Metair CEO Riaz Haffejee has resigned and will leave the car components manufacturer and battery-maker at end-March.
Haffejee, who joined the company, valued at R4.38bn on the JSE, just more than two years ago, is stepping down to “pursue other opportunities more in line with his personal career goals”.
Haffejee will be available for two months to end-May to ensure a “smooth transition and handover”, Metair said in a brief statement. CFO Sjoerd Douwenga will step in as interim CEO with immediate effect, while Anesh Jogia from the company’s finance executive will become interim CFO.
“A process to appoint a permanent CEO has been initiated,” Metair said.
The group, which also has interests in the energy storage sector, has been affected by raw material shortages, including that of semiconductor chips, supply chain delays and the loss of production after the floods in KwaZulu-Natal in 2022.
“Whenever a CEO suddenly leaves, it normally signals to the market that something untoward is going on, but as I have come to learn in my 30 years’ experience, you never know what is going on behind the scenes in someone’s personal life,” said Anthony Clark, small to medium-cap analyst at Smalltalkdaily Research.
“CEOs have stepped down before because of a family tragedy, medical sickness or simply needed to move on to progress their careers. There was no colour added to why he stepped down.”
Earlier in March, Metair reported that its headline earnings per share was likely to drop 104% in the year to end-December, effectively swinging it into a loss.
The company was also hit by hyperinflation in Turkey where it has operations through battery manufacturer Mutlu Akü.
Metair’s share price ended Wednesday down the most in two weeks, falling 3.38% to R22.03.
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