Trustco’s Informanté paper sale off for now

TRUSTCO’S hopes to sell its weekly tabloid, Informanté, have been shattered.

The company’s managing director, Quinton van Rooyen, yesterday confirmed that the deal was off.According to him, ‘the people interested as well as the offers made were not acceptable’.He was reluctant to divulge more information about who the prospective buyers were and why they were ‘unacceptable’. All he was prepared to say was that ‘it is business as usual’.This comes barely one month after the company announced that it was inviting public tenders through which it wanted to dispose of the freely distributed paper.Now it seems that this process was unsuccessful.Van Rooyen said Informanté will still be distributed free of charge – in contrast to earlier plans to start charging for the paper.He also confirmed that they have been in talks with various potential candidates to spearhead the newspaper in future, including the outgoing group executive editor of Democratic Media Holdings (DMH), Chris Jacobie. ‘But we’re consulting widely and have spoken to Chris [Jacobie].’ According to Van Rooyen, they want to increase the paper’s print run as well as its circulation – qualities Jacobie is renowned for in the media industry.When approached for comment, Jacobie said he would first have to be asked and then decide whether or not to take up a position.When the decision to sell Informanté was announced, employees were given the option of either accepting a retrenchment package or joining the new owners.Among those who opted for a package was Trustco Media’s MD, Neville Basson, Van Rooyen confirmed.However, because the deal did not go through, the position has changed and the ‘retrenchment process has been reversed’. This means that should some Informanté employees who chose to be retrenched want to leave, they would have to resign.Van Rooyen denied allegations that other senior company employees also face retrenchment.When he announced the plan to sell in February, Van Rooyen said selling the newspaper is ‘in line with the strategy of the group to divest itself from non-core activities and assets’.’The rolling out of the Trustco micro-insurance and micro-finance model in the rest of Africa requires the undivided focus of the management team in Namibia,’ he said.Doing away with Informanté came as a surprise. Just last September, at the release of Trustco’s financial results, Van Rooyen still had plans to charge readers for their weekly dose of gossip.At the time, he described the weekly as Namibia’s ‘largest, most read and controversial’ paper, and said it ‘is a very effective way of talking to our clients’ although ‘it doesn’t really fit in with the Trustco financial services model’.Despite making a profit of N$137,5 million last year, Trustco decided not to declare a dividend, the first time since 2007 that it has failed to do so. Van Rooyen said the availability of capital as well as the financial impact of Trustco Mobile necessitated this ‘prudent decision’.

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