Divisions and internal battles have been intensified as Black Management Forum president Mpho Motsei retaliated against those he believes have been against the forum's progress.
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The Black Management Forum (BMF) occupies a significant place in South Africa’s institutional memory.
Established in 1976, it has long carried the burden of black professional advancement, managerial leadership and transformation in corporate South Africa.
Beyond its historical significance, its relevance rests on the moral authority it claims in speaking about ethical leadership, accountability and institutional transformation.
That is why the current turmoil at the BMF matters beyond the organisation itself.
Public reports of suspensions, counter-suspensions, disputed authority, allegations of governance failures and financial irregularities raise questions about institutional discipline. The greater issue is what happens when a body created to advance leadership becomes publicly consumed by its own leadership crisis.
Every organisation faces internal disagreement: boards differ, executives clash, allegations emerge, reports are contested and disciplinary processes sometimes become necessary. Governance is tested precisely in moments of pressure. The concern arises when the response to pressure begins to deepen the very instability it was meant to resolve.
Suspension is a serious governance instrument. Used properly, it can protect an investigation, preserve records, prevent interference and allow allegations to be tested fairly. Used carelessly, it becomes a weapon of internal power. The difference lies in authority, process, purpose and proportionality.
This is why competing suspensions should worry any governance practitioner. When a board suspends a president, the president disputes that action and then suspends board members, the organisation moves from disciplinary process into institutional uncertainty.
Stakeholders are left asking who has authority, which resolutions are valid, which meetings were properly convened, whether notice was given, whether quorum existed and whether the organisation is still being governed through its constitutional instruments or through factional force.
Governance cannot function where authority is unclear.
At the centre of any such dispute should be the organisation’s Memorandum of Incorporation, rules, delegation framework, board charter and applicable law.
These documents are the institutional guardrails that determine who may call meetings, who may vote, who must recuse themselves, how resolutions are passed, who may suspend whom, how disciplinary processes are initiated and what rights affected persons have before adverse action is taken. Governance loses its anchor where these guardrails are ignored or contested.
The first lesson is that process protects both the institution and the individual. Allegations must be taken seriously, especially where they concern financial management, conflicts of interest, irregular appointments, director remuneration, distributions or the misuse of institutional authority. Yet seriousness does not remove the need for fairness.
Those implicated must be given a reasonable opportunity to respond. Evidence must be tested. Decision-makers must have lawful authority. Conflicted persons must step aside where required. Records must be preserved. Reasons must be clear.
Due process is part of institutional credibility. It protects those under scrutiny while also protecting the organisation from decisions driven by power, faction or expedience.
The second lesson concerns conflicts of interest. Public reports suggest that one of the concerns relates to directors allegedly participating in decisions involving their own remuneration.
That kind of allegation goes to the heart of governance because decisions about one’s own benefit require heightened caution. In company law and governance practice, conflicts must be disclosed, managed and recorded. Recusal should be meaningful, rather than symbolic.
A conflicted director should not shape the decision from which they stand to benefit.
This is especially important in organisations that rely on membership, sponsorship, donations or public legitimacy. Its non-profit purpose heightens the duty to manage money with discipline.
Funds entrusted to mission-driven institutions carry the expectations of all stakeholders. Financial decisions must withstand both legal scrutiny and moral scrutiny.
The third lesson concerns distributions and solvency.
Where questions are raised about dividends or distributions, the governance issue extends beyond the amount involved.
A distribution is not simply a financial event. It is a board judgement about the organisation’s ability to meet its obligations after value leaves the company. The solvency and liquidity test exists because directors must not approve distributions casually.
They must apply their minds, record the basis for the decision and be able to demonstrate that the organisation remained financially sound after the decision.
The fourth lesson concerns board records. In moments of institutional dispute, minutes and resolutions become the memory of the organisation.
They show what was decided, who was present, who voted, who declared an interest, who recused themselves and what authority was relied upon.
Where records are weak, delayed, incomplete or disputed, the organisation becomes vulnerable to competing narratives.
This is why governance requires discipline before crisis arrives. A well-governed institution should be able to produce its record calmly. Its authority should be traceable. Its resolutions should be clear. Its decisions should not depend on whoever speaks loudest after the meeting.
The fifth lesson is reputational risk.
The BMF has spent decades as a voice on transformation, leadership and black professional advancement.
When such an institution becomes publicly associated with infighting, disputed suspensions and allegations of governance failure, the consequences extend beyond those directly involved, reaching members who joined because they believed in the mandate, young professionals who look to the institution for leadership, sponsors and partners who associate themselves with its credibility, and the broader transformation project that depends on institutions practising the leadership they promote.
Reputation is protected through disciplined response, clarity and accountability.
The sixth lesson concerns business continuity. Leadership battles can consume institutional energy, shifting attention from purpose to control, weakening communication, unsettling staff, confusing members, slowing programmes and causing stakeholders to hesitate.
In such an environment, even a strong historical mandate can be weakened by internal exhaustion. The organisation may still exist legally, but its ability to serve its purpose begins to suffer.
This is where governance must return to first principles. The board’s role is to steer the organisation, preserve its purpose, govern risk, oversee management and act in the best interests of the institution.
The executive’s role is to manage operations within delegated authority. Members have rights through the structures created by the governing documents. Where these roles collapse into personal contestation, the institution becomes secondary to the dispute.
In this moment of confusion, the organisation must clarify who has lawful authority pending the outcome of processes, establish independent and properly constituted disciplinary or investigative mechanisms, secure records, communications systems and institutional assets, communicate with members and stakeholders in a measured way, separate personal disputes from organisational authority and ensure that those implicated in particular matters do not control the processes that test those matters.
A crisis of trust cannot be resolved by the same confusion that created it.
Mission-driven organisations often assume that a noble purpose will protect them from governance failure. Purpose can inspire people, but only governance can discipline power. A transformative mandate does not exempt an institution from process. It demands higher fidelity to it.
The BMF’s current turmoil should therefore be treated as a governance warning. Institutions built to advance leadership must be particularly careful when leadership fractures.
They must show that accountability can be pursued without lawlessness, that allegations can be tested without factional theatre and that authority can be exercised without institutional harm.
South Africa needs credible institutions that can speak with moral authority about transformation, leadership and accountability. That authority is earned internally before it is projected externally.
When governance turns on itself, the first task is to restore process. The second is to restore trust. The final task is to return the institution to its purpose.
For the BMF, that purpose is too important to be lost in the noise of internal conflict.
* Nqobani Mzizi is a Professional Accountant (SA), Cert.Dir (IoDSA) and an Academic.
Nqobani Mzizi is a Professional Accountant (SA), Cert.Dir (IoDSA) and an Academic.
Image: Supplied
** The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of IOL or Independent Media.
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