A revamp of the board is on the cards for FirstRand, following the departure of Mac Maharaj from his position as director at the bank.

This will allow FirstRand the opportunity to address some of the concerns raised by Adv John Myburgh in his recent corporate governance review of SA's top five banks.

Speaking after Maharaj's resignation was announced, FirstRand chairman GT Ferreira said that the group was reviewing the composition of its board and would make a number of changes "soon".

With Maharaj's departure, the number of directors on the FirstRand holding group drops to 14, while the number of directors on the FirstRand Bank board drops to 13.

But there are no female directors among the group of 19 people on both boards and few blacks.

In his corporate governance review, Myburgh identified this as one of FirstRand's weaknesses.

"There are no women on the board. FirstRand indicated that a process is under way to recruit additional nonexecutive directors to increase the size of the board to address the gender and race shortcomings." Maharaj's departure along with the imminent retirement this year of FirstRand Bank board members John Gafney and Sadek Vahed provides the group with the opportunity to address this problem.

With Maharaj gone, there are only four blacks on the FirstRand boards; Cyril Ramaphosa, Khehla Shubane, Ben van der Ross and Vahed.

"We need to rethink the composition of the boards throughout the group and we have already been doing this," said Ferreira.

He said that Myburgh's concerns would be addressed, but gave no indication of when new board appointments would be expected.

The Maharaj issues have sparked anew the "swing-door" debate over the movement of politicians from government to the private sector and FirstRand suggests it may be reluctant to dip into the pool of government talent.

About the appointment of former transport minister Maharaj, Ferreira said: "I can't say we won't do this again, but we would need to consider the consequences."

Myburgh said the ideal size of a bank board would be 16 members, with about 12 being nonexecutive directors.

With acknowledgements to Rob Rose and the Business Day.