Of the 90 employees, approx. 15 have probably been put there by the Dj. Family, friends etc.

Dj and the other fellows probably do business with the Centum probably through an array of companies with confusing ownership - Where company X owns 60% of company Y which owns 85% of company Z whose wholly owned subsidiary bla bla bla.

Even if Centum's value goes to zero, Dj will have gotten his money (and yours) out through several other doors and windows.

The employees and management can't say anything because they know who butters their bread!

Ask @vvs to tell you how his "good friend" Merali does business and why he would never touch any of his companies even with a 50 feet pole!!!!

I understand the hierarchical playbook at centum and also the fact that the directors(the dj included) have their hands in the bonus cookie jar and I alluded to the same in my post.

What puzzles me is why the main shareholder in the company is seemingly rummaging for peanuts via a bonus to employees(inclusive of directors) instead of reinvesting the money vis a vis profits plough back to boost the share price where he stands to gain a whole lot more.

Employees should always be rewarded for doing a good job, that is not in contention. But paying KES1B to 90 employees for a firm that makes less than 4B per year is questionable.

Trancentury's stake in Kenya Railways was valued at over KES5 B but when the truth came out, it was valued much less. All those years, directors and management were enjoying bonuses on NAV growth.

Tick Tock. Centum Time bomb.

Bonuses should be narrowed to each employee's performance. You will be surprised that a company may grow its profits significantly even when some members of staff under performed.

We are given bonuses where i work and it depends on your individual performance as per the performance targets we are given yearly. The targets are then raised in each subsequent year. The bonuses we get are usually a percentage of our salaries or multiples of it should one exceed targets which are usually not that low.

Bonuses should not be a percentage of profits or NAV growth. That is fleecing share holders and will be prone to manipulations by employees to maximize them

Two things.

1. The person setting the target should not be a beneficially of the same.

2. Not meeting target leads to one getting fired.


3. The highest you should get to would be double the target bonus.

4. The money needs to be paid from outright free cash flow.