Tongaat Hulett’s future continues to hang in the balance following the release of its amended business rescue plan and has been subsequently delayed, according to its business rescue practitioners (BRPs).
Last year, the 130-year-old South African sugar maker was placed in administration after failing to recover from an accounting scandal.
Shareholders were referred yesterday to the Stock Exchange News announcement released on June 14, which said the voting on the business rescue plans of Tongaat Hulett and its subsidiaries, Tongaat Hulett Sugar South Africa and Voermol Feeds, which are also in business rescue (together the Companies), had been postponed.
“Following meetings of creditors of the companies held on September 8, convened for the purposes of creditors voting on proposed motions regarding the date of publication of the companies’ amended business rescue plans and the reconvening of the adjourned meetings, creditors voted in favour of extending the date of publication of the companies’ amended business rescue plans to no later than October 31 and a further adjournment of the meetings to determine the future of the companies to no later than November 30,” shareholders were advised.
Attempts by Tongaat Hulett’s BRPs to right the debt-stricken sugar producer have so far hit a brick wall, with a proposed rights issue quashed, and lately in South Africa, questions last month were raised over the role of the Industrial Development Corporations (IDC) in the business rescue scheme.
IDC advanced financing to Tongaat Hulett under the business rescue scheme to sustain operations.
A bid to rescue it and put it on a path to recovery has seen Kagera, a little known Tanzanian company, being picked to acquire the assets of the ailing South African sugar producer.
“This deal has all the hallmarks of irregularity and underhand dealings to rail road Kagera as the winning bidder. The deal is being resisted in two of the jurisdictions that Tongaat operates – Zimbabwe and South Africa – because losing bidders there feel unfairly treated,” a South African legal source told Business Report recently.
BUSINESS REPORT