It has taken Old Mutual more than a year to announce the appointment of a permanent CEO to lead one of SA’s biggest life insurers, especially now, during choppy Covid-19 waters.
Williamson has been holding the fort as acting CEO since Moyo was first suspended on 23 May 2019 on the grounds of “a material breakdown in the relationship of trust and confidence” relating to his private investment firm NMT Capital. Old Mutual was a long-standing 20% shareholder in NMT. That Williamson helped steady the ship as acting CEO when Moyo was piling up lawsuits against Old Mutual and has been with the group for more than two decades made him the front-runner in the search for a permanent CEO, said an insider at the company.