The Order of the Baobab in Silver

Mr Maduke Lot Ndlovu (Posthumous) Awarded for:

His excellent contribution to transformation in South Africa. He contributed immensely to the development of black commerce in the country.

Profile of Mr Maduke Lot Ndlovu 

Mr Maduke Lot Ndlovu was born in Kriel in Mpumalanga on 15 August 1951 and died on 22 August 2013 after a long battle with cancer. He obtained his early education in various farm schools around Kriel. He went on to become a very successful businessman, leading institutions such as SA Phillips and Nedbank.

Ndlovu did not allow the fact that he was raised in a poor household constrain his future. He studied business management at the University of South Africa, and pursued his postgraduate studies at Wits University, Harvard University and Northwestern University in the United States. He started work as a clerk at the Department of Home Affairs at the height of apartheid.

He later worked for SA Phillips in the marketing sales division, where he distinguished himself through excellence. After South Africa gained democracy, Ndlovu was approached by senior black businesspeople to rescue the fast-sinking Black Management Forum (BMF).

Faced with a myriad financial and management challenges, the BMF was on the brink of collapsing. Ndlovu took up the role of Managing Director in the ailing institution without pay.

He turned the BMF around and the institution is today a well-functioning entity, thanks to Ndlovu’s distinguished business management acumen. He was also the CEO of Nedbank’s Peoples Bank division, positioning the bank to meet the financial needs of ordinary South Africans.

He was a humanitarian at heart who was driven by the desire to improve the circumstances of the marginalised and excluded sections of the South African society.

He played a critical role in the development of black businesses in post-apartheid South Africa. Through his engagements with Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) and government structures, Ndlovu always agitated for BEE deals that would genuinely develop black businesses instead of offering trajectories to a quick buck.

His realisation that BEE transactions excluded the majority of ordinary black people led to Ndlovu calling for the development of a more inclusive BEE model. This culminated in the development of the current Broad-Based BEE empowerment scheme.

He pushed vociferously for black people to be included in the middle and upper management levels of both the private and public sectors, which were still conspicuously dominated by white South Africans in the early days of democracy.

His work has ensured that South Africa has a burgeoning black management and business class. In true patriotism, he embraced with open arms the challenge of the newly democratic society and the transformation of society in the interest of unity.

Upon his retirement as the President of the BMF in 1999, Ndlovu made a significant donation towards the establishment of a bursary scheme to assist poor yet deserving students acquire tertiary education. The BMF then established the Lot Ndlovu Bursary Scheme.