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INNSCOR Africa Limited group yesterday announced changes in its top brass with Addington Chinake becoming the new board chairman following David Morgan’s resignation while Godfrey Gwainda has been appointed finance director.
Chinake, 45, is a respected legal practitioner who has been in the field for the past 21 years and is a senior partner of Kantor and Immerman Legal Practitioners.
Gwainda, 41, who has been the finance director for Irvines Zimbabwe Pvt Ltd, replaces Julian Schonken who has been moved to the position of executive director in charge of the light manufacturing sector.
In a statement, the group said the appointments were made at the giant firm’s annual general meeting two months ago.
Morgan tendered his resignation intention as non-executive director and chairman towards the end of the year after serving the firm for more than 16 years, according to the notice.
“As a consequence of Morgan’s retirement it has become necessary for the Innscor board to appoint a new independent non-executive director and chairman of Innscor.
“After conducting a series of interviews the nominations committee recommended to the Innscor board that Addington Chinake was the most suitable person to appoint and the Innscor board has unanimously approved the appointment with effect from 1st of January 2015,” read the notice.
For the past 13 years Chinake has been specialising in corporate and commercial law including mining and competition law, tax law and litigation, mergers, acquisitions and capital raising.
He has been involved in a number of FDI transactions and multi-million dollar acquisitions and disposals by foreign companies of equity in Zimbabwe Stock Exchange listed entities and Greenfield mining projects.
Chinake, who is chairman of Astra Industries Limited, has acted for a number of listed firms and worked as a non-executive director.
Gwainda on one hand is a chartered accountant with 17 years of work experience. He completed articles of clerkship with KPMG and qualified as a chartered accountant in 2000.
He joined Innscor in 2001 as the group regional financial controller in charge of operations before becoming financial director for Innscor International, a company registered in Mauritius specialising in franchising and investment holding across Africa.
Gwainda has served as finance director for Innscor fast food division in both Zimbabwe and the region and as a group finance executive in the CEO’s office.
Last year the group posted a 54 percent revenue growth in the half year period ending June, breaching a turnover of $1 billion in an economy saddled with liquidity challenges.
The giant corporation runs major outlets such as Chicken Inn, Nandos, Creamy Inn, Bakers Inn, Steers, Irvines Zimbabwe, Spar, Savemore, Colcom, National Foods and Shearwater Adventures.
derick.khumalo