Leigh Roberts CA(SA) (Chair)
B.Com, CA(SA)
Leigh is the CEO of the Integrated Reporting Committee (IRC) of South Africa and is the Chair of its technical Working Group. She has been deeply involved in integrated reporting in South Africa and internationally. As a member of the Technical Task Force of the International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC), she worked on the development of the Integrated Reporting Framework (International <IR> Framework) released in 2013, and as a member of the Framework Board she looked at its update and revision, released in 2021. She is a member of the Integrated Reporting and Connectivity Council. Leigh has co-authored two books with Professor Mervyn King: Integrate: Doing Business in the 21st Century (Juta) and The Healthy Company (Juta 2021). She regularly runs board and executive training workshops in South Africa and internationally. She is a specialist trainer for the IoDSA and the JSE Ltd. She has previously adjudicated for the CGISA IR Awards in the Top 40 Listed Companies category, and has contributed to numerous publications internationally. Leigh is one of the founders of the IRC of South Africa.
Elrida Oberholzer (Secretariat)
B Com Hons (Communication Management), MA Strategic Communication
Elrida is a Strategic Communication Specialist and founder of Stretto Strategies, a company that specialises in assisting private and listed companies in telling their value creation stories through Company Profiles, Communication Policies & Strategies and Integrated Annual Reports. Previously, Elrida worked as a stakeholder and communications professional at the University of Johannesburg. She is has also been a part-time lecturer at the University of Pretoria where she taught Business Communication to second years. Elrida is part of the Secretariat Team at the Integrated Reporting Committee of South Africa. She is passionate about the role communication plays in bringing different teams of experts together to create sustainable value for companies. Elrida holds a BCom Honours Communication Management Degree from the University of Pretoria and a Masters in Strategic Communication from the University of Johannesburg graduating Cum Laude in all degrees.
Cathie Lewis
Admitted attorney and conveyancer of the High Court of South Africa; Fellow of the Chartered Governance Institute of Southern Africa LLM: Law of Contract (University of Pretoria) LLM: Corporate Law (cum laude); (University of Pretoria) MSt in Sustainability Leadership (University of Cambridge) (Graduate School of Business, UCT) PhD candidate
Cathie is Founder of Earth Energy (Pty) Ltd, an ESG, climate change and water governance consultancy. She has over 26 years’ experience in governance, legal and sustainability, of which 11 has been as a group company secretary in the listed environment. She is one of the founding directors of Co-Go, Collaborative Governance Network for Water Security; fellow and board member of the Chartered Governance Institute of Southern Africa (CGISA) and member of its Technical Committee and has been elected as a member of the KZN Climate Change and Sustainable Development Council constituted by the Premier’s Office.
Corli le Roux
BA.LL.B
Corli is an independent specialist and associate of Six Capitals ESG Advisory focusing on sustainability in business and investment, responsible leadership, transparent governance and reporting. Her career spans more than 20 years in capital markets, during which she led the Johannesburg Stock Exchange’s (JSE) work and positioning in relation to sustainability for over 15 years, including managing the development and evolution of the pioneering JSE Socially Responsible Investment (SRI) Index. Since 2017, she has been serving clients across the corporate and non-corporate sectors locally and globally with a range of ESG-related strategic research, analysis and advisory services, including analysis and benchmarking of integrated and sustainability reports. Her committee memberships include the GRI Global Sustainability Standards Board (GSSB), the judging panel for the Chartered Governance Institute of Southern Africa (CGISA) Integrated Reporting Awards, and the Land Bank External Monitoring & Evaluation Peer Review Panel.
Desiree Jones
CA(SA)
Desiree is passionate about helping businesses create more authentic relationships with their stakeholders. A Chartered Accountant by training, Desiree has over 10 years’ experience in stakeholder engagement, ESG, investor relations, risk and integrated reporting. Prior to founding Alchemy, Desiree was a senior manager at Standard Bank.
Dirk Strydom
MPhil Internal Auditing (UP), CIA, PIA, FIIASA
Dirk is the acting head of the Institute of Internal Auditors South Africa’s (IIASA’s) Technical Department who provides professional practices and technical related support in line with the International Professional Practices Framework for internal auditors in South Africa. He has over 14 years of experience in enterprise risk management, corporate governance and internal control. He has a special interest in integrated reporting and organisational sustainability and the evolving role of internal audit with reference to the aforementioned. He has served on the IRC of SA’s working group for 5 years and he is also an honorary member of the IRC of SA.
Fay Hoosain
BA, LLB, LLM
Fay is an admitted attorney and notary public. She is a non-executive director of The Ethics Institute and the CEO of Big Ticket Items (Pty) Ltd. She has held several key management positions at Sasol including that of Company Secretary of Sasol South Africa, Senior Vice President: Governance, Compliance and Ethics and Senior Vice President: Strategic Projects. She has been involved in integrated reporting as a preparer, decision-maker and advisor since 2012. Among her various executive roles, as Chief of Staff to the CEO and President of Sasol Ltd, Fay was responsible for formulating and rolling out internal governance processes relating to integrated thinking including the preparation and sign-off of Sasol’s integrated reports. Fay has served as a subject-matter expert and spokesperson for Sasol and Business Unity South Africa. She regularly presents and contributes to research papers, best practice case studies and panel discussions as an expert on integrated reporting and the role of organisational culture and the board in embedding integrated thinking. She advises organisations on their integrated and ESG reports and results announcements.
Jayne Mammatt
Chartered Accountant
Jayne is a Chartered Accountant by profession and became involved in the broad areas of corporate governance, sustainable development, and climate change in 2002. Since then, she has worked across a variety of industries including mining, oil and gas, banking, insurance, telecommunications, technology, construction, real estate, and state-owned entities. Jayne focuses on developing and delivering services in the areas of sustainable development strategy, framework, practices, reporting and assurance; Sustainable Development Goals; integrated reporting and management; social and environment impact and outcomes measurement; safety, health and environment risk, performance, and compliance, and climate change risk and resilience.
Jayne has written various “thought leadership” articles for publication in the press, presented at numerous conferences, co-authored of The Company Director’s Handbook, and contributed a chapter to SAICA’s Green II. She was a member of the Institute of Directors Sustainable Development Forum, the Integrated Reporting Committee of South Africa (IRCSA) Board and the NBI’s Advisory Committee on Environment and Sustainability. She is a member of the IRCSA Working Group and the King sub-committee on climate change.
Karen Koch CA(SA)
B Com (Acc) (Hons), M Com (Taxation), CA(SA)
Karen is the Chief Advisor: Integrated Reporting at Eskom Holdings SOC Ltd. Karen qualified as a Chartered Accountant and worked in assurance with a large firm for almost a decade. Thereafter, she joined Eskom as an IFRS advisor. Her duties since have included financial reporting, enterprise performance management and integrated reporting. Karen is responsible for the end-to-end integrated reporting process at Eskom, from concept to publication of the integrated report. Karen is passionate about advancing the use of integrated reporting to help companies tell their value creation stories, in order to connect and build trust with stakeholders.
Karin Ireton
MA International Political Economy
Karin has over 25 years’ experience working in the sustainable development field at corporate, national and international level. She is an experienced non-executive director and has served on the boards of listed, not-for-profit and state-owned entities. She chaired the Institute of Directors Sustainable Development Forum from 2009 until 2019. She has held executive roles in the energy, mining and banking sectors and was a sustainability pioneer in each of those roles. She currently consults to international and local organisations and is the director of Sustainability Matters. Karin served as Chairman of the GRI’s 45-member international Stakeholder Council and member of the GRI Board (ex officio). She was a lead author of the Principles for Responsible Banking by UNEP FI in 2019 and the South African National Treasury Draft Technical Paper on Financing a Sustainable Economy in 2020. She was the lead author of a 2016 paper published by the UN Environment Programme on sustainability reporting by government agencies across several countries.
Larissa Clark CA(SA)
B Com (Acc) (Hons), M Com (Taxation), CA(SA)
Larissa is a partner in Ernst & Young’s professional practice group. She has over 20 years’ experience, in South Africa and the United Kingdom, advising clients on IFRS and non-financial reporting matters. Larissa is the sponsoring partner of EY’s flagship event, the Excellence in Integrated Reporting Awards program, developed in conjunction with the University of Cape Town. The program surveys the top 100 JSE listed companies and aims to recognise the outstanding efforts of those companies that are leaders in integrated reporting. Larissa has also hosted workshops with leading JSE listed companies to analyse, discuss and improve their integrated reports over the last 10 years.
Mark Hoffman CA(SA)
BCom (Acc) (Hons), CA(SA)
Mark joined Deloitte in 2019 as Partner Assurance Services, having previously worked with KPMG for 29 years. Mark has worked with over 150 organisations in implementing and improving their IFRS financial reporting and integrated reporting processes and systems. Mark has worked with more than 50 companies in IFRS accounting change, disclosure refresh, finance process solutions, complex transaction support (including BBBEE structures, capital projects, restructuring, mergers and acquisitions) and related financial reporting solutions. He has extensive experience on the development of IR processes, methodologies, report production, integrated assurance, King IV governance disclosures, as well as strategy, performance reporting, risk management, stakeholder engagement, governance and remuneration application.
Melanie Smith
MPhil (Sustainable Development)
Melanie has more than 7 years of experience in corporate sustainability with a focus on ESG, transformation, and B-BBEE legislation. Prior to joining Six Capitals Advisory with Alternative Prosperity Group in 2016, Melanie held roles as an environmental officer and verification analyst where she was responsible for conducting environmental impact assessments and B-BBBEE audits respectively. In her current role at Six Capitals, Melanie oversees the ESG advisory practice. Melanie is responsible for the execution and delivery of corporate reporting projects contracted by Six Capitals’ clients (listed and unlisted). Melanie has hands-on experience in developing and implementing ESG policies, frameworks, and strategies as well as supporting clients with technical advisory related to their corporate reporting commitments. Melanie has strong knowledge of corporate reporting frameworks such as the Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures (TCFD), United Nations Principles for Responsible Investment (UN PRI), Code for Responsible Investing in South Africa (CRISA), the B-BBEE Act, Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and the Integrated Reporting (<IR>) Framework. Melanie holds a Masters in Sustainable Development for the University of Stellenbosch.
Mohamed Adam
BA (UDW) LLB (Wits) LLM
Mohamed is an admitted attorney and also holds an LLM in International Trade Law from the University of Essex in the UK. He held several positions in Eskom Ltd in a professional and management role, and in February 2015 he joined ArcelorMittal South Africa Ltd as General Counsel and GM Regulation. His experience includes involvement in executive management, legal and compliance, ethics, corporate governance, sustainability and integrated reporting. He has been a member of the King Committee on Corporate Governance for many years and served on the King IV task team. He was also the chairman of the board of directors of The Ethics Institute until July 2019. He is the co-author, together with Dr Reuel Khoza, of The Power of Governance: Enhancing the Performance of State-Owned Enterprises (2005).
Ronel Fourie
MCom (Business Management)
Ronel Fourie is a partner in the Corporate Reporting Services Division (CRS) at PwC. Her roles include leading initiatives to fulfil the CRS strategy of upholding quality through assurance engagement team support. She is a member of the PwC Global CRS team specialising in IFRS as well as in sustainability reporting. She is part of a number of PwC sub-committees currently drafting firmwide guidance on sustainability reporting. She is responsible for coordinating the annual PwC corporate reporting training curriculum and is passionate about facilitating training. She is also responsible for sign-off on the IFRS compliance of financial statements and interim report reviews of a number of listed companies.
In the last 5 years she has formed part of the team that acts as the convenor of judges on the Chartered Governance Institute of South Africa’s Integrated Reporting awards and is a co-author of their annual publication. She has completed a masters in Business Management on Integrated Reporting and is currently enrolled at the Albert Luthuli Leadership Institute for a PhD in leadership
Scott Williams CA(SA)
BA (Hons) Business Accounting and Finance, Postgraduate Certificate in Development Management, ACA BFP (ICAEW), CA(SA)
Scott is an Associate Director in PwC’s Sustainability and Climate Change Department. He has 10 years of Financial Assurance experience as well as a Postgraduate Certificate in Development Management. Scott’s expertise includes sustainable development assurance (SDA) and integrated reporting (IR) and he has performed numerous engagements across various sectors. Scott has contributed to various thought leadership publications including the 2018 PwC Mine publication on global mining. He is also a participant in the United Nations Young Sustainability Innovation Programme (YSIP) and has been a presenter and panellist at several SDA and IR related events. Scott completed his articles with PwC in Glasgow, Scotland before joining PwC South Africa.
Shaheed Osman
BAcc Sci, HDip Acc, CA(SA), RA
Shaheed is an Associate Director and has over 12 years of experience at KPMG. He has a dual role at KPMG, being part of the technical accounting department and a client-facing role in external audit as a registered auditor with IRBA. His audit clients have included JSE listed companies and global multi-national groups.
Shaheed sits on various KPMG global topic teams, including the Business Assurance/Integrated Reporting topic team and the Better Business Reporting topic team. Shaheed also serves as the KPMG SA ESG audit lead focusing on understanding the reporting implications of ESG-related matters which is then shared with audit teams through training, publications and other forums.
Sheralee Morland
Certified Risk Management Professional (CRM Prof). B Compt, BCompt Hons
Sheralee has been involved in integrated reporting since its inception in South Africa in 2010. Her professional career of some 30 years spans a range of governance roles, including auditing, internal audit and risk management in the banking, insurance, asset and investment management, pension funds, medical aids and mining sectors. Over the last 12 years until June 2018, Sheralee held the role of Executive Head of Enterprise-wide Risk Management at Nedbank Ltd. She was a key contributor to their regular award-winning integrated report and participated in its evolution from the conventional annual report to that of an integrated report. Now she designs, writes and project manages the production of integrated reports for listed and unlisted companies as the CEO of Joshero (Pty) Ltd. She is a past president of the Institute of Risk Management South Africa (IRMSA) and served on their executive for 9 years.
Thandeka Mthembu, CFA
BCom (hons) finance, CFA charterholder
Thandeka is as an investor relations manager at Royal Bafokeng Platinum where she is responsible for communicating with analysts, ESG and company reporting which includes the RBPlat integrated report which has won numerous awards. Thandeka was previously an ETF Strategist at CoreShares Asset Management where she was involved in the creation and marketing of new exchange traded funds. Prior to that she worked at Bank of America Merrill Lynch where she gained experience in investment banking, equity capital markets and corporate broking. Thandeka is a CFA Charterholder and holds a BCom Honours degree in finance from the University of KwaZulu Natal.
Thuto Masasa CA(SA)
B.Com, CA(SA)
Thuto is the Head of BDO Advisory Services and is a qualified chartered accountant with extensive experience established over 15 years of working in commerce, assurance and corporate advisory services. Her past experience includes working for Cummins, a Fortune 500 company, Deloitte and was the Head of External Audit at Nkonki Incorporated, before establishing Phakisa Incorporated. She has worked in London for a big four firm and has facilitated training in various countries in Africa, Asia and Europe. Thuto has actively contributed to integrated reporting thought leadership initiatives, which include the Nkonki JSE Top 100 Listed Companies and State-Owned Companies’ Integrated Reporting Awards since their inception in 2011. She has spoken at a global level on the topic including presenting at the IIRC International Convention in 2015. She won the prestigious Young Accountant of the Year at the 2016 International Accounting Bulletin (IAB) and The Accountant (TA) Awards. In the past Thuto has held various non-executive directorships within the private and public sector including listed entities.
Professor Yvette Lange CA(SA)
MPhil Business Management (Responsible Leadership), CA(SA), CIA, CCSA
Yvette is an Adjunct Professor within the Auditing Division at the School of Accountancy at Wits University. Yvette’s expertise includes assurance and analysis, risk management, sustainability aspects and non-financial assurance and advisory. Prior to joining Wits in January 2020, Yvette was a Director within the Governance, Risk and Internal Audit team at PwC joining from PwC’s Sustainability and Integrated Reporting team. Yvette had responsibility for overseeing and developing non-financial assurance methodology, risk and quality matters for PwC globally and locally. In 2018, she was seconded to the International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC) as a Technical Specialist. She is a past member of CFAS (Committee for Auditing Standards) and Chairman of the (Independent Regulatory Board for Auditors’ Sustainability Standing. She is a member of the research team on integrated reporting within the Wits School of Accountancy and oversees the research projects of the IRC of SA.
Professor Warren Maroun CA(SA)
ACCMA CA(SA) PhD
Warren is a Professor of Accounting at the School of Accountancy, Wits University. He is a member of the Chartered Institute of Management Accountants (CIMA) and South African Institute of Chartered Accountants (SAICA). His research interests include integrated reporting, corporate reporting, external audit and corporate governance with a specific focus on the functioning of mechanisms of accountability. Warren has published over 50 journal articles, including papers in the Accounting, Auditing & Accountability Journal, Accounting Forum, British Accounting Review and International Journal of Auditing. He has also produced several technical and practitioner-focused reports for professional bodies such as the Association of Certified Chartered Accountants (ACCA). He has co-edited two books on integrated reporting namely, Sustainability Accounting and Integrated Reporting and the Routledge Handbook of Integrated Reporting with Charl de Villiers.
Wasfie Ismail
Master’s in Business Administration and Post Grad Diploma in Integrated Reporting
Wasfie is an independent specialist focusing on strategy and performance incorporating sustainability, integrated thinking and reporting within the State-Owned Companies and Airports domains as well as coaching and mentoring. Wasfie is also the independent Chairperson of the Estate Agency Affairs Board – Retirement Fund. Prior to this, Wasfie worked at the Airports Company South Africa SOC Ltd, providing strategy development and facilitation, sustainability and triple context oversight, organisational performance, balanced scorecard leadership, strategic initiative management and integrated reporting production. Wasfie was the Assistant General Manager – Finance and Administration at O.R Tambo International Airport responsible for the Finance, Human Resources, Information Technology, Projects and Legal Divisions. Earlier, Wasfie served at Old Mutual plc in various capacities in Health Benefits Division, Employee Benefits Group Finance Division and Client Services Division as the Manager Management Information Services.
Zanele Salman
MBA, Dipl Marketing Management, BSc (Hons) Chemistry
An experienced investor relations and business development executive with over 18 years corporate experience and over two years as founder and director of Isibani-ci, an investor relations, strategic communications and business development firm. She has worked for corporations like Sasol Ltd, Nampak Ltd and Barloworld Ltd, where she fulfilled various roles spanning the elements of the value chain, giving her a comprehensive understanding of operations optimisation, strategy, project management, marketing and sales as well as the key factors that lead to improved performance. She combines business management success with expertise of delivering proven value in executing complex strategic reporting and engagements.