Prof Mervyn King

Mervyn King is a Senior Counsel and former Judge of the Supreme Court of South Africa. He is Professor Extraordinaire at the University of South Africa on Corporate Citizenship, Honorary Professor at the Universities of Pretoria and Cape Town and a Visiting Professor at Rhodes.

He has an honorary Doctorate of Laws from the Universities of the Witwatersrand in South Africa, Leeds in the UK and Deakin University in Australia,and is Chairman Emeritus of the King Committee on Corporate Governance in South Africa, which produced King I, II, III, IV and V.

He is Chairman Emeritus of the International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC) in London, Chairman Emeritus of the Global Reporting Initiative in Amsterdam and a member of the Private Sector Advisory Group to the World Bank on Corporate Governance. He chaired the United Nations Committee on Governance and Oversight and was President of the Advertising Standards Authority for 15 years.

He is chairman of the African Integrated Reporting Council and chairman of the Integrated Reporting Committee of South Africa.

He received the ICGN and Finance for the Future Lifetime Achievement Awards for promoting quality corporate governance globally.

Wits University honoured Prof King in 2025 by establishing the Mervyn King Centre for Corporate Governance and Sustainability.

He has been a chairman, director and chief executive of several companies listed on the London, Luxembourg and Johannesburg Stock Exchanges. He has consulted, advised and spoken on legal, business, advertising, sustainability and corporate governance issues in over 60 countries and has received many awards from international bodies around the world.

He is the author of many books on governance, sustainability and reporting, the latest being “The Healthy Company”.

He sits as an arbitrator and mediator internationally.