Putprop notified its shareholders that Mr Mark W Gemmill, Mr Richard Tiefenthaler, Ms Nonku Ntshona, and Mr Kura Chihota have been appointed as independent non-executive directors with immediate effect. Mark Gemmill has a Masters degree in Business Administration from the University of Cape Town. With over 20 years’ experience in the corporate finance and investment banking sectors both locally and abroad, Gemmill is currently the manager of a niche focussed transaction origination and execution service provider which he founded in 2007.

Richard Tiefenthaler, who is a qualified attorney and professional Quantity Surveyor, holds an International MBA (Linz, Austria) and is a member of the Law Society of Gauteng, the Association of South African Quantity Surveyors and the South African Institute of Building. Following two years as a property development manager, Richard is currently practising as a senior partner of Tiefenthaler Attorneys and is a member of Tiefenthaler Consulting.

Nonku Ntshona is a qualified Quantity Surveyor with a post graduate diploma in Property Development and Management and a Masters degree in Building. She is a member on numerous professional bodies such as council member at the South African Property Owners Association (SAPOA) and the South African Council of Quantity Surveyors Profession (SACQSP). Nonku is the founder and Managing Director of Nonku Ntshona & Associates Quantity Surveyors Proprietary Limited.

Kura Chihota is a property practitioner with over 15 years’ experience in the real estate sector. Subsequent to obtaining his BCom degree, Kura also completed a Postgraduate Diploma in Business Management (DeMontfort, United Kingdom), a Real Estate Management Programme (Harvard Business School, United States) and a Property Development Programme (University of Cape Town). He is currently the Managing Director of Leapfrog Commercial Property Group, a commercial consultancy, and sits on the board of Fortress Income Fund.

Putprop also reported a rise in earnings per share. The company advised shareholders that the earnings per share for the six months ended 31 December 2014 period was 62.4 cents compared to the EPS of 56.4 cents for the six months ended 31 December 2013. Putprop Limited operates a portfolio of properties with strong contractual cash flows.

Putprop’s current property portfolio of 16 properties is spread across the office, retail and industrial sectors. The REIT has a market capitalisation of R216 million at 30 June 2014.