Scarlate Masiye | Director | Legal and Compliance | Africa and Middle East | Bridgestone | mail me |
When people picture South Africa’s automotive industry, they still picture a factory floor filled with men in overalls. That image is out of date.
Motor Industry Bargaining Council workforce data show that women now account for almost 95,000 employees across the organised automotive retail aftermarket. That represents about 30% of a workforce of nearly 317,000. We work on assembly lines and in engineering bays, boardrooms, and increasingly in offices where we weigh the industry’s biggest risks.
Governance builds confidence
I sit in one of those offices. My role is not to build tyres or export vehicles. Instead, I help ensure that we do so legally, ethically and sustainably.
From that vantage point, one lesson is clear. People often mistake good governance for caution. It is not. Good governance isn’t caution. Done well, governance gives a business the confidence to act. It gives businesses that confidence because they understand the risks they take. They also understand why they take those risks and what they will do when circumstances change. That distinction matters in an industry with much to gain and much to lose.
In 2025, South Africa’s vehicle and component exports reached a record R291 billion. They accounted for 15.6% of the country’s total exports, according to NAAMSA’s Automotive Trade Manual 2026.
The sector supports jobs, industrial capability and investor confidence. Its performance matters well beyond the factory gate. Yet manufacturers operate amid fragile supply chains, shifting regulation and pressure to decarbonise. They also face growing expectations around corporate accountability.
Risk starts with strategic questions
The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) promises access to a larger, more integrated market. However, businesses must navigate rules of origin, tariffs and varying regulatory regimes.
South Africa’s Industrial Development Strategy 2026 adds further urgency to decarbonisation, diversification and digitalisation. These may sound like separate commercial, policy and sustainability concerns.
In practice, each concern also raises a governance question:
- Can a manufacturer verify the origin of its inputs?
- Can it substantiate environmental claims with operational evidence?
- Can it enter a new market without exposing itself to competitive, anti-bribery, or contractual risk?
- Can its supply arrangements withstand a currency shock, logistics disruption, or sudden regulatory change?
Businesses that can answer those questions are not being cautious. They are building the confidence to move forward.
For too long, businesses have treated legal and compliance functions as a brake pedal. They often consult these functions at the end of a transaction. Sometimes, they ask for approval after making the decision. Other times, they call legal teams after something has gone wrong. This approach reduces legal leadership to saying “no”. Its more valuable contribution, however, involves helping the business determine “how”.
Bringing legal expertise in earlier
Timing shapes the quality of that contribution. When legal expertise enters the first strategic conversation, risks can remain manageable.
When teams wait until final sign-off, those risks may become harder to address. A supply contract can be structured to withstand disruption. A market-entry plan can be tested before the business commits capital. A sustainability claim can also be checked against available evidence.
That approach ensures the business communicates what it can prove, rather than what it hopes to communicate. The result is not a risk-free organisation. No manufacturer that invests, innovates or expands can avoid risk. Instead, the result is an organisation that takes risk deliberately rather than by accident.
This thinking shapes a compliance approach built on visible leadership, risk assessment and clear standards. It also relies on continuous learning and trusted channels for raising concerns. In 2025, more than 2,000 concerns were reported and investigated through the company’s confidential reporting system worldwide.
Culture makes governance work
A high number of reports may seem troubling. I see something more useful: an early-warning system. Silence does not necessarily mean an organisation has no problems. It may mean people do not trust the process or believe it is safe to speak.
Good governance isn’t caution. It depends on culture as much as on controls. A code of conduct cannot protect a business if leaders reward results regardless of how people achieve them.
A risk register also has little value if people soften difficult information before it reaches decision-makers. Operational integrity begins when people raise concerns early. It also begins when leaders remain prepared to hear those concerns.
This is also why greater diversity in industrial leadership matters. Women’s growing presence in the automotive sector should not be measured solely by participation numbers. Instead, businesses should measure it through influence. Are women shaping investment decisions, market-entry strategies, climate plans and responses to risk?
Women in the strategic control room
Let me state the obvious: legal, compliance, risk and sustainability are not peripheral functions. They form part of the strategic control room of a modern industrial business.
When women lead in these areas, they are not merely entering the automotive industry. They are helping shape how responsibly and competitively it grows.
South Africa does not need manufacturers afraid of risk. It needs manufacturers capable of taking informed risks. They must remain disciplined, clear about what they know, honest about what they do not know, and prepared for what may change. That is the purpose of modern legal leadership. It should not hold the business back. Instead, it should make its ambition more resilient.
Good governance isn’t caution. It is not the brake. It gives an organisation the confidence to accelerate without driving blind.
