Special Interview:
Blurb:
The chief executive officer, Business Development Cluster,
Liberty Group, Mr. Mukesh Mittal, recently hosted selected African editors to a
breakfast in the cozy HariCot in GrahamsTown, Eastern Cape, South Africa; as a
sideline event at the 2013 Highway Africa Conference. He has worked across five
continents on very senior levels before joining Liberty Group. Our Group
Executive Editor, REMMY NWEKE was there for DigitalSENSE Business News, reports
that the company plans big for Nigerian market with special investment covers
to unveil soon.
Preamble:
THANK you very much for joining us at this breakfast
and for taking your time out to be here and hear a little more about Liberty
Group.
Tell us about Liberty Group?
We have been through Africa and we have embarked on this
defensive strategy for about six years and now we are present in important
countries and we are very proud the way we expanded into Africa and I will give
you a very good detail about that.
We have worked in four continents with five companies in
South America and Portugal. Perhaps to say I am not saying it because of where
we are located at the moment, but this is a public motive sighting
opportunities that I have come across in my career, the potential of this
continent and the potential of South Africa, even is enormous and I will talk a
little bit more about why I said that I will not spend a little bit time as
well from what we are seeing here is massive investment in infrastructure and
the general sense is talking about Kenya among the other four other companies
in Kenya and Nigeria, Botswana and Nambia.
As a multi-national company, what is in Liberty for
Africa?
From what we are seeing it’s transformational and I think
this is our generation chance of making a difference in Africa and Liberty is
well placed to be one of the beneficiaries of this. Let me tell you a little
bit more about Liberty. It’s just over 50 years old. It is 55 years old as a
company and it is the fourth largest insurance company that is listed on the
Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) and we have over 500 billion Rands of assets
and management and a lot of people have trusted us to put their money with the
Liberty group and we have made 6 million retail policy with us It is a very
sizeable company and our vision is to be the most trusted investment and
insurance company across Africa and the choice of market.
Let us into the company’s vision for Africa?
Now, the thing about our vision is trust and I think this is
the kind of differential we bring to the table to making people trust us with
their money and their hard earned livelihood and we set them up and we give
them the product that suit them and make sure it is valuable to their needs,
the offers and value for money and we fulfill our promises and that is quite an
undertaking by any organisation to do that.
What is the passion?
So, when you look around the stable I hope we can live up to
that promise that you trust us on that you want us to do. But what is our
passion, our passion is to make the difference to people’s lives by guarding
them to expand later.
I just want to pick that sentence a little bit more and
explain it a little better. We want to make the difference to people’s life
regardless of where they are located and regardless of their background and
what they have to offer, and their potential etcetera.
What’s the difference between Liberty Group and others?
We want to make the difference in their lives because we
want to guard them to financial freedom and the word here is key as well is
guard. We then, guard consumers through our expertise, our knowhow, and our
people towards actually making people’s life better.
We restructured into businesses to eventually distinct
ourselves to depend on businesses; the insurance business and as a management
business and in Africa what we have done is, we expanded in four areas in
insurance as a management and properties. And the story by Liberty is property
development that is very significant for not just for South Africa but perhaps
required globally. So, one of our flagship developments is in Southern City, so
if you have been to Johannesburg you probably are in the mode of a concomitant
city. It is necessary we need to take up all the capabilities that Liberty has
within this organisation and it is now one of this square mile in the Africa
continent. Liberty does that from stretch almost 50 years it has almost become
a flag ship for us.
Kindly expatiate on Liberty insurance and other aspects
of businesses in Africa?
So, let’s talk a little bit about the insurance business
firstly in Africa. We are actually present in 14 counties and by merely looking
at our business we are in the core long term insurance business and we are in
six countries and sometimes we required, for example, like the CFC in Kenya or
the Heritage Business in East Africa and Tanzania as well as Kenya and they do
businesses that we require.
They are going extremely successful for us and it has been
an incredible journey and I am happy to be involved in the journey in the last
two and half years and that is an assistance that come to know about what we
are learning from the Kenya businesses; the uses of mobiles, the uses of
distribution, the uses of technology in that region is phenomenon and because
that is the part of the world that it is booming it is fundamentally booming,
you will think they have the product marketing that is why it’s very promising.
Do you have investments in Nigeria or West Africa?
We are in East Africa, Kenya and Tanzania and Ugandan and in
Nigeria, we have our business called THT – Total Health Trust; so, it is going
very well for us. I am sure I don’t need to explain it to you, you can explain
it much better for us; Nigeria has huge potential, huge capacity, and extremely
large population and high broad prospective and we are looking at the insurance
business there as well as expanding our management capabilities to Nigeria,
Ghana and West Africa.
What of the Southern Africa?
And in southern Africa, we are in places like Botswana, Nambia
and we are looking into Zambia in next year through the insurance vehicle and
our business is actually Pan African business. So, what we have to offer is the
solution to the senior management and top management across the continent so
that is why we are present in 15 countries, we are in places like Zimbabwe,
Malawi, Mozambique.
It is quite expansive foot print. We propose to next year on
the insurance side to locate to Nigeria, Zambia and Ghana. We also have a short
business which is multi cover or house hold cover.
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