Bain ‘ashamed’ of serious mistakes made with SA work

Bain & Co. said it’s “ashamed” of the consultancy’s role in destabilising South Africa’s tax agency after the country’s most senior treasury official called for companies to stop doing business with the firm.

The public apology by Stephen York, Bain’s managing partner in South Africa, comes days after the UK banned the group from bidding for state contracts because of its links to corruption in the African nation under the presidency of Jacob Zuma.

Bain was found by the country’s judicial commission to have had ties to illegal dealings during work restructuring the South African Revenue Service, where senior staff were ousted and the institution’s investigative capacity was gutted.

“We apologise to you,” York said in a full-page advert in finance newspaper Business Day on Friday. “Bain made serious mistakes in the procurement and execution of our work at SARS.”

While regaining the South African people’s trust “will not be