Process to appoint new Lottery chair underway
Here is the shortlist of six candidates
A new chair is being sought for the National Lotteries Commission after the current chair, Professor Barney Pityana, indicated that he would be retiring. Archive photo: Ashraf Hendricks
Candidates for the soon-to-be-vacant position of National Lotteries Commission (NLC) board chairperson have been whittled down from 22 to six by the parliamentary portfolio committee handling the process.
The vacancy arose after the current chair, Professor Barney Pityana, 80, advised the minister who has oversight of the lottery of his intention to quit at the end of this year.
Pityana, who still has two years of his contract left, told Parliament recently that he has agreed to remain in office until the appointment of a new chairperson.
The shortlisted candidates are:
- Nomazotsho Yvonne Memani, a practicing advocate with a career that has included both public and private sector work, “with a strong focus on high-stakes litigation”.
- Lufuno Toyko Nevondwe, an advocate and current chairperson of the independent trust responsible for safeguarding lottery funds on behalf of its beneficiaries. He is also currently a board member of the Film and Publication Board and of the South African National Space Agency.
- Judy Hermans, a former ANC MP and whip of the party’s trade, industry and competition portfolio committee study group. (A study group formulates party policy and ensures that it is implemented.) During that time, the ANC members of the portfolio committee defended the NLC in the face of growing evidence of corruption involving lottery funds. She was later appointed chair of the portfolio committee and, during the latter part of her tenure, the ANC stopped protecting the NLC, apparently after instructions from “higher up” in the party.
- King Tembinkosi Bonakele, a current member of the NLC’s board. He is a lawyer and served as Commissioner of the Competition Commission of South Africa for nine years of his total 18-year service. He is a qualified lawyer with an MBA.
- Wayne Manthe, a chartered accountant with over 30 years of experience working with organisations in the private and public sectors in South Africa. He has expertise in forensic, sustainable and internal auditing and risk management.
- Mpho Mosing, former chair of the audit and risk committee of the State Diamonds Trader (SDT), and former a member of the Gauteng Liquour Board commission of inquiry into fraud and governance controls.
The Trade, Industry and Competition Portfolio Committee must follow a prescribed process, which includes security clearance for shortlisted candidates, with tight deadlines to complete its work.
The committee will interview the six candidates on 11 and 12 November and then submit a report to Parliament, which will debate it on a date still to be announced.
The final short list will then be sent to the minister to choose a chairperson.
The public has an opportunity to submit comments on the shortlisted candidates up to 10 November. Written submissions should be sent to the Committee Secretary, Mr A Hermans, at ahermans@parliament.gov.za.
Support independent journalism
Donate using Payfast
Don't miss out on the latest news
We respect your privacy, and promise we won't spam you.
Next: Durban ward councillor’s mobile office overturned by angry residents
Previous: Court green-lights eviction of over 1,800 Ballito residents
© 2025 GroundUp. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
You may republish this article, so long as you credit the authors and GroundUp, and do not change the text. Please include a link back to the original article.
We put an invisible pixel in the article so that we can count traffic to republishers. All analytics tools are solely on our servers. We do not give our logs to any third party. Logs are deleted after two weeks. We do not use any IP address identifying information except to count regional traffic. We are solely interested in counting hits, not tracking users. If you republish, please do not delete the invisible pixel.