Dr Iqbal Surve

Dr Iqbal Survé

Chairman

Born and educated in Cape Town, South Africa, Dr Iqbal Survé is a physician, entrepreneur businessman and an ardent philanthropist.

During the dark days of apartheid, he was affectionately known as the “Struggle Doctor” due to his provision of medical care to victims of apartheid brutality, including some of those imprisoned on Robben Island.  He maintained both a personal and/or a professional relationship with many former Island prisoners, counting Nelson Mandela, Ahmed Kathrada, Andrew Mlangeni and Govan Mbeki among them.

After leaving medicine in 1997, he founded The Sekunjalo Group, which is today, wholly owned by the Survé family. Dr Survé serves as the Executive Chairman of The Sekunjalo Group, which is headquartered in Cape Town.

Africa’s economic emancipation is an important commitment for the Survé family and Sekunjalo, with the Group and the family investing in a number of industries, including the media sector on the African continent. Dr Survé is the chairman of one of Africa’s largest print and online media groups, Independent Media, which has 24 major newspaper titles with 10 million readers daily.

In 2015, Sekunjalo founded Africa’s first global news, text, picture and video content syndication service – the African News Agency (ANA).  ANA currently distributes African content around the world, reaching in excess of a billion viewers/readers daily through its platforms. Sekunjalo, as part of its tech- media investments portfolio, has also acquired a majority shareholding in one of Africa’s fastest growing eCommerce companies, Loot.co.za.

Dr Survé is involved in a number of multi-lateral institutions and global organisations and is a regular keynote speaker at international conferences and gatherings.

He is a founding member of the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI), and a founding member of the BRICS Business Council, a regular participant at the World Economic Forum (WEF) Davos.  He has served as the first chairman of the Global Growth Companies (GGC) Advisory Board, and Vice -Chairman of the Global Agenda Council (GAC) for Emerging Multinationals. In 2017 he was appointed Chairman of the South African chapter of the BRICS Business Council. Dr Survé is the co-Chairman of the BRICS Media Forum,

In 2017, Dr Survé was appointed to the Forum Member Adviser’s board of the World Economic Forum, and as a board member of the Stewardship Council for the Entertainment and Systems initiative – one of the most prestigious System Initiative boards for the World Economic Forum.

He is a participant member of the G20 meeting and serves on G20 Task Teams as well as the UNGA private sector forum

Dr Survé’s other acknowledgements and involvement include:

  • Alumnus of the HRH Prince of Wales Business and Environment Programme
  • A Fellow of the African Leadership Initiative (Ali)
  • A patron of the South Africa -Italy Summit
  • Co-chairman of the South Africa- Saudi Arabia Business Council (SASABC)
  • A patron of the Munich based GISSAID
  • A patron of the Swedish based World Children Prize for the Rights of the Child (WCPRC)
  • A founder member of the Siemens Global Sustainability Advisory Board
  • A member of the YPO Gold Cape Town chapter
  • Honoured twice with the Directors award for his contribution to tertiary education by the University of Cape Town (UCT), Graduate School of Business

Dr Survé is an alumnus of the University of Cape Town (UCT), the Graduate School of Business (GSB), the American College of Sports medicine (ACSM) and Harvard University, with degrees in medicine, science and business.