[dropcap]M[/dropcap]obile operator MTN South Africa has poached Telkom’s top communications executive.

Jacqui O’Sullivan has resigned from the partially state-owned telecommunications provider, where she has served as managing executive of group communication and public relations, and will join MTN on 1 October after three months of “gardening leave”, according to a well-placed source with knowledge of the situation.

O’Sullivan’s move to MTN comes less than a year after it hired another top Telkom executive, Enzo Scarcella, who left Telkom — where he was chief marketing officer — to take up the role of MTN South Africa chief operating officer.

In her new role, O’Sullivan will be in charge of communications as well as the MTN Foundation, the company’s corporate social investment vehicle, the source said.

She joined Telkom in September 2014. She was previously head of corporate communications at South African Airways.

O’Sullivan was apparently persuaded to join MTN by Godfrey Motsa, himself a fairly new recruit to the company. Motsa had previously worked at Vodacom as chief officer of the South African consumer business unit.

When Motsa left Vodacom to join MTN, his former employer successfully enforced a restraint of trade against him, which forced him to focus on markets outside the country for MTN until its expiry.