Corporate News
In Summary
- Fair Competition Commission of Tanzania confirmed that it had given a green light for the transaction that will see Nakumatt stores in Tanzania increase to four.
- The acquisition has been valued at about Sh4 billion.
- Shoprite exited Tanzania after about 12 years in the country after being accused of importing the bulk of its products from its mother company in South Africa.
The Tanzanian competition watchdog has cleared
Nakumatt’s bid to take over three stores owned by South African retailer
Shoprite in Dar es Salaam and Arusha, moving the buyout closer to
conclusion.
The Fair Competition Commission (FCC) of Tanzania
Wednesday confirmed that it had given a green light for the transaction
that will see Nakumatt stores in Tanzania increase to four, in addition
to its Moshi outlet opened in 2011.
The acquisition has been valued at about Sh4 billion.
‘’We granted the approval to Nakumatt on Monday.
There were no much issues to deal with after Tanzania Union of
Industrial and Commercial Workers which had filed the case to block the
buyout by Nakumatt settled their grievances with their
employer,’’ said the Tanzanian Fair Competition Commission public
relations manager Frank Mdimi in a telephone interview.
Shoprite employees had moved to court two months
ago blocking the buyout by Nakumatt, over fears that they would lose
their terminal benefits with changes in ownership of the retail stores.
‘‘The approval has been granted with strict
conditions to Nakumatt on how they should operate in Tanzania and the
protocol to be observed when buying or importing their products,’’ added
Mr Mdimi.
Under the new guidelines, Nakumatt will be
expected to employ a certain percentage of the locals in their stores
and sign a pact with the government detailing how much they will be
buying from Tanzanian manufacturers and disclosing the bulk they will be
buying from Kenya.
Nakumatt Holdings’ head of strategy and operations Thiagarajan Ramamurthy last month told Business Daily that
the retail chain has already figured out how to address this concern,
which is said to have been the main reason behind Shoprite’s exit from
Tanzania.
“Our focus will be to support local manufactures
by buying most products from them,’’ said Mr Ramamurthy in an earlier
interview with the Business Daily.
Shoprite exited Tanzania after about 12 years in
the country after being accused of importing the bulk of its products
from its mother company in South Africa.
The Nakumatt Holdings managing director Atul Shah
Wednesday said the approval was a big win for the retailer which now
plans to start operations in the next three to four weeks to come.
‘‘We are ready for the Tanzanian market, we will start operations in less than a month or so,’’ said Mr Shah.
Nakumatt will rebrand the three Shoprite stores.
No comments :
Post a Comment