On 23 March South Africa`s Naspers announces it would sell US$ 10bn of its shares in Chinese media giant Tencent. It foresees the sale to raise money for funding investments across a portfolio of ecommerce and tech assets in emerging markets, incl shares in the holding company of Mail.ru (Russia) and Flipkart (India). Traditionally known as a print media company in South Africa, Naspers also owns pay-TV operations in 48 African countries. Some shareholders have been outspoken about the group’s executive pay policy, saying it unfairly rewards executives for the performance of Tencent, in which Naspers holds a 31.2% stake but no management control. JSE-listed companies have to engage with shareholders when a vote against remuneration policy is over 25%. Naspers is accused of not revealing the level of opposition to its remuneration policy by lumping its two classes of shares together when disclosing voting details.
