{"id":862130,"date":"2026-08-18T05:00:13","date_gmt":"2026-08-18T05:00:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/862130\/"},"modified":"2026-08-18T05:00:13","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T05:00:13","slug":"xhanti-payi-appointed-chair-business-explainer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/862130\/","title":{"rendered":"Xhanti Payi Appointed Chair | Business explainer"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Indlulamithi SA Scenarios Trust has announced the appointment of its new Board of Trustees. This marks an important milestone in the organisation\u2019s continued commitment to advancing strategic thinking and shaping a shared vision for South Africa\u2019s future by fostering inclusive conversations and evidence based foresight.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The newly appointed Chairperson of the Board of Trustees, economist and researcher Xhanti Payi, takes over from Professor Somadoda Fikeni\u00a0who has led the Trust since its founding in 2017.\u00a0\u00a0Professor\u00a0Fikeni remains as a Trustee, and continues\u00a0to work closely with the new Chairperson, including attending key stakeholder engagements in support\u00a0of Indlulamithi\u2019s work. .<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Several notable appointments were made for this new term, Xhanti Payi as Chairperson and three new trustees were appointed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Indlulamithi also welcomes the following new Trustees:<\/p>\n<p>Kagiso Masela, who brings over a decade of experience across financial services, ESG and real estate-linked markets. He currently serves as Channel Manager for Sustainability &amp; ESG Solutions at First National Bank.<\/p>\n<p>Thato Tsita, is an investment banking executive and fund manager with more than 20 years of experience across South African and global markets. She is currently a Partner and Director at Tamela Capital Partners.<\/p>\n<p>Zimkhitha Peter,\u00a0is a values-driven entrepreneurial leader with over 15 years of senior executive experience across philanthropy, education and entrepreneurship. She currently serves as Chief Executive Officer of Allan &amp; Gill Gray Philanthropy SA.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Board of Trustees provides strategic oversight and governance for Indlulamithi. It safeguards the independence of the organisation\u2019s research and scenario-planning work, while guiding Indlulamithi through the next phase of its 2025 to 2029 strategy.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Chairperson Xhanti Payi, expressed the privilege and gratitude to take on the role at such a pivotal moment for South Africa.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis appointment is truly a privilege and comes at a pivotal time in democracy of our country.\u00a0This year Indlulamithi will embark on\u00a0Conversations on the Journeys to our Future; a dialogue series based on the 2035 Indlulamithi Scenarios and Barometer. This will entail publishing of popular awareness-raising material &amp; toolkits on various media platforms. In addition, several workshops will be hosted to trigger action among identified stakeholders representing various sectors. These activities are in alignment with Indlulamithi\u2019s Strategic Goal 2 for the 2025 to 2029 period: \u201cAdvocate for and Support Social Compacts that promote collaborative governance based on the Indlulamithi scenarios.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The Board Chairperson further highlighted Professor Fikeni\u2019s progressive and industrious leadership over the past nine years.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">\u201cThe former Chairperson Professor Somadoda Fikeni led the Trust since inception and has overseen the launch of the two sets of scenarios, five barometers and a set of economic models.\u00a0\u00a0He was also instrumental in the formalisation Indlulamithi, as well as resource mobilisation to effectively implement Indlulamithi programmes. As of April 2026,\u00a0\u00a0nine\u00a0\u00a0of the eleven Trustees are returning to serve a second term, and three new Trustees have since joined the Trust, \u201d added Payi.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">For almost a decade, Indlulamithi has developed some of South Africa\u2019s most closely watched scenario-planning tools. Its original three scenarios \u2013\u00a0Nayi le Walk, IsBhujwa and Gwara Gwara\u00a0\u2013 were built on extensive research into the drivers of social cohesion. They were also grounded in the conviction that economic growth, without social cohesion, would leave South Africa short of a genuinely prosperous future.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Following the shocks of the COVID-19 pandemic and the unrest of 2021, Indlulamithi refreshed its scenarios. By 2023, the Barometer\u2019s 54 indicators showed the country was gravitating towards a new \u2018Gwara Gwara plus\u2019 trajectory. This prompted the launch of a new set of scenarios for 2035:\u00a0Hadeda Home, Vulture Culture\u00a0and\u00a0Weaver Work.<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">These foresight tools remain central to Indlulamithi\u2019s work under its new leadership. In the period ahead, the organisation will launch\u00a0Conversations in Journeys into the Future. The dialogue series will be grounded in the 2035 Indlulamithi Scenarios and Barometer, and will be supported by workshops and awareness-raising aimed at stakeholders across South African society.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Indlulamithi SA Scenarios Trust has announced the appointment of its new Board of Trustees. This marks an important&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":862131,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[45,49,48,137],"class_list":["post-862130","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entrepreneurship","tag-business","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-entrepreneurship"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/862130","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=862130"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/862130\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/862131"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=862130"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=862130"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=862130"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}