South African gold mining executive Brett Kebble
was murdered last night while driving near his
home in Johannesburg. Without his help the Gold
Anti-Trust Action Committee might never have
gotten started, and so we are horrified and
want to send our condolences to his family and
friends.
The Bloomberg News Service story about Kebble's
murder is appended, along with a link to
MoneyWeb's story by Alec Hogg, which reports
that the murder seems to have been something
more than random violence.
CHRIS POWELL, Secretary/Treasurer
Gold Anti-Trust Action Committee Inc.
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South African Gold Magnate
Brett Kebble is Shot Dead
By Stewart Bailey and Antony Sguazzin
Bloomberg News Service
Wednesday, September 28, 2005
quote.bloomberg.com
South African millionaire Brett Kebble, who helped create
two of the country's four largest gold producers, was shot
dead last night near his home in Johannesburg, police and a family spokesman said.
Kebble, 41, was shot while driving on Johannesburg's
Atholl-Oaklands road, Chris Wilken, a spokesman for the
South African police, said in an interview today.
"He was shot between 9 p.m. and 9:15 p.m.," Wilken said.
"He may have been followed. He was shot while he was
driving. More than one shot was fired." Nothing was
taken from the car.
Kebble quit on Aug. 30 as head of Western Areas Ltd.,
joint owner of a $24 billion gold deposit near Johannesburg,
and two other gold-investment companies after Western Areas
ran out of money and he faced questions from investors
in Randgold & Exploration Ltd., one of the companies,
over the whereabouts of shares worth $268 million.
Wilken said the police were unaware of the motive for
the shooting. As of 1 a.m. local time his body was still
in his silver S-Class Mercedes car, parked on Atholl-Oaklands
on a bridge above Johannesburg's M1 highway. He lived
in the nearby Inanda suburb.
David Barritt, a spokesman for the family, confirmed the death in an e-mailed statement.
Kebble's 11-year career in South Africa's $5.5 billion-
a-year gold industry spawned Harmony Gold Mining Co.,
South Africa's No. 3 gold miner, DRDGold Ltd., the fourth-largest, and the development of South Deep, the world's
largest gold deposit, with Canadian partner Placer Dome
Inc.
Kebble quit his jobs at Western Areas, Randgold and JCI
Ltd. after Johannesburg-based Investec Ltd., South
Africa's No. 5 bank, told investors it wouldn't free up
a 460 million-rand ($71 million) loan to keep the companies afloat unless he left.
Western Areas and JCI said on Aug. 30 in statements to
the stock exchange in Johannesburg that Investec insisted
that their boards be changed before they made the loan.
The companies announced the resignations that day of
Kebble and non-executive director Sello Rasethaba.
Kebble's partnership with Placer began in 1999, when
Kebble helped secure a $235 million investment from the Vancouver-based miner, ensuring South Deep's development.
The project to dig the 3.3 kilometer (2.1 mile) mine
went awry as it ran up costs of more than $1 billion.
South Deep is 2 1/2 years behind schedule.
The delays at South Deep were compounded by Kebble's bet
in June 2002, through futures contracts, that the gold
price would fall. The price of bullion has since surged 40 percent.
As a result of derivative contracts Western Areas holds,
the company sold its gold at $308 an ounce in the quarter
ended June 30, compared with a an average market price of $427.88. Production costs were $426 an ounce.
Kebble was born in the gold mining town of Springs, east
of Johannesburg, and schooled in the Free State province
before graduating in law from the University of Cape Town
in 1988. He entered business after his mining engineer
father, who once worked for Anglo American Plc, sold his
Cape wine farm and came out of retirement in 1991.
Teaming up with Adam Fleming, a relative of the James
Bond spy-novel author Ian Fleming, Kebble joined Randgold, working initially under Executive Chairman Peter Flack.
After accumulating a majority stake in the company, he
fired Flack and installed himself as chief executive. He
was 32 at the time.
"He was one of the brightest corporate financiers I
ever met, and I've met some clever ones in my time,"
Flack said in an Aug. 17 interview from Johannesburg.
Harmony, DRDGold and Randgold Resources Ltd., all of
which were spun out of Randgold during Kebble's period a
s a director, have a combined market value of 34 billion
rand.
The family's possessions include multimillion-rand
properties ranging from a three-storey house overlooking
Cape Town's Atlantic coast to Melrose Place, a national
monument in northern Johannesburg once owned by Gavin Relly,
a former chairman of London-based Anglo American.
Kebble's plan to weld together seven companies in which
his family held stakes and trade the company's shares
in Toronto was scuppered five years ago by Harmony's
Chief Executive Bernard Swanepoel, a former mine manager
under Kebble who started and won a hostile takeover for
the biggest of the companies, Randfontein Estates Ltd.
The legacy of that contest is that Kebble faced charges
of fraud, conspiracy and contravention of South Africa's Companies Act, Lucinda Moonieya, a spokeswoman for South Africa's Public Prosecutor's Office said in an e-mail on Aug. 31. The case was due to be heard in October next year.
On Nov. 3, 2003, Kebble said he would contest charges
announced by Johannesburg High Court Judge Joop Labuschagne.
Shareholders including Aflease Gold & Uranium Ltd., which
owns 12 percent of Randgold & Exploration, had asked
Kebble to account for stock the company owned in Randgold Resources.
Randgold & Exploration's shares were suspended from trading
on Johannesburg's stock exchange on Aug. 1 after the
company missed a deadline to submit annual financial
statements.
Kebble is survived by his wife and four children.
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MoneyWeb's story by Alec Hogg:
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