{"id":866628,"date":"2026-07-19T17:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-07-19T15:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=866628"},"modified":"2026-07-20T08:52:40","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T06:52:40","slug":"the-south-african-paid-over-r227-million-to-manage-a-billionaires-investment-company","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/business\/866628\/the-south-african-paid-over-r227-million-to-manage-a-billionaires-investment-company\/","title":{"rendered":"The South African man paid over R227 million to manage a billionaire’s investment company"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Jannie Durand, CEO of Remgro, has been paid R227.625 million since he was appointed to oversee South African billionaire Johann Rupert\u2019s investment company. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Durand was appointed as CEO on 7 May 2012. He oversees the day-to-day management of the investment group chaired by South Africa’s richest man, Johann Rupert.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Remgro is one of South Africa’s oldest and most influential companies. It started in 1948, when Anton Rupert established the Rembrandt Group as a tobacco business.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The company expanded rapidly over the following decades into wine, spirits and international markets before listing on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange in 1956.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During the 1990s and early 2000s, Johann Rupert restructured the business, creating three separate companies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Richemont became the family’s international luxury goods business, Reinet became a Luxembourg-based investment vehicle, and Remgro evolved into a diversified South African investment company.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today, Remgro holds interests in a broad range of businesses, including Mediclinic, OUTsurance, Discovery, FirstRand, RCL Foods, Rainbow Chicken, eMedia, Vumatel, Seacom, DFA, TotalEnergies and Heineken Beverages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It also has several social impact investments, including the Blue Bulls, the Stellenbosch Academy of Sport, and the Stellenbosch Football Club.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As CEO, Durand is responsible for managing a portfolio worth well over R100 billion and overseeing major corporate transactions, including Remgro’s acquisition of Mediclinic Southern Africa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While Rupert remains the company’s active chairman, Durand is responsible for implementing the group’s strategy and managing its investments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His remuneration has fluctuated considerably over the past 14 years. His first year as CEO was only a partial year, while significant increases to his guaranteed salary followed in 2013 and 2014. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Remgro said these were “once-off adjustments” reflecting his increased responsibilities after becoming CEO, and to bring his remuneration to a “market-related level”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The annual reports also highlighted occasions where Durand voluntarily declined salary increases. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2018, he turned down a 7% pay rise and requested that the equivalent amount be redirected to Remgro’s corporate social investment budget for local initiatives.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He repeated a similar decision in 2019 and declined part of an approved salary increase so the funds could again support community projects.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Good news for investors <\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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The Covid-19 pandemic also had a noticeable impact on executive pay. Durand and other executives accepted a 30% salary reduction during April, May and June 2020.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The following year, the remuneration committee approved no salary increase for executive directors because of the economic environment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

His long-term incentives were also heavily affected during this period. Remgro’s reports show that no long-term incentive payouts were made between 2019 and 2021 because the company’s share awards were “underwater”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This meant that the share price was below the award price, and no new awards were granted during the pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As markets recovered, Durand’s remuneration increased considerably. His largest pay packages came in 2022 and 2023 after historical share awards regained value.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2023 alone, long-term incentives contributed R23.4 million after performance conditions linked to shareholder returns were met.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rather than providing subjective assessments of Durand’s leadership, Remgro’s annual reports explain that executive remuneration is based on “the executive’s level of responsibility, his\/her overall performance and the achievement of specific agreed objectives”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The reports also noted that long-term incentives “only render value if stretching performance conditions are met”, directly linking executive rewards to shareholder returns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Durand’s tenure has coincided with another strong period for Remgro. The group’s latest interim results showed headline earnings rising nearly 40% to R5.1 billion for the six months to 31 December 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Its interim dividend increased by more than 80% to 173 cents per share after the company reported strong operating performances across its core portfolio and continued progress in executing its strategic objectives despite ongoing global geopolitical and economic uncertainty.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here is the remuneration data for CEO Jannie Durand, including both his fixed pay and long-term incentives, from his appointment in May 2012 to 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Year<\/th>Total Remuneration (R)<\/th><\/tr><\/thead>
2012<\/td>R6,514,000<\/td><\/tr>
2013<\/td>R9,005,000<\/td><\/tr>
2014<\/td>R9,684,000<\/td><\/tr>
2015<\/td>R11,625,000<\/td><\/tr>
2016<\/td>R12,443,000<\/td><\/tr>
2017<\/td>R20,656,000<\/td><\/tr>
2018<\/td>R13,919,000<\/td><\/tr>
2019<\/td>R14,322,000<\/td><\/tr>
2020<\/td>R13,733,000<\/td><\/tr>
2021<\/td>R14,804,000<\/td><\/tr>
2022<\/td>R25,077,000<\/td><\/tr>
2023<\/td>R39,789,000<\/td><\/tr>
2024<\/td>R17,320,000<\/td><\/tr>
2025<\/td>R18,734,000<\/td><\/tr>
Total<\/strong><\/td>R227,625,000<\/strong><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/div><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jannie Durand has been paid over R227 million since he was appointed to oversee South African billionaire Johann Rupert\u2019s investment company.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":92,"featured_media":866665,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"posted","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"2078857653560692877","_sma_x_attempts":1,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9872],"tags":[4666,2591,853],"class_list":["post-866628","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","tag-johann-rupert","tag-remgro","tag-south-africa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/866628","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/92"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=866628"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/866628\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":866794,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/866628\/revisions\/866794"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/866665"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=866628"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=866628"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=866628"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}