‘Steinheist’: ‘Devilsdorp’ producers tackle Steinhoff saga in new doccie

On 6 December 2017, after CEO Markus Jooste resigned amid an investigation into accounting irregularities, Steinhoff’s share price plunged by 90% in a week, wiping over R200 billion off Johannesburg’s stock exchange, JSE.

This led to a series of events that has now come to be known as the Steinhoff saga, which began with the loss of vital funds disappearing from ordinary South Africans’ pensions and investments. 

The Steinhoff saga will now be unpacked in Steinheist; a three-part documentary series about the biggest corporate scam in South African history.

Who made ‘Steinheist’?

Steinheist is made by Idea Candy, the producers of Devilsdorp, the record-breaking Showmax Original that is now the most nominated documentary going into the South African Film and Television Awards this weekend.

Idea Candy has chosen to partner with Showmax once again for their latest offering and the streaming service dropped a full-length trailer for the Steinhoff saga project this past week. 

“Before the Steinhoff crash, the furniture giant was billed as ‘the Ikea of Africa’, employing over 130 000 people on over 40 brands across four continents,” said Steinheist director Richard Finn Gregory. 

Gregory’s Patagonia-set feature documentary on Showmax, The Boers At The End of The World, won three Saftass in 2016. 

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“Steinheist is the story of Markus Jooste and a hundred-billion-rand lie that everyone bought – a lie that was built across over two decades. How did this happen? How did no one see it coming? And how is Marcus Jooste not in jail?” he asked.  

Who will feature in the doccie?

The trailer gives the first glimpses of the richest cast in Showmax history, including Jooste himself, former Steinhoff chairman Christo Wiese (who remains a billionaire despite reportedly losing the bulk of his wealth in the Steinhoff crash), Bruno Steinhoff, founder of Steinhoff International and Louis du Preez, the current Steinhoff CEO, who’s been a driving force behind the company’s remarkable recovery. 

Coronation co-founder Thys du Toit will also appear in the doccie to share his thoughts on a story that Financial Mail editor Rob Rose called “South Africa’s Enron”.

The gripping Steinhoff saga documentary also includes exclusive interviews with Rose, who wrote the book of the same name that Steinheist is adapted from, and Pieter du Toit, author of The Stellenbosch Mafia.

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BizNews editor Alec Hogg, Moneyweb managing editor Ryk van Niekerk, and award-winning financial journalist Fifi Peters also feature.  

Steinheist will also offer insight into what Wiese describes in the trailer as “the Jooste black magic” using footage of Jooste’s 2018 testimony before parliament.

It will also give audiences insight into a complex man who is described variously as “one of the best accountants ever in this country” (van Niekerk); as someone who was only interested in his business and in horse-racing (Hogg); as someone who “got addicted to the lifestyle, the money, the fame” (Thys du Toit); and as a “very clever, slick, and a very slippery operator” (Pieter du Toit).  

To find out how one company managed to put blinkers on a country tune it to Steinheist airing exclusively on Showmax on 22 September 2022, with new episodes every Thursday until 6 October 2022. 

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