Leonard Neill SOUTH AFRICAN Port Operations (Sapo) will shrink as the private sector takes over the reins in the government's privatisation of the country's harbours, and it will need vastly improved management to save it from becoming completely extinct. This was the warning from Richard Goode, director of the Department of Public Enterprises' restructuring of state owned enterprises, at a media briefing in Pretoria last week. With the Department insisting that privatisation is now essential, and that the private sector's involvement in Durban's container terminal is to be speeded up, Goode emphasised that Sapo would Ôhave to take its chances in the market.' In Durban, for instance, it might be reduced to just one type of terminal, such as the car terminal, where it has shown it can be efficient, he said. "Sapo will shrink, because its business will effectively be taken away in the privatisation process. It will lose power where other services become effective, and it may well have to narrow its focus to one or two options. "What we have to ensure is that the least attractive businesses have to be managed in such a way as not to allow Sapo to suffer. We must not allow a situation to develop where all the diamonds are snapped up, and the residual pool is totally unattractive." Problems at the container terminal, however, included poor Sapo managerial performance, which needed to be addressed, he said.
