President
Lynelle Bagwandeen FCG, LLB, LLM

Lynelle Bagwandeen is the company secretary of Naspers Limited since August 2020. Prior to that she was general counsel and head of legal at Netcare Limited. She has held this position since 1 March 2011 and was promoted to the company’s executive committee in 2012. She was appointed as a director to the board of the Hospital Association of South Africa (HASA) in 2015. She completed her articles at a large national law firm and was admitted as an attorney in 2002. Her area of expertise remains corporate governance and enhancing compliance with due regard to health legislation and the Companies Act. Lynelle is the chair of the CGISA membership committee.

Senior Vice President
Sonia Giuricich FCG (Acc)

Sonia runs an accounting and tax practice which has some large clients. Sonia is vice president of CGISA. She is a PPG member and serves as chair of the CGISA finance and risk committee.  She worked for 6 years at Anglo American and for 3 years at Total SA in accounting and internal auditing.

Vice President
Sandile Mbhamali FCG, RA(SD) Eswatini

Sandile is currently the company secretary and management accountant at Robinson Bertram Attorneys (2011), where he advises on tax and finance issues, performs all company secretarial functions and supervises the accounts department. Sandile founded the first beneficiary fund in Eswatini, Likhwane Beneficiary fund. Sandile is a former director of CGISA representing Eswatini. Sandile’s professional skills include lecturing in corporate governance, risk management experience and having an in-depth knowledge of King IV. Sandile serves on the CGISA executive committee and is chair of the social and ethics committee.

Past President
Karen Robinson FCG, LLB, LLM

Karen is the company secretary of Vodacom SA. She was previously company secretary at The Huge Group. She is a member of the Professional Standards Committee of CGI. Karen is an experienced company secretary, having worked in both the listed and unlisted environment. She has experience in the construction, mining, financial services and telecommunications industries and previously served as the company secretary of Aveng Ltd, Gold Fields Ltd and FedGroup. Karen serves on the executive committee.

Stephen is a member of the King Committee. He serves on the Council of the global Chartered Governance Institute and also serves on the Council of the Corporate Secretaries International Association.

Stephen has held a number of senior positions in the education sector. He was Director: Strategic Support at the South African Qualifications Authority. He was also Director: Research and School Improvement at the Matthew Goniwe School of Leadership and Governance, which was responsible for training 2000 school governing bodies in Gauteng. Prior to that, Stephen was Chief Education Specialist: Curriculum Delivery and Support at the Johannesburg East District of the Gauteng Department of Education, which was responsible for 120 schools.

He has presented a number of papers on corporate governance at conferences. He is a prolific writer and writes a quarterly column in Boardroom magazine. He co-authored “Challenges facing company secretaries in South Africa today”, which was published in The Corporate Report (Juta).

Deolinda da Silva

Sonia Giuricich