FORMER Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe (RBZ) governor and
businessman Gideon Gono has acquired a majority shareholding in The Heritage
School (THS), one of the country’s leading private schools.
The elite institution, which abuts the exclusive Borrowdale
Brooke estate, was founded by the Austin and Pangeti families, who each owned
50 percent.
Through his Family Foundation, Gono now owns a 76 percent
stake after purchasing 50 percent shareholding from David Rodney, Janet Austin
and their son Thomas William. He acquired an additional 26 percent interest
from the Pangeti family.
The Pangetis – George, his wife Evelyn Sandra and son
George Jnr – retain a 24 percent stake. The transactions were concluded for an
undisclosed amount of money and the terms of the deals were also not
immediately revealed.
The Austins and the Pangetis – long-time family friends of
the former CBZ Holdings chief executive – retain their positions on the
school’s reconstituted board.
“My association with THS dates back to the day the first
foundation brick was laid in 1996. I subsequently brought my twin girls, Pride
and Praise, here for their secondary education from 1999 to 2004. Gideon Jnr
was here from 2002-2004,” Gono said at a takeover ceremony attended by the
school’s academic and non-academic staff yesterday.
“The vision and passion to get involved in the education
sector of our economy was born from my own humble beginnings before
independence so today marks a realisation of the vision, a vision that seeks to
see The Heritage School transform itself to become the best educational
institution in Zimbabwe by the year 2020,” he said.
“This will be achieved by nothing else other than the
dedication and determination on the part of everyone associated with THS from
the academic staff, parents, students, non-academic staff, our bankers and
associates in the field of education locally and abroad,” the former Central
Bank boss said.
With a combined enrolment of 1 400 – across infant, junior
and senior departments – THS was established in June 1996.
Gono, who will not sit on the school’s board of governors,
has since appointed ex-Standard
Chartered Bank senior staffer Julius Chikomwe
as chairman of the board.
The practicing lawyer and ex-Zimbabwe Open University
councillor would be joined by Richard Mukurumbira, a robotics and renewable
energy PhD holder, and Harvard University lecturer Stanford Chibanda.
While Chikomwe is a law and finance graduate from the
Duisenberg School of Finance in Amsterdam, the latter two also bring massive
credentials to the board through their experience gained in Australia and the
United States.
Meanwhile, Jane Austin has been appointed deputy
chairperson with responsibility for establishing beneficial networks for THS
and Gono said the school would maintain a close working relationship with the
Primary and Secondary as well as Higher and Tertiary Education ministries.
“As a school, we must aspire to be a leading school in the
science, technology, engineering and mathematics (initiative)… agriculture, and
other purely academic subjects,” he said, adding “this explains the makeup of
our board and we will ensure that there is a robotics science, and IT
discipline that is second to none… beginning next year”.
Asked about how the deal was financed, Gono could only say
“it has been financed in our minds and by bringing the future into the
present”.
A former tea maker, the Harare businessman kick-started his
41-year career through private studies to become – among other achievements –
University of Zimbabwe chairman and RBZ governor, serving between 2003 and
2013.
In June, Gono was appointed chairman of the Zimbabwe
Special Economic Zones Authority. He was, until recently, the majority
shareholder of The Financial Gazette, from which he has since divested. Financial Gazette
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