clearly affected the group's performance. Though revenue rose from R92m to R103m, it incurred a R1m operating loss for the half-year to December.

Lok says he is now focused on turning the group around and has brought in German consultants to improve its operating performance.

Source: Financial Mail