In light of the events tmobile rock crusher with 1000cm a day capacityhat led to mining services company Sentula Mining’s having to restate the results for its 2006/7 financial year, chairperson Sam Jonah reassured shareholders at the presentation of the company’s results for the year ended March 2008, last week, that it had embarked on a rigorous “house-cleaning” exercise.
“Sentula is very much on course to deliver on its promises to its shareholders,” he said, adding that a company that was growing as fast as Sentula Mining faced numerous challenges, not least in the area of reconciliation and consolidation of accounts.
He added that the management and board of Sentula were fully committed to working with the JSE, the Financial Services Board and auditing company KPMG to ensure that all issues were dealt with appropriately.
CEO Robin Berry said that, in May, Sentula’s board began to realise that there might have been errors in the company’s 2006/7 financial statements, but decided that they would have to be restated only on the night of June 1.
Sentula then put up a statement the following morning notifying the market of this, which hacked off one-quarter of its share price in a single day.
“The house-cleaning exercise will help to inculcate a culture of accountability and transparency, with proper accounting standards and controls. As painful as the housekeeping exercise is, it is a necessary process, and the board and management believe that Sentula will come out of this better off,” said Jonah.
Jonah was invited to join the Sentula board as chairperson in 2006. Shortly after that, the company announced its intentions to develop Sentula into the “integrated mining service company of choice” in Africa.
Jonah said that the company’s strategy for pursuing this vision required an aggressive growth strategy revolving around the expansion of its operations, and the acquisition of competitors in the contract-mining space. Its vision was to also take advantage of the worldwide demand for coal by becoming a key player in coal-mining.
The board, he said, therefore decided on a set of measures that would better prepare the company for this vision, with the objective of transforming Sentula from a traditionally family-owned and largely family-run company, which happened to be publicly listed, into a ‘serious’ public company with a diversified shareholder base.
There had been a restructuring of the company, with acquisitions and the appointment of new directors. In every respect, Jonah said, the company bore no resemblance to the company he joined as chairperson in 2006.
Sentula, formally Scharrig Mining, invested R1,2-billion last year.
Berry said that the company was poised to take advantage of the surging demand for energy and coal, but admitted that the second half of 2008 would be challenging.
He added that he believed Sentula had the expertise, resources and equipment to achieve its coal-mining and mining services objectives within a five-year period.