Dead Matter (Part One, Two & Three): How political corruption decimated Mpumalanga’s biodiversity

[Lisbeth]

How State Capture cashes in on conservation efforts — and contributes to the climate crisis


From left: Sustainability professor Mark Swilling | Our Burning Planet senior journalist Kevin Bloom | Land fraud investigator and author Rehana Rossouw. (Photos: Supplied)

By Julia Evans | 21 Apr 2022

Our Burning Planet Journalist Kevin Bloom discussed the link between State Capture and environmental breakdown with sustainability professor Mark Swilling and land fraud investigator Rehana Rossouw, unpacking how efforts to conserve our environment often lead to opportunities for government corruption and fraud.
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‘I thought years ago, after they stole from Nelson Mandela’s funeral fund, that the ANC couldn’t go lower than that.

“I thought that that was the lowest of the low that we had seen in corruption in South Africa. But it seems that the lowest is yet to come,” said land fraud investigator and author Rehana Rossouw during an Our Burning Planet Webinar on Thursday.

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Rossouw was discussing how the recent KZN floods had, once again, seen the government misusing funds meant for conservation, for fraudulent and corrupt schemes.

Our Burning Planet Journalist Kevin Bloom discussed the link between State Capture and environmental breakdown with sustainability professor Mark Swilling and Rossouw, unpacking several examples, many of which were investigated by OBP, such as Bloom’s long-running coverage of Deputy President David Mabuza’s involvement in the land claims scam, the rise of the bushmeat trade on the borders of the Kruger National Park and illegal mining assaults on the west coast.

Through this, Bloom highlights how it is becoming continually clear that State Capture is killing our biomes.

The KZN floods

When this webinar was planned, the Our Burning Planet team didn’t know the KZN floods were about to happen, but it is yet another example of how government corruption is affecting the environment.

“If the KZN provincial coffers had not been so efficiently milked over the years, the landslide damage may have been mitigated,” said Bloom, asking Swilling what the recent floods say about our ability as a country to handle the environmental and climate changes that are inevitably on their way.

Swilling, whose primary research has dealt with societal transitions, responded, “What we are witnessing is the failure of our systems to anticipate the impact of climate on the natural systems that we depend on.

“It’s a shout-out to say we as humans are fragile and we need to invest in climate resilience. If we don’t… what we’ve just seen is just going to multiply many times into the future.”

Bloom asked Rossouw if the fallout from the floods was a turning point or wake-up call for ANC.

“Unfortunately for the ANC, I think we have now reached the stage that every event is an opportunity for corruption,” replied Rossouw, citing how relief resources collected for people who were working to mitigate the disaster were being looted. Rossouw said she didn’t think the ANC was going to change, or that this would serve as a turning point from past corruption.

“I expect to see even more corruption in whatever climate mitigation there is in South Africa, I really do.”

Fred Daniel and the land claims scam

“I just have to say… I’ve never come across something so vast, so broad, so venal and so destructive, in all my 25 years as a journalist in this country,” said Bloom in reference to Rossouw’s nonfiction book, Predator Politics: Mabuza, Fred Daniel and the Great Land Scam.

“My book is about one South African citizen, Fred Daniel, who had sold a successful business and decided to dedicate the rest of his life to a personal project to mitigate climate change,” said Rossouw, explaining that Daniel was aware of climate change from a young age and wanted to use his money to heal the land.

Daniel bought 69,000 hectares of land in southern Mpumalanga, wanting to transform it into a game reserve to attract wealthy clients as well as it being a site for SA citizens to gain knowledge and as an educational facility for local children. Rossouw explained that after going to the government to partner with them to transform and conserve the land, Daniel discovered how corrupt the government was.

“Bit by bit the provincial government did what I called the ‘predator politics’; spotted an opportunity to steal again, to be corrupt again and again,” said Rossouw.

Daniel discovered the land claim scam, where the government put up fake land claims on Daniel’s farms at exorbitant prices, with claimants that weren’t certified.

“The provincial government decided that they would act as a broker between the Land Claims Commission and these so-called claimants and suddenly farms were being sold willingly to the government for restitution to landless black people,” said Rossouw, “the value of those farms in some instances became eight times higher, four times higher, six times higher.”

Rossouw points out that while her book deals with the whistle-blower Fred Daniel’s story, the model for State Capture actually arose in Mpumalanga before Fred ever bought land.

She said that before 1999, during the first term of office of the Mpumalanga provincial government, the Parks Board — responsible for conserving and protecting land on behalf of all citizens of South Africa — was used as a vehicle to transfer state funding to the ANC.

It was discovered that money intended for conservation had been transferred from a government agency into the coffers of the political party.

“And so over the years in Mpumalanga conservation projects have failed spectacularly, and mostly because of corruption. David Mabuza became premier when the scheme was already in place,” said Rossouw.

“David Mabuza became deputy president of South Africa when this scheme was already exposed.”

Another double movement of alternatives

Swilling explained that the core argument of his book, The Age of Sustainability: Just Transitions in a Complex World, is about understanding that the sustainability transition follows many other historical transitions that have already taken place.

These included the agricultural revolution, the Industrial Revolution, the rise of oil-based and fossil fuel-based energy systems, and now — the rise of information technology and green technology.

“The argument is that we have gone through major transformations or transitions in the past. All the indications are that the current global system is unsustainable, and there’ll be another transition.”

Swilling’s thinking is influenced by Karl Polanyi and his book The Great Transformation — originally published just after World War 2, which explores the idea of “the double movement”.

“What Polanyi is trying to understand is, how is it possible to have — from the mid 1800s through to the Second World War — this massive, powerful rise of global capitalism… on the one hand, and on the other, the rise of literally hundreds of thousands of initiatives that were more about solidarity with each other as human beings within society and with nature.”

Swilling uses Polanyi’s idea in his book to discuss how contemporary society has its own type of unfolding double movement.

“We’ve had globalisation of a very extractive nature, near liberalisation, financialisation, increased extraction of natural resources and increased emissions with climate consequences.

“But we’ve also had another double movement of alternatives. The rise of literally hundreds of thousands of initiatives, social movements, green movements, eco villages, communities, alternative technologies.

“And on the small scale, people like Fred Daniel, who want to help the earth, are the ones who are part of the double movement that we need in sustainability transformation.

“There’s so many people like that all around the world. I meet them all the time,” reflected Swilling, “they kind of sensed the pain of Mother Earth and the destruction caused within our society, especially amongst the poor.

“They put these together and say — I want to do something different. I want to be different. I want to be a different person in the Anthropocene.

“These are the people driving the double movement. And that’s where hope lies. This is hope without easy answers, but it nevertheless is hope.” DM/OBP

[Lisbeth]

FRED DANIEL VS DEPUTY PRESIDENT

Conservationist vs DD Mabuza: Threats ‘likely to escalate’ as resumption of trial looms


From left: Conservationist Fred Daniels. (Photo: Supplied) | Deputy President David Mabuza. (Photo: Gallo Images / Sunday Times / Masi Losi) | Former president Jacob Zuma’s lawyer Mike Hellens. (Photo: Gallo Images / Netwerk24 / Deaan Vivier)

Kevin Bloom | 21 Jul 2022

On 9 June 2022, when they were meant to be representing Deputy President David Mabuza and a host of government entities at a pre-trial meeting of the Pretoria High Court, senior counsel Mike Hellens and Dawie Joubert were in Dubai with the Guptas. But, according to a letter to the state attorney written by conservationist Fred Daniel’s lawyers, this was not the major concern. Security issues, in the days leading up to the resumption of the trial, were paramount in the missive.
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‘South Africa’s smartest lawyers.”

This nice compliment was recently paid by Peter Bruce, former editor of Business Day, to Mike Hellens and Dawie Joubert. Bruce’s regular column was focused that day — 7 June 2022 — on the arrest in Dubai of Rajesh and Atul Gupta, who had just been hauled into custody on the basis of an Interpol red notice.

The columnist’s lament, given that the Gupta brothers had “helped to rob the country blind”, was that South Africa’s prosecuting authority and justice department did not have the chops to “seize the opportunity”. Hellens and Joubert, he suggested, were more than capable of springing the brothers free.

At issue, of course, was the role that the Guptas had played — aided and abetted by former president Jacob Zuma — in hollowing out the organs of the South African state and pilfering hundreds of billions in public funds.

Like Daily Maverick’s Rebecca Davis, who memorably referred to the issue of extradition as a “very delicate diplomatic egg dance”, Bruce was concerned that the legal environment was tailor made for the likes of Hellens and Joubert. With such an abundance of loopholes and technicalities for the pair to work with, his advice to us was to lower our expectations.

What Bruce couldn’t know, however, was that two days later, when Hellens and Joubert were scheduled to attend a meeting called by Judge Cassim Sardiwalla of the Pretoria High Court, they would still be in Dubai with the Guptas.

Instead of representing their pre-booked clients, who happened to be Deputy President David Mabuza and a host of interlinked government entities, the advocates would send juniors in their place. In a transcript of the meeting obtained by Daily Maverick, one of these juniors would explain to the judge that Hellens and Joubert “did not receive timeous notice”.

So how, we wondered, might our deputy president have felt? Was it possible that he considered himself “jilted” — left on the back-burner for a more high-profile case?

If the letter sent by DLBM Attorneys to state attorney Nelson Govender on 6 July was any indication, the answer may have been that Mabuza wasn’t particularly bothered.

DLBM, which through the course of the protracted trial had been acting for conservationist Fred Daniel in his R1-billion civil suit against the government, laid out in the missive how the government defendants had time and again “put sand in the gearbox of the administration of justice”.

In this context, the failure of Hellens and Joubert to show up at the meeting was a relatively minor complaint. Accessed by Daily Maverick on CaseLines — the online trial bundle to which we had been granted access by Judge Sardiwalla — the letter opened with quotes from the government team’s threat to sue Daniel’s advocate “in his personal capacity”.

2022-07-06 Letter From DLBM to the State Attorney - Trial Issues


As background to such tactics, DLBM referred to a series of events that, if they weren’t backed up by the court record, would have been difficult to believe.

Way back in July 2020, it turned out, a judicial directive had been granted to “curtail the ambit of the trial” by making cuts to the parties’ respective witness lists. The civil action, which had been launched by Daniel 10 years before, was clearly a matter that the justice department wanted finalised. But the very next day, noted DLBM, the defendants had done the opposite — they had “expanded” their witness list. Not only that, Daniel’s attorneys added, but they had threatened that if the plaintiffs removed witnesses, these same witnesses would be added to their list.

And then, according to DLBM — who were referring, again, to documents in the court record — the defendants had for no rhyme or reason added Charles Ndabeni and Richard Spoor to their list of witnesses. As readers of Daily Maverick may remember, Ndabeni had just signed a pivotal affidavit on Daniel’s behalf, while Spoor, one of the country’s foremost land rights experts, would later give testimony so explosive that it would all but blow Mabuza’s case apart.

Still, to return to the letter of 6 July, the litany of DLBM’s provable allegations did not end there. Advocate Andre Ferreira, who would be replaced by Joubert as senior counsel for the government in early 2022, “took it a step further by stating that his clients will not make the admissions as requested, even if the plaintiffs threaten to break his fingers”.

Had Daniel or his legal team ever threatened violence against the government defendants? Daily Maverick could find no evidence of such a thing. On the contrary, our long-running coverage of the case had demonstrated that the violent intimidation had emanated, consistently, and in the strangest of ways, from the other side. Which was why DLBM also noted that “the relevant government officials should be made aware of the security concerns of the plaintiffs and their witnesses”.

With the fourth session of the trial due to kick off shortly, stated DLBM, “threats to the plaintiffs and their witnesses are likely to escalate”.

The attorneys noted that the trial had become a “frozen conflict”, and that, as office-bearers, the current government officials had an obligation under section 7(2) of the Constitution to “respect, protect, promote and fulfil” the plaintiffs’ rights to a fair hearing. Then, near the end, DLBM pointed to the essence of the trial: the ongoing damage to Mpumalanga’s natural environment as a result of the documented governmental corruption.

“[The defendant’s] expert Dr Anderson confirms the catastrophic damage caused by the over-population of elephants to the biodiversity at the Nkomazi Game Reserve,” noted DLBM, referring to the nature reserve that Daniel had allegedly been forced to flee as a result of the Mpumalanga land claims scam. As Daily Maverick has previously reported — and as DLBM repeated — after Daniel had sold the majority of his shares, there was a barrier fence erected on the reserve that was, and remains, “illegal”.

To bring the story full circle, then, did Hellens and Joubert deserve the title of “South Africa’s smartest lawyers”?

On 24 June 2022, it was reported by News24 journalist Karyn Maughan that Hellens — in a local case that had since become central to the potential extradition of Rajesh and Atul Gupta — had slammed the fraud and money laundering charges against the brothers as “woefully inadequate.” Hellens, noted Maughan, had threatened in the Bloemfontein High Court that he would litigate to compel the National Prosecuting Authority to fully disclose the case that the brothers had to answer. In the ensuing confusion, the judge had postponed the case to 8 September.

By Bruce’s definition, presumably, this would indeed count as “smart”. And as for their non-appearance before Judge Sardiwalla, it took just two days for the state attorney to fire back a very clever letter on the advocates’ behalf.

Letter From State Attorney to DLBM 2022-07-08

“A further example of your one-sided attitude is to criticise,” he informed DLBM, “for their non-appearance at the inspection in loco meeting on 9 June 2022, both Advocate Mike Hellens SC and Advocate Dawie Joubert SC. Both of these senior counsel sent e-mails with regard to their inability to attend, as they were not even in the country and were actively engaged in other work matters, rendering it impossible for them to attend the meeting. To make matters worse, the meeting was not even arranged but simply announced, without regard to anyone’s availability.”

Nowhere in the state attorney’s letter of 8 July was there mention of either the expanded witness lists or the security threats. In the days leading up to 8 August, it seemed — when the fourth session of the trial was scheduled to begin — things would only get hotter. DM/OBP

[Lisbeth]

CONSERVATIONIST VS DEPUTY PRESIDENT

Revealed: David Mabuza, Fred Daniel and the missing crime dockets


Illustrative image | Sources: Deputy President David Mabuza. (Photo: J Countess / Getty Images) | Fred Daniel. (Photo: Supplied) | pngtree | Hawks logo. (ikipedia)

By Kevin Bloom | 07 Aug 2022

Just days after Daily Maverick implicated Nonhlanhla Patience Mnisi, the wife of Deputy President David Mabuza, in a land claims scam in Mpumalanga, the Hawks told whistle-blower Fred Daniel that the matter would be investigated. By our reckoning, the circumstantial evidence pointed to one place – but a few months (and a few crucial missing court dockets) later, it seems the investigation has run out of steam.
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The General

Early on the morning of 22 March 2022, a Tuesday, conservationist Fred Daniel received a message from Brigadier Desmond Alexander of the Directorate for Priority Crime Investigations, known as the Hawks.

It was an unexpected message and Daniel had good reason to be suspicious, but the weight of its contents could not be denied.

Alexander’s boss, he informed Daniel, had just tasked the Serious Corruption Offences unit with looking into his “matter”.

“What are the chances,” asked the brigadier, “that we can meet on Thursday, perhaps with your lawyer, for an introduction and discussion?”

As Daniel understood it, the reason for the urgency was the exposé that had been published a few days earlier by Daily Maverick – a conclusion he had drawn from a series of follow-up calls with Alexander.

Headlined Case number 35402/2010 – the Mabuzas and the giant Mpumalanga land claims ‘scam’, the article was centred on the revelation that Deputy President David Mabuza’s wife, Patience Nonhlanhla Mnisi, had received “substantial commissions” on a sale of hotly contested land in the Badplaas region of the province.

Given the intricacies of the investigation, with the evidence filling three lever-arch files, the final article was 6,500 words. Fundamentally, this was because Daily Maverick had been compelled to follow the trail all the way back to 2004, when Daniel – who was the owner of Nkomazi Wilderness, a private nature reserve near Badplaas, at the time – had first blown the whistle on the fast-evolving land claims scam.

Along the way, up to the evidential core of our narrative in 2015, we had encountered a hijacked community trust, spurious land claims, brazen conmen and the obvious collusion of Pam Golding Properties, Mnisi’s employer.

In line with Daily Maverick’s long-running coverage of Daniel’s R1-billion civil suit against the government, which listed the Mpumalanga Tourism and Parks Agency as the first of 24 defendants, the article also emphasised how the scam had led directly to the breakdown of the province’s biodiversity.

Beyond that, quoting from an expert report of Judge Willem Heath, the article noted how the land fraud had hollowed out Mpumalanga’s public institutions, costing the country about R35-billion in lost investment and revenue.

Throughout the article, the intimidating presence of Mabuza loomed large. Aside from the ongoing harassment and death threats faced by Daniel and his family, Daily Maverick linked Mabuza’s name to the murder of campaigners against illegal land grabs in the province (not exactly a new allegation).

But perhaps most significantly, in light of the multiple criminal charges that were laid during the years that Mabuza was serving as the premier of Mpumalanga, we contacted the Hawks for an update.

“[We] have no record of such an investigation,” Brigadier Nomthandazo Mbambo, the directorate’s spokesperson, informed us.

But less than three days after publication of our exposé, it appeared that the Hawks were “very interested”. Alexander’s boss, he informed Daniel via WhatsApp, was Major General Kubandran Moodley, the directorate’s head of serious corruption investigations.

For the next few months, after he had assigned a pair of senior colonels to the team, Daniel would find himself in regular contact with the general.

At first, the interchanges were friendly and light. On 8 May 2022, for example, Daniel sent Moodley a pin location for a meeting the following day, to which the general responded with “prayer-hands” and “thumbs-up” emojis. But by June, a cold wind had begun to blow through the WhatsApp thread.

“I am very worried about my safety and that of my family,” Daniel wrote to Moodley on 10 June, with respect to the fourth session of the civil trial that was shortly due back in court. “My witnesses are being threatened as well as my legal team. Please can we discuss this.”

Moodley replied that he was “in a workshop” and would revert later that afternoon. By 13 July, however, more than a month later, Daniel’s fears had yet to be allayed.

“Had these criminal complaints been properly investigated,” he wrote to the general, “I doubt I would have been in this terrible litigation with my own gov. Please let me or [my advocate] know how best we can deal with this as it represents a constitutional crisis and a risk to my family.”

Indeed, as he explained to Daily Maverick, Daniel had not set out on this path with Moodley to betray him by sharing the correspondence with us. He considered Moodley “a good guy”, he told us, someone who was genuinely interested in bringing the criminals to book. But, Daniel added, he knew better than the general that the complaints laid between 2011 and 2014 – with, specifically, the Mpumalanga division of the South African Police Service (SAPS) – had played a central part in all of the trauma he would later be forced to endure.

Read more in Daily Maverick: “Conservationist vs DD Mabuza: Threats ‘likely to escalate’ as resumption of trial looms”

It was with a mixture of foreknowledge and foreboding, therefore, that Daniel read Moodley’s reply to his message of 13 July.

In the response, Moodley explained that he had not been involved “in the investigation of the other matters” handled by the Mpumalanga branch, and that, if he so wished, Daniel had every right to complain to the directorate’s national head or to the National Prosecuting Authority itself. Then, in fast-typed and barely readable prose, the general wrote this [sic, etc]:

“I agreed to help at an head office level due to the lack of mp assisting with these investigation nd the high level of interference as u claimed from senior government officials.”



The interpretation of this sentence could have gone a number of ways. For starters, had Moodley really “agreed” to help? By the evidence of Alexander’s opening message to Daniel on 22 March, it was Moodley who had initiated the investigation off his own bat.

Second, was it due to the lack of assistance from the Mpumalanga branch that Moodley had stepped into the breach, or was this something he had only discovered later? Something, for instance, that was slowing him up?

Finally, and in the same vein, was it Daniel who had “claimed” the interference of senior government officials, or was Moodley now experiencing this same interference in real time?

The Colonels

To answer these fundamental questions – which, we assessed, were the fulcrum in the weighing of Daniel’s allegation of a “constitutional crisis” – it was necessary for Daily Maverick to drill much deeper into the correspondence.

The alleged crisis, of course, was in the security state; and if there really was “no record of such an investigation”, as the Hawks had informed us in March, that would have been the obvious place for us to begin.

And so, once again, to “protect [himself] and his family” by “placing the information in the public domain”, Daniel gave us access to the written communication.

As it turned out, Moodley’s change in attitude and tone, from the pleasantries of early May to the obfuscations of mid-July, appeared to map the timeline of “difficulties” faced by his investigating team. To Daily Maverick, the salient points from the correspondence seemed evident enough.

On 31 May 2022, acting on the advice of Moodley, Daniel’s advocate Jacques Joubert had sent an email to Colonel GB Lekhuleni and Lieutenant-Colonel Tseliso Mokhoema, the investigating officers newly assigned to the case.

In the email, Joubert provided the officers with the case file numbers of three dockets – CAS 28-09-2011, CAS 57-10-2011 and CAS 47-03-2014. All of the dockets, Joubert made clear, were held at the Badplaas police station in Mpumalanga.

“It will make more sense for us to meet if you’re in possession of the said dockets,” Joubert signed off, “to find out why the cases were not prosecuted.”

Read more in Daily Maverick: “Case number 35402/2010 – the Mabuzas and the giant Mpumalanga land claims ‘scam’”

On 8 June 2022, after confirming receipt of Joubert’s email, Lekhuleni sent an email back – with the comforting news that the officers were “going tomorrow to fetch the dockets”. Then he added: “Once we have them and perused [sic] we will advise you on the next step to be taken.”

Nine days later, on 17 June – in a move that appeared to corroborate Daniel’s views on the pure intentions of Moodley – Lekhuleni played open cards.

“We went to collect the dockets from Badplaas police station,” he wrote to Joubert, “and it’s disturbing to note that the original dockets could not be found. We were given only two useless files by the station purporting to be the case dockets, which cannot take our investigation anywhere. I’m suggesting that you come to the office next week with your complainant statement so we can register a new case.”

So there it was, proof that the case files had gone missing. As they would later inform Daily Maverick, although Daniel and Joubert weren’t surprised by this outcome, it was “shocking” to have their suspicions confirmed. They appeared to have recovered quickly, however, because Joubert fired an email back that same afternoon.

“Thank you for your prompt response,” he began. “Fortunately, we have copies of the contents of the dockets, including the warning statements, so you can reconstruct the dockets easily.”

What Joubert meant by “warning statements”, he explained to Daily Maverick, was that the individuals named in the case dockets had subsequently been charged with the alleged crimes. In other words, the evidence had been forwarded to the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), which, at that early stage, was satisfied that it should form the basis of a criminal trial.

In this context, acknowledging that the colonels had only found two files, Joubert asked them in his reply which one they could not find. He also asked if the files indicated why the cases had been removed from the roll.

The final email in the thread was sent by Lekhuleni on 20 June: “I hold a different view on how we should deal with this matter going forward. The dockets that you asked us to get from the station are obviously not helping us in taking your complaint forward. The police CAS system shows that the [dockets] were withdrawn in court and became missing while in the custody of the police.”

Next, in a series of bullet points, Lekhuleni laid out how the Hawks had decided to manage the situation.

“[You] must approach the NPA and ask for an explanation on why the cases were withdrawn,” he stated. “If the NPA decides to review the decision of the previous prosecutor, you can give them the copies of the docket that you have. I guess that will reactivate [the process].”

In the following point, however, Lekhuleni appeared to contradict himself. He informed Joubert that neither he nor Mokhoema “preferred” to be involved in the “reconstruction” of the dockets — since, he explained, the complaints laid between 2011 and 2014 had been assigned to different officers. Once again, Lekhuleni suggested that Joubert or Daniel compile a new affidavit.

After that had been done, Lekhuleni added, the Hawks would open an inquiry. If the allegations were “supported by the collected evidence”, he concluded, a new case docket would be opened and enrolled in court.

It was, as Daniel feared, a stalemate. As Daily Maverick was aware from our previous reporting, Daniel had already approached the NPA for a review of the decision. On 21 February 2019, in a letter from Daniel’s attorneys to the office of Advocate Shamila Batohi, the NPA’s recently appointed chief, a formal request had been made to reinstate “the corruption related, common law charges”.

In the same letter, Daniel’s attorneys had requested Batohi to “expand the existing charges to include contraventions of the Prevention and Combating of Corrupt Activities Act no 12 of 2004 (Precca) and the Prevention Against Organised Crime Act no 121 of 1998 (Poca) and to add further suspects who should be on trial with the current accused.”

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The main additional suspect to which the letter had referred was, it so happened, none other than Deputy President Mabuza.

“The above request,” the attorneys had explained to Batohi, “is based on compelling evidence that Mr DD Mabuza [in his previous capacity] as MEC for Agriculture and Land Affairs [in Mpumalanga] orchestrated a violent protest in Badplaas and the evidence that Mr Mabuza instructed his office to pay an amount of R3.3-million to his business partner and corruption kingpin, Mr Pieter Visagie.

“Unless Mr Mabuza is able to provide a lawful explanation of this payment to Visagie, he should with respect be put on trial with the other accused.”

Read more in Daily Maverick: “Claws out for DD ‘The Cat’ Mabuza as his past comes back to haunt him”

There was no response to this request from Batohi’s office, neither was there confirmation of the letter’s receipt. The civil trial, however, which would kick off in winter 2021, would clearly demonstrate Mabuza’s involvement in the violent protest, as well as the payment to Visagie.

III. The Charges

What, then, were the contents of the original dockets?

In effect, CAS 28-09-2011 and CAS 57-10-2011 had set down, in a format supposedly acceptable to the Hawks and the NPA, the full narrative of malfeasance as published by Daily Maverick in March 2022.

The charge sheet in the former, CAS 28-09-2011, had named Visagie as one of six accused in the hijacking of the Ndwandwa Community Trust, which had initially been set up to consolidate the restituted land of claimants in the Badplaas region.

According to the evidence of the trust’s founder, Robert Nkosi, the title deed had been removed from the master of the high court’s file “under the pretence that the trust was to be amended”.

Nkosi’s extensive affidavits, which formed a central pillar of CAS 28-09-2011, showed how the master of the high court was “duped into issuing new letters of authority” because he believed that the originals had been stolen.

“The only conclusion that can be drawn is that the Ndwandwa Community Trust was hijacked as a vehicle to milk the land reform funds,” Nkosi testified, “and when I refused to be part of the scheme the [regional land claims commission] officials and other officials conspired with Mr Visagie, who wanted me out of the way.”

From there, the narrative jumped to a company under the grandiose name of Investment for Agricultural Sustainability in Africa, or Ifasa, which was listed as the first accused in the charge sheet of CAS 28-09-2011.

Ifasa was registered by Gustav de Waal, who also happened to be the second accused on the charge sheet. In early 2010, according to the evidence, Ifasa partnered with the Ndwandwa Community Trust, knowing that its letters of authority were fake.

One of the aims of the partnership was to purchase 12,000 hectares in the south of Nkomazi Wilderness — which Daniel, although he’d retained partial ownership, had recently sold to Emirati company Dubai World.

The case docket had further demonstrated how Ifasa’s illegal plan had secured the backing of the Mpumalanga provincial government, with Mabuza at the helm.

In 2013, although a civil court had by then ordered the fake trustees to resign, the NPA mysteriously dropped the case. Two years later, Daniel received word that the same 12,000 hectares had been sold behind his back to the government, with the Badplaas office of Pam Golding Properties acting as the broker — Mabuza’s wife, Mnisi, was at the time (and remains) a leading agent in this office.

As for CAS 57-10-2011, the missing contents had once been about the inflation of land prices in Mpumalanga. Here, Visagie was named by Nkosi as the architect of the scam.

Backed up by testimony from both Daniel and attorney Richard Spoor, evidence was provided that Visagie, acting on behalf of the Mpumalanga government, had approached dozens of Badplaas farmers with a deal they couldn’t refuse — the only condition for the sale, the documents proved, was that the farmers could not dispute any fake claims. Time and again, after the sales had gone through, the docket had shown how Visagie had then split the difference in the hugely inflated on-sale to the regional land claims commission.

But while CAS 28-09-2011 and CAS 57-10-2011 were about criminal activities that had occurred in the past, the original contents of CAS 47-03-2014 referred to a crime that was still ongoing. This later case, opened by forensic investigator Paul O’Sullivan, had focused on an illegal fence that Dubai World had erected in Nkomazi Wilderness soon after the acquisition from Daniel.

And like the 2011 cases, it turned out, Daily Maverick had already covered the back-story to this gutted docket.

In 2007, when he was still the full owner of Nkomazi Wilderness, Daniel had commissioned two separate reports on the land’s carrying capacity for elephant. The first, compiled by environmental consultants International Conservation Services, had concluded that the reserve could sustain one animal per 2,000 hectares. The second, compiled by Professor Wouter van Hoven of the University of Pretoria, had calculated a less-conservative estimate, at one per 1,000 hectares.

In the event, Daniel had planned to introduce a small family herd of eight animals into a fenced-off area of 12,700 hectares, with the intention of monitoring the herd while dropping the fences into the full 39,000-hectare expanse.

With the transfer of the land to Dubai World, however, it wasn’t long before 10 elephants were introduced into a fenced-off area of 5,500-hectares, a situation that had clearly violated the permit conditions of the Mpumalanga Tourism and Parks Agency (MTPA).

Among the documents that O’Sullivan had submitted as part of CAS 47-03-2014 was the MTPA’s authorisation, dated 2 October 2007, in which it was stipulated that “[the] area where elephant will be introduced will not be smaller than 12,700ha”.

As Daniel informed Daily Maverick in the winter of 2022, the ecological damage that had since been visited on Nkomazi Wilderness was something that still caused him sleepless nights. Indeed, during the in loco court inspection for the civil trial on 1 February 2022 – at which Daily Maverick was present – the herd was found to number 18 elephants, within the same 5,500ha enclosure. The trees had been stripped bare, and the soil in parts trampled to dust.

For Daniel, this was further evidence that the land claims scam had decimated everything in its path.

According to the plaintiffs’ trial bundle in the civil case, there was a direct link between the MTPA’s willingness to “look the other way” and Dubai World’s decision to play ball with corrupt officials. In this regard, Daniel referred Daily Maverick to an article that was published by the Mail & Guardian in August 2010, with the subheading, “‘Illegal’ fence carves out chunk of world heritage area for livestock”.

The article, written by Yolandi Groenewald, had focused on the Songimvelo Game Reserve – Nkomazi’s neighbour and the largest provincial reserve in the country – where at least ten rhino were known to have died as the result of an illegal fence erected by land claimants.

“A former [MTPA] chief executive, who left under a cloud, allegedly authorised the invasion of the reserve by land claimants, despite the claim not being finalised,” Groenewald had written.

“The Land Claims Commission and Mpumalanga’s department of agriculture, rural development and land administration, then headed by current Mpumalanga Premier David Mabuza, financed the fence.”

The Answers

On Lekhuleni’s insistence that all consultations should take place at the Hawks office in Pretoria, the visitors register for the Serious Corruption Offences unit on 27 June 2022 contained the signatures of Daniel and Joubert.

By Daniel’s telling, perhaps because Moodley wasn’t present, the meeting did not go well. More concerned than ever for his safety, Daniel took out his cellphone and photographed the empty dockets — which signalled an abrupt end to proceedings.

Still, the truth as told by these images was irrefutable. All that remained of CAS 28-09-2011 and CAS 57-10-2011 were a bunch of bank records without context, while the cover sheet of CAS 47-03-2014 stated simply “undetected”. There was, however, a statement from the officer who had been assigned to investigate the illegal fence.

His name was Detective Sergeant Malaza, and when Daily Maverick called the contact number listed on the statement he immediately hung up. What we wanted to ask Malaza was why, in his sworn testimony that he “was not responsible” for misplacing the docket, had he also testified that he could not locate the complainant?

Was O’Sullivan, we wanted to know – whose details had long been listed in the public domain – all of a sudden impossible to find?



It also seemed anomalous that the sergeant had marked the date for commencement of the investigation as 1 September 2008, when the copy of O’Sullivan’s complainant statement was dated 13 March 2014. Was it a coincidence that the violent protest at the gates of Nkomazi Wilderness, in which Mabuza would later be implicated, happened in August 2008?

In this regard, if we had managed to keep him on the call, we might have asked Malaza about his former colleague Kobus Vermeulen, who was the detective inspector caught in the hostage situation at the Badplaas police station in late July 2008 – a situation, as Vermeulen testified before the Pretoria High Court, that had everything to do with land claims.

Did Malaza remember that terrible week, when the protest at the gates of Nkomazi Wilderness had followed, and the Badplaas police – according to the testimony of Vermeulen – had been ordered from on high not to intervene?

Unfortunately, answers to such questions were not forthcoming; not from Malaza, and not from anyone employed by the SAPS. Our questions for Moodley were referred back to Mbambo, the Hawks spokesperson, who told us in return that she would “try to engage” Moodley. The problem, she informed us, was that the general was “not on duty”.

Then, at the final hour, just before this article was going to be published, we received the equally unhelpful word from Mbambo that “both cases” — although we’d sent her the docket numbers for all three — had been “investigated at provincial level and finalised”.

Likewise with the NPA, whose questions for Batohi were referred to Marie Loots, chief prosecutor for the Middelburg cluster in the Mpumalanga office. And it appeared, from the response via Batohi’s media liaison, that only an excised list had been forwarded to Middelburg.

What the national office refused to answer was why they had ignored the formal request from Daniel’s attorneys, sent in February 2019, to reinstate the charges and add Mabuza as a suspect.

That said, regarding the questions that did make it to Loots, we were very eager for answers.

Was the NPA aware of the evidence, recently led in case number 35402/2010 of the Pretoria High Court, that had implicated Mabuza in a number of allegations from the empty or missing case dockets?

Also, was the NPA aware of any undue interference that may have resulted in the cases being removed from the role?

In line with the trend, Loots did not get back to us. The questions sent to the office of the deputy president were disregarded without confirmation of receipt, which left Daily Maverick with little choice but to draw our own conclusions.

And on this score, when it came to the history of suppression and the twisting of the facts — not to mention the outright, provable falsehoods and the displays of contempt for the law — arguably the most-loaded items of information had appeared in a media release issued by the Mpumalanga premier’s office on 3 February 2018.

Read more in Daily Maverick: “Assassins, elephants and sweating advocates in Barberton Mountain Lands”

“This matter has nothing to do with Mabuza nor land claims,” the release stated. “If Mr Daniels [sic] with his cohorts have any evidence of any wrong doing in particular of criminal nature [sic], he can lay charges directly with the police Hawks in Pretoria, the Public Protector etc.”

It was circles within circles, laying the ground for similar statements that Mabuza would make after his promotion, on 27 February 2018, to deputy president. But now, putting the circumstantial sword to such evasions was not just the empty or missing dockets, it was the other thing that the release noted: “Mr Mabuza does not even know the full facts on [sic] this apparent dispute between [Daniel] and the MTPA.”

As it so happened, the 2015/2016 annual report of the MTPA had included the following paragraphs at the bottom of page 198, under the heading “Contingencies” and sub-header “Fred Daniel Case A”:

“Following the 2015 resolution of the Mpumalanga Provincial Government Executive Council to centralise the management of critical litigation matters, the Group has during the month of October 2015 transferred the management of this court case to the Premier’s Office through DEDT [Department of Economic Development and Tourism] for further handling. However the liability for legal fees remains with the Group.

“Legal fees in the sum of R6.2 million have been incurred in the matter since its commencement. The Group has made a part payment of those fees leaving a balance of R2.4 million to date.”

In other words, for the simple reason that he had taken control of the civil litigation in 2015 — removing the files from the MTPA yet leaving the agency to pay — Mabuza’s contention three years later that he did not know “the full facts” was a little hard to swallow.

Read more in Daily Maverick: “Conservationist vs Deputy President Mabuza: Fred Daniel gets his R1bn day in court after 11 years”

As for the fees paid to attorney and counsel in the matter, which Daniel was doing out of his own pocket while the South African taxpayer was forking out for the State, Daily Maverick was led back to the alarming context of the 2018 media release.

Daniel, it transpired, had just a few days before obtained an interim protection order against Mabuza, awarded by the magistrate court of the Gert Sibande District in Carolina. Issued with a suspended warrant of arrest, the order had prohibited the politician from engaging in “any verbal or other communication” aimed at causing “mental, psychological, economic or physical harm”.

Since it had also stated in the media release that “Daniel will be exposed as a liar and abuser of our court system to defame innocent people”, on 19 February 2018 the parties were back in court — this time, and once again on his own dime, Daniel’s intention was to enforce Mabuza’s arrest.

But it didn’t happen. A new magistrate, Sarel Grabe, threw the matter out. According to the affidavits of three attendees in court on the day, including former Mpumalanga premier Mathews Phosa, Mabuza’s counsel was observed “in private conversation with [Grabe] in his office, without the presence of counsel for the complainant”.

FD22 2018-08-05 b) Affdivit Dr Phosa

For Daily Maverick, the pattern was unmistakable. Although the misinformation campaign had lately been widened to include us – with even General Mulangi Mphego, disgraced former spy boss and now Mabuza’s special adviser, launching his own personal attacks – the evidence, for anyone who cared to look, was overwhelming.

It was all in the plaintiffs’ trial bundle for case number 35402/2010 of the Pretoria High Court. And with the fourth and final session of the civil trial due to start on 8 August 2022, it was up to anyone who was paying attention to demand justice. DM/OBP

[Richprins]

Everybody is rightly terrified of Mabuza.

Go, Maverick!

[Lisbeth]

Or everybody is involved in one way or another or scared to death by somebody. The whole system is rotten

[Lisbeth]

‘Disgust’ of the judiciary: Stalingrad written all over David Mabuza’s defence in land claims fraud case


Deputy President David Mabuza. (Photo: Gallo Images / Beeld / Theana Breugem) | Adobe Stock | Rawpixel

By Kevin Bloom | 09 Sep 2022

On Friday, 2 September, the fourth session of conservationist Fred Daniel’s R1-billion civil claim against the South African government came to an end in the Pretoria High Court. With the fate of Deputy President David Mabuza in the balance, counsel for the defence had managed — once again — to avoid any engagement with the material facts. But the judge, visibly angry, promised closure before the end of the year.
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I Cost orders

'The conduct of this case is absolutely disgusting, to say the least.”

The background context to this statement of Judge Cassim Sardiwalla, delivered to counsel in the Pretoria High Court on 31 August 2022, was abundantly clear.

Equally clear, as he indicated, was that if he could have used a more descriptive phrase than “absolutely disgusting”, he almost certainly would have.

On the judge’s directive, handed down on 24 August 2022, the parties in case number 35402/2010 were meant to have taken the previous week — without his presence or oversight — to “define the issues and limit the trial duration”. Unfortunately, the fourth session of the trial, which had initially been set down for 25 July but had only commenced on 8 August, was going entirely according to script.

And the script, which counsel for the South African government had effectively been writing since July 2010 – when conservationist Fred Daniel first lodged his R1-billion civil claim – could once again be summed up in two words: Stalingrad Defence.

To be more specific, advocate Dawie Joubert (acting for the Mpumalanga Tourism and Parks Agency and the other government defendants) and advocate Mike Hellens (acting for Deputy President David Mabuza in his personal capacity), were still pulling every trick in the book to ensure that the plaintiffs ran out of steam.

As Daily Maverick reported in late July 2022, just days before the fourth session of the trial was due to begin, Daniel’s legal team had already furnished the state attorney with compelling evidence that the government defendants had time and again “put sand in the gearbox of the administration of justice”.

The history, Daniel must have guessed, was important — mainly because it was likely to determine the course of events to come.

In that pivotal letter to the state attorney, Daniel had therefore instructed his lawyers to refer to an earlier judicial directive, handed down in July 2020, to “curtail the ambit of the trial” by reducing the witness lists. As noted in the court record and repeated in the letter, the very next day the defendants had done the opposite — they had “expanded” their witness list. Not only that, Daniel’s attorneys added, but they had threatened that if the plaintiffs removed witnesses, these same witnesses would be added to their list.

It turned out, bizarrely, that this had been more than just a threat. According to Daniel’s attorneys — who were referring, again, to documents in the court record — the defendants had then for no rhyme or reason added Charles Ndabeni and Richard Spoor to their list of witnesses.

As readers of Daily Maverick may remember, Ndabeni had just signed a pivotal affidavit on Daniel’s behalf, while Spoor, one of the country’s foremost land rights experts, would later give testimony so explosive that it would all but blow Mabuza’s case apart.

To return, then, to 31 August 2022. The source of the judge’s fury was clearly that counsel for the defence had ignored judicial directives to “limit the duration of the trial” before. And the directive handed down on 24 August could not have been stated in more transparent terms.

“I am now stopping the proceedings for the parties to within seven days reach settlement on the entire matter,” Judge Sardiwalla had ordered. “Alternatively, on the better part of the common cause issues. And I would like to see written agreements between yourselves. And if there is no agreement, I want motivation as to why parties refuse to agree or want the Court to decide.”

Minutes before handing down this directive, Sardiwalla had referred to reports in the trial bundle that were “common cause”. Even though the contents of these reports were not in dispute, he’d stated, counsel had been “wasting the Court’s time” by “continuous, protracted cross-examination.” And while he had been careful not to name the offending parties, it was inherent that his barbs had been aimed at counsel for the defence.

“[There] will be cost orders if there is no cooperation,” the judge had continued. “So I am directing both parties to narrow issues and be cooperative. And I am not going to interfere with the process. You do it between yourselves and your clients.”

II Underlying agendas

A week later, as readers will no doubt have guessed, there was no settlement. Neither was there any agreement on the common cause issues. So, after affirming his “disgust” yet again, Judge Sardiwalla provided some insight into what was going through his mind.

“I get the sense there are underlying agendas to make sure this case is dragged out as long as it can [be],” he stated.

If ever there was a definition of the Stalingrad Defence, this was it. More importantly, it would have been lost on nobody in the virtual courtroom that Sardiwalla’s reference to “underlying agendas” had everything to do with Deputy President Mabuza.

As Daily Maverick reported in September 2021, the Pretoria High Court had by now heard the damning testimony — backed up by documentary evidence — that linked Mabuza to the largest land claims fraud in post-apartheid history.

In this sense, it was no surprise that the judge president was taking a personal interest in the matter.

“The JP has expressed his anger,” Sardiwalla continued, “not his disappointment.”

As always, Sardiwalla was careful to maintain his objectivity — he did not say who the judge president was angry at. But given that counsel for the defence had declined to arrive in Sardiwalla’s courtroom with a report on progress, as directed on 24 August, the proverbial writing was on the wall.

Daniel’s advocate, on the other hand, had prepared a report.

Submitted on the afternoon of 30 August 2022, the day before the parties were due back in the virtual courtroom, it ran to 90 paragraphs over 21 pages. At the top, advocate Jacques Joubert pointed Judge Sardiwalla to the “golden thread” of events that allegedly proved the “disgraceful and unprofessional” conduct of counsel for the defence.

Joubert’s core argument was that Hellens and (Dawie) Joubert were now in clear breach of the Judge President’s Practice Directive 2 of 2019, specifically the directives to “act professionally in expediting the matter towards trial and adjudication” and to “address the problems which cause delays in the finalisation of cases”.



Over the course of the preceding week, as revealed in the court transcripts, counsel for the defence had given the distinct impression that they were intent on doing the opposite.

On 25 August, in order to comply with Sardiwalla’s order, (Jacques) Joubert sent his opposing counsel a summary of the plaintiffs’ case. Among other things, the summary stated that the defendants had breached their “statutory duties… to honestly administer the Restitution of Land Rights Act and Mpumalanga Nature Conservation Act No. 10 of 1998”.

After contending that the plaintiffs were as a result “driven off their land” and forced to sell their conservation project “at a fraction of the value”, Joubert had then laid out what he termed the “improper ulterior motives” of the defendants.

These motives, he stated in the summary, were to profit from “fraudulent transactions related to land claims”, to allow “illegal barrier fences to shrink the [conservation project] to benefit cattle farmers” and to “[sell] animals that should have been protected to hunters”.

But despite this concise summary, as Joubert noted in his report to the judge, counsel for the defence had called a premature end to the meeting of 26 August — “after accusing plaintiffs’ counsel of not understanding [the] plaintiffs’ case”.

That same afternoon, given that no progress had been made at the obligatory meeting, Joubert had sent a list of questions to his opposing counsel. He reported to Sardiwalla that these questions were aimed at ascertaining, first, the estimated duration of the cross-examination of Daniel — who, after four days of testimony, was still supposed to be on the stand — and second, the estimated duration of the testimonies of the defendants’ own witnesses.

As an obvious way to limit the trial’s duration, Joubert had also asked the defendants to provide witness summaries of the material facts in their case.

“A few further questions were asked on key issues in the hope that the issues could be resolved,” Joubert added in his report, “alternatively that defendants will state their version on those issues.”

But, as Joubert alleged, there had been no “meaningful response” to these questions. Instead, there had been a belated “angry letter” from the state attorney, which failed “to make any contribution to limit the disputes in regard to the facts.”

Indeed, by Daily Maverick’s reading, the letter from the state attorney was more of the same — not only had the government’s legal team declined to offer a summary of their case, they had drilled down into a morass of technicalities, asserting at last that they “denied” the “alleged wrongful actions” and “improper ulterior motives” of their clients.



Of course, if counsel for the defence had prepared a written report for Judge Sardiwalla, their bare denials in the letter may have held more weight. But, again, they arrived on 31 August empty-handed.

As for Joubert’s report, the remaining paragraphs outlined the long history of obstruction endured by the plaintiffs, stretching back to December 2018, when a previous judge had determined that the trial was ready to proceed and should be concluded within 25 days.

As readers of this series may remember, that “first and only” session of the trial was supposed to have commenced on 27 July 2020, with an end date of late August the same year. But the bizarre inflation of the defendants’ witness list (as referred to above), as well as a raft of special pleas and a 108-page request for further particulars (served on the eve of the trial), had brought a swift end to such plans.

Joubert’s report, with the backing of the court record, pointed out that many of the delays over the ensuing two years had contravened judicial directives. He was hardly out of line, therefore, to direct the judge to the Constitution.

Section 34, he noted, referred to the right of every South African to “a fair public hearing”. Taken together with his citation of section 173, he seemed to be suggesting (perhaps unwittingly) that the judiciary itself was on trial:

“The Constitutional Court, Supreme Court of Appeal and High Courts have the inherent power to protect and regulate their own process, and to develop the common law, taking into account the interests of justice.”

III Smelling victory

Judge Sardiwalla, for his part, appeared to be well aware of section 173.

“I am not going to allow this matter to run the way you want it to run,” he told Hellens on the afternoon of 31 August.

Still, in the face of the blunt refusal by Hellens, it was difficult to see how he could force the government defendants to provide witness summaries of the material facts in their case. In other words, if counsel for the defence continued to argue the technicalities without attending to the evidence, there was every chance that the “underlying agendas” would prevail.

And to reiterate, as Daily Maverick has reported through the 12 articles (and counting) that we have dedicated to the case, these agendas have all seemed to stem from the same source: the office of the deputy president of South Africa.

On 7 August 2022, the day before the fourth session of the civil trial kicked off, we published a piece under the title, “Revealed: David Mabuza, Fred Daniel and the missing crime dockets”. As noted in the piece, Major-General Kubandran Moodley, head of the Serious Corruption Offences unit of the Hawks, had been inspired by a feature that we had published in March 2022 — linking Mabuza’s wife to the alleged land claims fraud — to oversee a criminal investigation.

Moodley had assigned a pair of senior colonels to the matter, with the promise to Daniel and Joubert that the Hawks were treating it as an urgent priority. But by July 2022, the criminal investigation had fallen flat. The colonels discovered that three prior case dockets with the same or similar charges had “gone missing” — and Moodley, in a WhatsApp message to Daniel, was not ruling out the possibility of senior governmental “interference”.


(Photo: Supplied)

Given that these cases had been deemed fit for trial, with the National Prosecuting Authority inexplicably dropping the charges, the general may have had a point. As for Daniel, he had little doubt that the architect of the cover-up was Mabuza.

For Daily Maverick, then, a discomfiting truth was beginning to emerge — although the testimony heard in the civil trial appeared to align with the allegations in the lost Hawks dockets, the hands of the criminal justice system were (mostly) tied.

So where, in this very serious game, were the pieces likely to drop?

By any assessment of the board, with the Hawks and NPA for the moment on the sidelines, the move was Sardiwalla’s. Since taking hold of the trial, the judge had played an experienced and careful hand; as far as the technicalities were concerned, he had crossed all his “t’s” and dotted his “i’s”. But the time for a ruling was upon him.

On the morning of 2 September 2022, the last day of the fourth session, counsel for the defence arrived in the virtual courtroom with an unmistakable air of victory. They had somehow managed to ascertain that Jacques Joubert’s registration with the Legal Practice Council was not recorded in the system, which meant that Sardiwalla would be compelled to declare a mistrial. Unbeknown to the defendants, however, Joubert had already sorted the matter out — the day before, he had obtained a letter from the Western Cape division of the LPC, confirming that he was indeed registered.



But tellingly, at the same time that this was going on, a furious letter had been sent from the state attorney to the director of the Gauteng division of the LPC, cc’d to Judge President Dunstan Mlambo, Judge Sardiwalla and Daniel’s attorneys. In his latest letter, State Attorney Nelson Govender had requested an “urgent investigation into the conduct and affairs of Mr JF Joubert” on the basis that if he was not registered, “[the] trial is probably vitiated and made a nullity”.

Problem was, of course, that Govender had sent his missive to the wrong provincial division of the LPC. In the event, the only thing that the failed attempt at a mistrial appeared to prove was that Sardiwalla had been entirely correct in his assessment — delivered on 31 August — of a “war between the parties”.

The matter, according to Sardiwalla’s final words on 2 September, would have to be concluded before the end of the year. Although Hellens and (Dawie) Joubert did their best to acquaint the judge with their full diaries, he remained immovable. As everybody in the virtual courtroom knew, case number 35402/2010 had been deemed a “special trial” — which meant that advocates’ prior commitments were irrelevant.

Everybody knew, too, that Hellens and Joubert had skipped an important pre-trial conference in early June 2022. They had offered the excuse via their juniors that they did not “receive timeous notice”, when they had in fact flown to Dubai to represent the Gupta brothers.

For Judge President Mlambo and Judge Sardiwalla, the issues were therefore clear. In his report-back to Sardiwalla on 31 August, after pointing out the defendants’ consistent breach of judicial directives, (Jacques) Joubert had appealed to the judiciary for a ruling on witness statements.

“There is nothing in the legislation or the Rules of Court to preclude the filing of witness statements or summaries in a trial matter,” he had stated, in an attempt to compel the defendants to engage with the evidence.

He had also appealed for an imposition of time limits, so as to “avoid endless wasted time and costs”.

The four sessions of the trial, it was implied, with two seniors and two juniors acting for the state, had already cost the South African taxpayer an untold fortune. Joubert had therefore laid out, in precise detail, why and how the defendants “should be able to finalise their evidence within seven days”.

All that remained, along with Joubert’s appeal for “punitive cost order considerations”, was for Sardiwalla to arrive at his ruling for the fifth and final session. By all accounts, the judge would do so in close consultation with the judge president.

As both Sardiwalla and Mlambo were no doubt aware, if Mabuza one day became president without closure of the case, the citizens of South Africa would have some questions for the judiciary. DM/OBP

[Lisbeth]

After 12 years It's disgusting

[Lisbeth]

‘Land scam kingpin’ – Deputy President David Mabuza named as top suspect in organised crime complaint


Illustrative image | Sources: Deputy President David Mabuza. (Photo: J Countess / Getty Images) | Fred Daniel. (Photo: Supplied) | GroundUp / Ashraf Hendricks | Twitter|Wayne Duvenage, CEO of Organistaion Undoing Tax Abuse (OUTA) (Photo by Gallo Images/Rapport/Deon Raath)

By Kevin Bloom | 05 Dec 2022

On the morning of 5 December 2022, the Investigating Directorate of the NPA received a criminal complaint from the Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse under the Prevention of Organised Crime Act, with Deputy President DD Mabuza named as the lead suspect. The allegations cover a litany of charges that stretch from 2002 to the present day, mainly to do with the ‘land claims scam’ and the case of conservationist and whistle-blower Fred Daniel. For the first time, all aspects of the case are submitted in a single affidavit, including the contents of the “missing dockets” as reported by Daily Maverick in August 2022. “Hotlinks” to the attendant evidence are also included in the complaint.
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The top line
“We propose that the suspects referred to in the paragraphs below be charged under the umbrella offence of contravening Section 2(1)(d) of the Prevention of Organised Crime Act 121 of 1988 (POCA) in that they acquired or maintained, directly or indirectly, any interest in or control of the following criminal enterprises.”

The implication of this sentence, which introduces the criminal complaint submitted by the Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (Outa) to the Investigating Directorate of the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA), may very well be that Deputy President DD “The Cat” Mabuza has run out of lives.

Lodged on the morning of 5 December 2022, the affidavit places Mabuza at the top of a list of 15 suspects, all of whom were allegedly involved in a pair of interlinked criminal enterprises that – according to a 2015 report compiled by retired judge Willem Heath – cost the South African economy in excess of R35-billion.

Among the specific crimes listed under the umbrella of POCA are: defeating the ends of justice, theft, fraud, perjury, contempt of court, intimidation, extortion and “conspiracy, incitement or attempt to commit any offence referred to in Schedule 1 of POCA.”

EVIDENCE OF CRIMINAL COMPLAINT

The affidavit incorporates an intricate web of allegations that stretch back to 2002, two years before the so-called land claims scam was exposed in the South African press. Significantly, it relies for the most part on oral and documentary evidence already submitted to the Pretoria High Court, where conservationist Fred Daniel has been waging a 12-year battle against Mabuza and the South African government.

Daniel’s R1-billion civil action, covered at length by Daily Maverick – the only media organisation in the country that successfully applied, via its lawyers, for access to the trial – has also seen the admission to the court record of a number of expert reports, which have been included in the criminal complaint as corroborating evidence.

At the same time, the complaint refers to a matter in which Daily Maverick’s reporting has been implicated. In March 2022, we published an investigative feature that tracked a reportedly “pivotal” aspect of the scam, from a hijacked community trust to fake letters of credit and the likely involvement of Pam Golding Properties. The endpoint of Daily Maverick’s reporting was the alleged complicity of Mabuza’s wife, Nonhlanhla Patience Mnisi.

On the back of Daily Maverick’s exposé, in early winter 2022, an investigation was launched by the head of the Serious Corruption Offences unit of the Hawks, Major-General Kubandran Moodley. But the investigation ran out of steam, we reported, when it was discovered that three prior criminal dockets – which covered the same allegations as those highlighted in our original piece – had inexplicably “been emptied” or “gone missing”.

In paragraph 8 of the criminal complaint, Outa refers to this latter “explosive article”, as well as to a further three dockets that were likewise tampered with. In the complaint’s conclusion, paragraph 266 states: “The proverbial smoking gun is the removal of evidence from the dockets and the squashing of altogether 6 criminal cases pertaining to the criminal enterprises.”

For the first time, then, Outa consolidates the full list of allegations, including the contents of the missing dockets, into a single affidavit. Certain events that have so far not been tested in the Pretoria High Court, such as an alleged pre-planned assault watched over by a “smirking” Mabuza on a member of Daniel’s team, have also been listed.

By Daily Maverick’s reckoning, although the case remains unavoidably complex, the 41-page affidavit presents the evidence in the most concise and watertight manner possible. It leads the prosecutors, headed by Andrea Johnson of the Investigating Directorate – who, in her own words, is “committed to bringing impactful cases to court in the fight against corruption” – methodically through the litany of allegations, beginning about two decades back and ending in the present.

The land restitution scam

To start, Outa divides the complaint into two interlinked criminal enterprises: a “land restitution scam” and a “Problem Animal Fund enterprise”. The former, explains Outa, is essentially about “obtaining beneficial control of vast tracts of land (sometimes fraudulently) and selling the land at inflated prices to the land claims commission”, while the latter is about “generating income by killing wildlife and aiding and abetting the land restitution scam”.

These enterprises, as Outa alleges, “acting in concert and in common purpose”, came into conflict with private sector tourism and conservation, and “in particular” they targeted Daniel’s “Cradle of Life Project” in Mpumalanga.

Kicking off with the land restitution scam, Outa cites the Restitution of Land Rights Act and Section 25(7) of the Constitution – specifically, the provision that “precludes someone dispossessed of rights in land before 19 June 1913 from claiming the restitution of land or equitable redress of those rights” – to demonstrate how a significant number of claims lodged in the Badplaas region of Mpumalanga were fraudulent.

After listing a sample of eight farms on which claims were lodged in the early 2000s, the affidavit bluntly states: “It is evident from the historical deeds and property registers of the above farms that President Paul Kruger granted title to ‘Boers’ long before the Land Act of 19 June 1913.”

Then, Outa mentions for the first time the “architect” of the land restitution scam, Mpumalanga businessman Pieter Visagie, who is named as the second suspect – directly below Mabuza – in the criminal complaint.

Homing in on the farm Vygeboom, Outa provides the NPA with “hotlinks” to the title deed and property register, which show that the land was granted to the original owner in 1870. On 6 April 2002, the affidavit explains, a corporate entity controlled by Visagie, V8 Cattle Ranch (Pty) Ltd, purchased Vygeboom for R1.2-millon.

It is here that the pattern of extreme overvaluation of the farms, ultimately paid for by the South African taxpayer with the complicity of the Mpumalanga Regional Land Claims Commission (MRLCC), comes into focus.

“On 22 August 2003,” the affidavit notes, “Nceba Nqana, the land claim commissioner of the MRLCC, obtained an ‘independent’ valuation of Vygeboom from Clifford Michael Brandon who certified the market value of the property on page 9 of his valuation to be R 2.9-million.”

Brandon, as demonstrated in a seminal Ernst & Young report commissioned by the South African government, was later found to be an agent of Visagie. But more significantly, Nqana – who is listed as the fourth suspect in the affidavit – requested ministerial approval to purchase the eight farms mentioned above, including the farm Vygeboom.

The evidence of Nqana’s request is contained in a Section 42 D Memorandum, dated 17 February 2004.

“What is striking about the Memorandum,” Outa notes, “is that all the land claimants are lumped together under the Ndwandwa Community Trust, which Visagie had set up in terms of The Communal Property Associations Act 28 of 1996 to hold land on behalf of land claimants. It has never been clarified which of the above land claimants claimed the entire Vygeboom comprising 306ha before the cut-off date of 31 December 1998.”

Ultimately, Outa shows, Vygeboom was purchased by the Ndwandwa Community Trust – with the backing of the MRLCC – for a reported R4.5-million, which equated to “the theft of land restitution funds of R3.3-million”. Not only that, Outa continues, but the land claim to Vygeboom was “non-existent” because the claimants had been left unverified “due to ‘political’ interference”.

From this point, the affidavit expands into the bigger picture. It refers again to the Ernst & Young report, which forms part of the trial bundle in Daniel’s ongoing civil action against the government, listed as case number 34502/2010 in the Pretoria High Court.

This report, notes Outa, was corroborated by the testimony of forensic investigator Paul O’Sullivan in early September 2021 (see Daily Maverick’s exclusive coverage here), where Visagie was confirmed as the scam’s architect.

The same evidence was likewise supplied to the Badplaas police station, in CAS 43/10/2016, which, as Outa points out elsewhere, was one of the six criminal cases that were squashed. In that specific docket, O’Sullivan had included his own report – and here, Outa refers the NPA to “Annexure D”, where the “massive profits” taken by Visagie and his provincial government partners were laid out in graphs.

How big were these profits?

While Outa can’t say exactly, it can refer back to the MRLCC’s Section 42 D Memorandum, where “R103-million was requested from the Department of Land Affairs to settle various land claims in favour of [Visagie’s] corporate entities”.

But according to Ernst & Young, Outa continues, “the total payments in respect of land purchases in Badplaas by the MRLCC amounted to R206,275,524.00 during the period of review, which was between 1 April 2003 to 31 August 2004”.

The Ernst & Young report, the affidavit notes, implicates not only Nqana but his project manager, Linda Mbatha, who is consequently named as the seventh suspect in the criminal complaint.

“The above transactions,” Outa concludes, “represent the first phase of what might be described as a land grab by fraudulently converting labour tenancy claims into land restitution claims for entire farms. The second phase targeted the Msauli Village and the third phase the Nkomazi Wilderness [Daniel’s former nature reserve].”

Msauli Village

Back in 1999, the affidavit explains, Daniel’s former attorney, Richard Spoor, sent a goodwill letter to the MRLCC, “together with a map of the nature reserve that his clients were in the process of establishing”. After conducting his research into the history of the area and obtaining the relevant title deeds, Spoor advised Daniel in a report dated December 2000 that there was “no threat of restitution” on the proposed farms.

Spoor’s advice, Outa states, would later turn out to be “consistent with a reported Land Claims Court judgement of Meer J in 2018”.

But Daniel’s project was first targeted, the affidavit notes, “when Nqana informed Daniel in 2003 that a land claim had been lodged on the Msauli Village, farm Diepgezet 388JU”.

At this point, the affidavit refers to a secondary report, titled “Msauli Village Land Grab”, which lays out Daniel’s achievements in the establishment of a local community initiative. Given what is alleged in the next few paragraphs, Outa sees fit here to refer to “the tragic consequences of corruption”.

Paragraph 58 states: “Towards the end of 2003, Visagie made an offer to Daniel to buy the Nkomazi Wilderness at 300% higher than its value as agricultural land. Visagie said that he was connected to Mabuza and advised him to sell, rather than wait for a land claim to be gazetted on his land.”

Followed, with the attendant evidence, by paragraph 59: “Daniel refused to accept the offer, and on 21 May 2004 the MRLCC did what Visagie had warned Daniel would happen and gazetted land claims over the boundaries of the entire Nkomazi Wilderness.”

The above sequence of events, Outa continues, was corroborated by Spoor’s written statement (paragraphs 34 to 39) submitted to the Pretoria High Court on 10 February 2022.

“This cannot be a coincidence,” the affidavit alleges, “and constitutes prima facie evidence that the land claims were orchestrated by Nqana.”

In September 2004, after a final letter from Spoor to Nqana drew no positive response, the story broke in the South African press under the title of “SA’s own land grab”. As Daily Maverick has previously reported, the whistle-blowers were Daniel and Spoor.

In retaliation, Outa goes on, Nqana and others “orchestrated violent protests at the Nkomazi Reserve. They branded pliers to send a message that they intend to cut the fences of the Reserve if Daniel did not capitulate.”

At the bottom of page 12 of the criminal complaint, a photograph of one of these protests is included with the caption: “Crowds gathered outside Nkomazi Reserve on 1 December 2005 to force owners of the Nkomazi Reserve to recognise unlawful land claims.”

Taking control of the Ndwandwa Community Trust

Next, Outa moves on to the hijacking of the Ndwandwa Community Trust, where Visagie makes his reappearance. It is asserted here that the Badplaas businessman, supported by Nqana, “fraudulently substituted” a lawful trustee, Chief Robert Nkosi, with a “pliable trustee”, MJ Nkosi, in November 2006. This was done, the affidavit alleges, after the former “expressed his concern over Visagie’s plans to transfer additional farms to the Trust”.

As evidence of the crime, Outa cites the sworn affidavit of Daniel Krige, former Deputy Master of the North Gauteng High Court, who testified in the document that he had provided his feedback on the “fraudulent letters of authority” to the Department of Justice by the late winter of 2011. Moreover, Outa cites the court order of Judge Eberhard Bertelsmann, issued in November 2011, that the fake trustees should resign and that (Chief Robert) Nkosi should be reinstated.

“Chief Nkosi laid charges of fraud and theft against Visagie and MJ Nkosi at the Badplaas Police Station under CAS 28/09/2011,” the affidavit adds, referring to one of the three case dockets that Daily Maverick would later reveal had been emptied.

“The NPA issued summons in criminal proceedings against Visagie and must therefore have believed there was a prima facie case against Visagie, but despite the fact that Chief Nkosi put himself at considerable risk, the charges were withdrawn.”

Circumvention of PAIA application and threat of expropriation

On 10 February 2022, during his evidence-in-chief before the Pretoria High Court, Spoor provided testimony that Nqana and the new land claims commissioner, Peter Mhangwani, had (as Outa puts it) “stonewalled his attempts between 2004-2007 to obtain information about the merits of the alleged land restitution claims”.

In desperation, on 21 February 2007, Spoor brought a PAIA application “to compel the MRLCC to provide the information he needed to advise Daniel on the merits of the claims.”

But Mhangwani’s response, the affidavit contends, was to “prematurely refer the land claims to the Land Claims Court on 23 March 2007 (LCC 33/2007) and refuse to comply with the PAIA application”.

In a “fraudulent certificate”, Outa alleges, Mhangwani claimed that it was “not feasible to resolve the dispute by way of mediation as prescribed by Section 14(1)(b) of the Restitution of Land Rights Act”.

Then, as the next step in the intricate web of allegations (an allegation fleshed out further down in the affidavit), Outa asserts that Mabuza – who had recently been promoted to premier of Mpumalanga – committed perjury:

“Mabuza perpetuated the above cover-up on 25 March 2011, by stating falsely under oath (North Gauteng Division of the High Court in Case No. 19108/10) that the aforesaid land claims had been fully ventilated in the Land Claims Court.”

The contention, according to Outa’s reading of the records, is that the matter “has remained in abeyance in the Land Claims Court since 2007 to cover up the fact that the land claims were fraudulent”.

While a narrative context of Mabuza’s alleged perjury can be read in the third part of Daily Maverick‘s “Dead Matter” series, published in March 2021, Outa continues in the affidavit to highlight the “threat of expropriation”.

Referring once again to the MRLCC’s “circumvention of the PAIA application”, the affidavit notes that the then land affairs minister, Lulama Xingwana, “upped the ante by serving a Notice of Possible Expropriation dated 2 May 2007… on portion 26 of the farm Keez Zyn Doorn 708JT.”

Daniel, Outa points out, was in the process of purchasing the farm for incorporation into his conservation project and was waiting for transfer to take place.

“The Notice and caveats were removed by the Deeds Office,” the criminal complaint states, “after Spoor in a letter dated 23 August 2007 requested information to verify the Keez Zyn Doorn land claim and threatened litigation to set aside the Notice and caveats.”

Assaults on Travelport and John Allen

As reported by Daily Maverick in a number of articles that have comprised our 13-part series, Daniel was forced by what Outa terms “the above unlawful land claims and conduct of the enterprise to cover up the crime” to sell Nkomazi Wilderness to Emirati state-owned company Dubai World at a loss.

But the sale, which took place in March 2008, came with a proviso – to “keep his dream alive” and “mitigate his damages”, Daniel retained the plots of Travelport and Komati Springs inside the reserve, as well as “valuable” traversing rights.

“Dubai World agreed in writing that Travelport would be connected to the Reserve,” Outa notes, after pointing out that the 1,000-hectare plot, with its facilities for day visitors and a biopark for educational purposes, was now Daniel’s new residence. “It would become part of a Transfrontier Park initiative connecting back-to-back conservation initiatives into Swaziland and Mozambique.”

Unfortunately, adds Outa, the sale of Nkomazi Wilderness “did not remove Daniel as an obstacle and threat to the land restitution scam/corrupt enterprise”.

Enter Mabuza, who in mid-July 2008, in his capacity as the Mpumalanga MEC for land affairs and agriculture, set up the so-called Greater Badplaas Land Claim Committee (GBLCC), a lobby group for land claimants in Badplaas.

“This is confirmed,” Outa states, “in an email from [local ANC ward councillor] Pro Khoza dated 18 July 2008.”

Paragraph 103 of the affidavit then states: “On 2 August 2008 a large group of people were bused in from Middleburg by the GBLCC to launch an assault on Travelport. The purpose was to intimidate Daniel to [admit the land claim], which formed part of Travelport.”

Outa includes a photograph in the affidavit to demonstrate the violent nature of the assault, as well as a link to an article in the Lowvelder that “shows the extent of fences destroyed by the mob”.

The assault, the affidavit contends, was pre-planned: “Kobus Vermeulen, a former member of the Badplaas SAPS, testified (pg. 230 – 238) in the North Gauteng Division of the High Court in Case No. 34502/2010 on 1 August 2021 that the local police were instructed not to get involved.”

As Daily Maverick reported at the time and as Outa repeats, the evidence was not contested in the high court.

“Vermeulen testified (pg. 236),” Outa continues, “that Mabuza arrived on the scene accompanied by police from another area and stood on the back of a pick-up truck with a loudhailer and told the attackers to go home and that he will make sure they get ‘their’ land back.”

Vermeulen’s evidence, the criminal complaint adds, was corroborated by an affidavit of local journalist Bheki Mashile, “who witnessed the assault on Travelport”.

During the protest, Outa alleges, Daniel’s business partner John Allen (see more below) was “kicked” and “robbed of his camera”. Simon Huba, another partner of Daniel’s, was allegedly “held in a safe and tortured by the police who called him an impimpi”. Huba, since deceased, had testified to this in his own affidavit, Outa states.

In the same vein, Vermeulen himself would later get the treatment: “Vermeulen also testified that Pro Khoza and members of the GBLCC assaulted him and held him and other policemen hostage at the Badplaas police station for hours…

“Members of the Badplaas police station laid a complaint at the Human Rights Commission on 21 October 2008 following the above conduct of Pro Khoza and the GBLCC.”

Also, as Outa notes, two high court judges ruled that members of the GBLCC were interdicted from violence, intimidation and attacking Travelport’s fences. But that didn’t appear to stop another assault from occurring, on 12 September 2008, at a meeting at the Forever Resort in Badplaas with Mabuza and members of the GBLCC.

“Mabuza,” the affidavit explains, “had earlier called Daniel to arrange a meeting between him and the GBLCC. Realising that his presence may aggravate the conflict, Daniel sent Spoor and Allen to attend on his behalf.”

Allegedly, the Mpumalanga MEC was the chair of the meeting. On Allen’s arrival (Spoor arrived late), members of the GBLCC “immediately started to assault and swear at him”.

The assault, Outa notes, is described in paragraph 95 of Allen’s witness statement. “Mabuza, according to Allen, watched with his arms folded and a smirk on his face.”

About six weeks later, on 17 October 2008, a second telephone conversation occurred between Daniel and Mabuza. Outa includes the cellular records in the affidavit, which contains the number of Mabuza’s bodyguard at the time, and adds in a footnote on page 20 that a further perjury would be committed in the sworn affidavit of March 2011, where the Mpumalanga premier denied that the conversation took place.

Daniel, it’s alleged, had called Mabuza to ask for his protection. “Mabuza,” Outa notes, “told him that he cannot protect him if he does not recognise the land claim on Travelport.”

In paragraph 126, Outa sums it all up as follows: “The assault on Travelport and John Allen, and Mabuza’s veiled threat that he cannot protect Daniel if he does not recognise the Travelport land claim, amount to the common law offence of attempted extortion and the statutory offence of intimidation under sections 1(1) and 1a(1) of the Intimidation Act 72 of 1982.”

Payment by Mabuza to Visagie and defeating the ends of justice

“O’Sullivan’s testimony on 6 September 2021 in the North Gauteng Division of the High Court,” Outa continues, “also links Mabuza to the land claim corruption.”

The testimony (pg. 363-366) was that one Sunnyboy Maphanga, in his capacity as deputy director in the office of Mabuza, on 9 December 2008 motivated a payment of R3.4-million to Visagie.

“This was on top of the already inflated land prices of up to 2,500% for farms which Visagie sold to the MRLCC,” Outa explains. “The same Visagie identified by Ernst & Young… as the ‘architect’ of the land restitution scam.”

As it turned out, Maphanga and Mabuza were business partners and directors of the same private company, Nelesco. Although Mike Hellens SC, Mabuza’s counsel in the civil trial, denied in the Pretoria High Court that they were business partners, he did not deny that they were co-directors.

In paragraph 131, one of the most damning paragraphs of the entire affidavit, Outa adds: “O’Sullivan further testified (pg. 363-366) that Mabuza on the basis of Maphanga’s motivation signed a letter dated 6 January 2009 requesting the MRLCC to pay the R3.4-million to Visagie.”

Hellens, Outa notes, tried to minimise Mabuza’s involvement in the payment to Visagie, stating that his client relied on a committee to advise him.

But, aside from Mabuza’s co-directorship with Maphanga, there is evidence in the criminal complaint that this was a ruse.

“Visagie requested the above payment after FNB brought a liquidation application in the [High Court] against V8 Cattle Ranch (Pty) Ltd. An entity, according to the Ernst & Young report, controlled by Visagie.”

Paragraph 134 expands: “Evidence of the liquidation is found in paragraphs 14.2-16.1.2 of Visagie’s Particulars of Claim in a damages claim against FNB that arose from the liquidation. Of particular interest is a reference in paragraph 16.1.1 to a comfort letter from the Premier of Mpumalanga that payment of R3,149,950.00 was on its way.”

It appears that the “real reason” for the payment was to stave off the liquidation of Visagie’s V8 Cattle Ranch, Outa adds, and “not to rectify incorrect valuations (five years later) of already massively inflated land values”.

The result, Outa alleges, is that “Mabuza and Maphanga thus committed fraud by making a misrepresentation to the MRLCC that Visagie’s V8 Cattle Ranch (Pty) Ltd was underpaid an amount of R3,149,950.00”.

As Outa points out, the payment of R3.4-million, with the remainder as interest, would form the basis of criminal charges brought by the Economic Freedom Fighters against Mabuza in late 2015 (a report by the Lowvelder is included in the affidavit). But once more, nothing would come of the charges.

As promised, Outa now returns to the statement under oath, signed by Mabuza in March 2011, that the Badplaas land claims had been “fully investigated and fully ventilated” in the Land Claims Court.

Mabuza’s sworn statement, Outa contends, “was made to oppose Daniel’s applications for the appointment of a commission of enquiry into the malfeasance relating to the land claims”.

Paragraph 141 concludes thus: “Mabuza was prepared to defeat the ends of justice and commit perjury because he could not afford having a commission of enquiry exposing the Badplaas land claims corruption.”

IFASA land claim corruption & Mabuza’s wife

In the ensuing section of the complaint, Outa focuses on the alleged criminal offences as outlined by Daily Maverick in a 6,500-word investigative feature published in March 2022 – the same feature, as mentioned above, that gave rise to the aborted investigation of the Hawks.

“Also in 2011,” Outa begins, “Daniel caught wind that Dubai World was attempting to sell the Reserve to the MRLCC in the next phase of the land restitution scam/corrupt enterprise. This time the enterprise used a company by the name of IFASA and its director, Gustav de Waal, as a front.”

The enterprise intended to transfer the land of the nature reserve to the Ndwandwa Community Trust, the affidavit notes, which was at the time still controlled by MJ Nkosi and his fellow members of the GBLCC.

“The 2017 Delius report of the government found that only 7 families had limited labour tenancy claims in Badplaas,” Outa makes clear. “No claims existed in 2011 that could justify the return of the entire farms that constituted the Reserve.”

Still, “Dubai World was so desperate to sell the Reserve that it was willing to turn a blind eye to the prima facie evidence that no genuine land claims existed…”

The fraudulent scheme planned to change the land use of the Reserve back to agriculture, the NPA is informed, and it would have been funded by a government guarantee of R350-million.

“The purpose of the scheme is apparent from the IFASA minutes of a meeting on 9 April 2011, a meeting introducing MJ Nkosi as the programme director.”

To achieve its goal, Outa adds, IFASA “dangled an investment of R2.5-billion” (in the form of a fake letter of credit from an attorney) in community agricultural projects in front of the MRLCC.

But the scheme, which was hatched before Judge Bertelsmann, set aside the Trust’s fake letters of authority, was successfully challenged by Daniel in case number 35279/2011 of the Pretoria High Court.

Daniel, according to Outa, “stopped the fraudulent scheme in its tracks and saved… the fiscus more than R350-million.”

Then, picking up where the Hawks left off in July 2022, Outa suggests the following:

“The then acting land claim commissioner of the MRLCC, Tumi Seboka, the director of IFASA, Gustav de Waal, Dubai World, and Patience Mnisi (the wife of Mabuza) of Pam Golding were involved in the attempted IFASA land grab.

“Seboka, De Waal, Dubai World and Patience Mnisi should be investigated for the conspiracy to commit fraud against the MRLCC and the Department of Land Affairs by negotiating the settlement of a fraudulent land claim on the Nkomazi Reserve.”

It is here, referring to CAS 28/09/2011, CAS 57/10/2011 and CAS 47/03/2014, that Outa cites the email sent by a Hawks colonel to Jacques Joubert, Daniel’s advocate, on 17 June 2022 – it was confirmed in this email, Outa notes, that “some of the criminal dockets had disappeared and, in others, the evidence had been removed.”

Outa continues: “It appears correct when Mabuza said in Parliament that there is no evidence against him and in a press release on 3 February 2018, stated:

“If Mr. Daniels [sic] with his cohorts have any evidence of any wrong doing in particular of criminal nature, he can lay the charges directly with the Hawks in Pretoria, the Public Protector etc.”

Controlling the litigation and the ruling of Ngcukaitobi AJ

In 2015, Outa notes, Mabuza, as premier of Mpumalanga, “took control of the damages litigation” in case number 34502/2010 of the Pretoria High Court.

“He did so by moving the files from the [Mpumalanga Tourism and Parks Agency] to the premier’s offices. See page 144 lines 30-35 of the MTPA’s annual report of 2015/2016.”

Three years later, on 5 December 2018, Mabuza in his capacity as deputy president “filed a discovery affidavit on behalf of the MEC for land affairs and agriculture”, which was his previous position.

On 28 May 2019, Outa adds, during a meeting with Acting DJP Raulinga, Ferreira (SC) confirmed: “I also act for Mr David Mabuza in his personal capacity, who was sworn in as the deputy president today…”

Ferreira’s role, Outa explains, was taken over by Hellens in 2020.

Then, on 8 April 2021, “Mabuza filed a new discovery affidavit in which he discovered his curriculum vitae, stating that he as deputy president is leading government efforts to fast-track land reform”.

The point of it all, Outa contends, is this: “Mabuza is not cited as a defendant in the damages litigation, but the objective facts demonstrate that his shadow looms large over the litigation in the North Gauteng Division of the High Court in Case No. 34502/2010.”

Significantly, while the above was playing out, advocate Tembeka Ngcukaitobi, at the time an acting judge in the Land Claims Court, had given his ruling in case number LCC 60/2012.

The ruling, Outa notes, set aside the “unlawful consolidation of the Badplaas land claims under a single claim under reference number KRP12145”.

It also set aside the “unlawful transfer and registration of the land into the Ndwandwa Community Trust”.

Ngcukaitobi, Outa states, was “not prepared to rubber stamp [the] unlawful settlement agreement placed before him”.

In paragraph 181, the criminal complaint continues: “The City Press of 17 January 2016 under the headline ‘Court takes back the land’ reported on the above judgement by the Land Claims Court as follows: ‘A 12-year battle in Mpumalanga over whether the state may have been ripped off by a trust falsely claiming to represent black interests is coming to a head’.”

But here, according to Outa, is the kicker: “Mabuza’s then spokesperson, Zibonele Mncwango, distanced Mabuza from the land grab allegations in the City Press and simply stated that land claims were not his competence.”

Contempt of court and insolvency proceedings

To protect himself, Outa alleges, Deputy President Mabuza continued to defeat the ends of justice:

“On 19 February 2018, he handed up a false affidavit in the Carolina Magistrate Court in proceedings under the Protection from Harassment Act No. 17 of 2011 in Case No. 16/18.”

Mabuza’s attorney, Outa states, “falsely concludes in paragraph 6 of the affidavit that Daniel did not furnish the magistrate Godfrey Netshiozwi with the evidence contained in two lever arch files when he granted the interim protection order (IPO) in favour of Daniel on 29 January 2018.”

Netshiozwi, Outa goes on, “is prepared to testify that the conclusion drawn by Mabuza’s attorney (and later by magistrate Grabe) was patently false. It is absurd to conclude that an applicant would not furnish his evidence to the Court, especially if each annexure (evidence) is meticulously referred to in the founding affidavit.”

As Outa alleges, “the purpose of the fraud was to have the interim protection order dismissed and to obtain a credibility finding against Daniel.” Reference is made here to paragraphs 41 and 43 of magistrate Grabe’s judgement of 27 August 2018.

This finding by Grabe, Outa contends, mirrors an earlier press release of Mabuza on 2 February 2018: “The press release alleged that Daniel was a ‘fabricator of evidence and a serial abuser of the court process’.”

What this implies, according to Outa, is that Mabuza was in contempt of Annexure “A” of the 28 January 2018 IPO.

“Mabuza,” states Outa, “contravened Section 18(1)(a) of the Protection from Harassment Act when he made the press release and [is] liable on conviction to imprisonment of up to 5 years.”

Consideration should also be given, Outa adds, “to investigate Grabe for contravening Section 8 of the Prevention and Combating of Corrupt Activities Act 12 of 2004 relating to corrupt activities by judicial officers.”

In doing so, the criminal complaint states, “Grabe was putting Daniel’s life at risk”.

Still, in 2019, “as part of the ongoing attempt to discredit Daniel as a witness”, IFASA “crawled out of the woodwork” – a full eight years, Outa notes, after Daniel had prevented the scheme from coming to fruition.

“IFASA joined an application to liquidate Mountain View Investments (Pty) Ltd and sequestrate Daniel… both plaintiffs in the special damages trial in the North Gauteng Division of the High Court in Case no. 34502/2010.”

As it transpired, IFASA had submitted a requisition that the plaintiffs owed it R372-million in damages for scuppering the deal in 2011.

“On cue,” states Outa, “Ferreira (SC), former senior counsel for Mabuza, during a meeting on 28 May 2019 for the allocation of trial dates, informed the acting Deputy Judge President of the North Gauteng Division, Raulinga J, that dates could not be allocated because two of the plaintiffs [had] been sequestrated.”

Daniel, in return, laid charges of fraud against the perpetrators under CAS 373/03/2019 at Pretoria Central Police Station.

Three years later, Outa notes, SAPS “has done nothing to investigate the fake creditor’s requisitions”.

Mabuza’s non-existent niece and further contempt of court

But the most chilling aspect of the charges, by any account, is reserved for paragraphs 203 to 213.

“After obtaining credibility findings by Grabe,” Outa states, “and by November 2018, elements in Crime Intelligence connected to Mabuza’s special adviser Mr Mulangi Mphego set in motion a plan to once and for all discredit Daniel as a witness of the land restitution scam/corrupt enterprise”.

The plan, the NPA is informed, “involved a non-existent niece, Thandeka Mabuza, who gave Daniel an affidavit creating a false narrative that she had overheard Mabuza plotting to have Daniel and his family murdered”.

While elements of the story were covered by Daily Maverick in February 2022, shortly after we had accompanied the Pretoria High Court on its in loco inspection of Daniel’s former nature reserve, Outa’s presentation is – by a long shot – the more devastating.

“Brigadier Xaba of the Crimes Against the State Unit of the Hawks sent Captain Matipi and Warrant Officer Koekemoer to investigate Daniel. Their involvement in the plot to protect the Deputy President of South Africa cannot be excluded.”

As it happened and thanks to facial recognition technology, Outa adds, “Thandeka” was exposed on Facebook as being one Nomfundo Sambo. The elaborate plot, as a result, quickly unravelled.

True to form, notes Outa, “Daniel laid criminal charges against the perpetrators under CAS 401/11/2018 at Pretoria Central Police Station”.

There was, however, still a bizarre series of contradictions.

“Captain Matipi informed Daniel that Sambo (a former school teacher) had been paid R750,000 shortly after Grabe’s judgement and claimed that she had won the money at a casino in Witbank. She later claimed that Daniel had paid her the money.”

As Outa alleges: “Someone must have exerted pressure on Captain Matipi because he suddenly began treating Daniel as a suspect by requesting a warning statement from him.

“The Hawks appear to believe that Daniel was behind a conspiracy to discredit Mabuza, a belief consistent with Mabuza’s press release and Grabe’s credibility finding that Daniel was a fabricator of evidence and serial abuser of the court system.

“The Hawks, it appears, were making common cause with Mabuza’s efforts to discredit Daniel as a witness of organised crime.”

Finally, as for how this pattern has been playing out recently in the civil trial, Outa concurs with the assessment of Daily Maverick, offered in August 2021 and again in September 2022, that the “Stalingrad Defence” has so far won the day.

“To further defeat the ends of justice,” the criminal complaint notes, “Mabuza has instructed the State Attorney to pull out all stops to prevent the plaintiffs from exercising their Section 34 rights under the Constitution in the North Gauteng Division of the High Court in Case no. 34502/2010.

“As a result of such instructions, Mabuza’s legal team has committed contempt of court on numerous occasions by disobeying judicial directives to limit the issues in dispute.

“The purpose of the above conduct was to create the illusion that wide-ranging factual disputes existed despite the government’s own forensic reports to the contrary.”

Outa’s concluding word on the land restitution scam is, therefore, the following: “It is estimated that the fees of 4 counsel briefed by the State Attorney by now would have cost the South African taxpayer in the region of R50-million. These are funds that could have been far better spent.”

The Problem Animal Fund enterprise

On page 31 of the 41-page affidavit, the second aspect of the criminal enterprise is at last addressed. Although the allegations here are not as wide-ranging or comprehensive, they appear to demonstrate – again with hotlinks to the attendant evidence – the direct connection between State Capture and ecosystem collapse in South Africa.

“The Problem Animal Fund enterprise exploited the province’s biodiversity by monetising the killing of so-called problem animals,” Outa begins. “This was done by selling hunting permits to the highest bidder.”

To this end, the NPA is informed, it “repurposed” the Wildlife Protection Services of the MTPA.

“Wild animals in Mpumalanga had to be protected against the employees of the WPS who were mandated to protect them according to Paul O’Sullivan’s evidence (pg. 135) on 17 August 2021 in the North Gauteng Division of the High Court in Case No. 34502/2010.”

The Fund, Outa notes, operated a private Nedbank account (Account Number 000179) “outside the controls” of the Public Finance Management Act No.1 of 1999 (PFMA).

“O’Sullivan found on page 3, paragraph 4.1 and on page 8 (bullet point 3) of his 2010 forensic report that the Fund contravened the PFMA. The report was commissioned by the MTPA.”

O’Sullivan further testified (pg. 329 – 333), Outa notes, that “WPS employees decided which animals were problem animals, issued hunting permits to the highest bidder and then paid the proceeds into the Fund (without oversight) controlled by them.”

Charles Ndabeni, the MTPA’s CEO at the time, “confirms O’Sullivan’s evidence of a conflict of interest” in paragraph 44 of his witness statement.

Ndabeni also testified, Outa notes, that “employees of the MTPA were hostile towards Daniel”. In line with the general strategy of discrediting him, they “described him as a racist who unlawfully occupied land”.

O’Sullivan, for his part, was told during his preparation of the above report – which was commissioned by Ndabeni – that Daniel “was an evil person and must be stopped” (here, Outa refers again to O’Sullivan’s testimony in the Pretoria High Court).

But, as Daily Maverick reported in the first and second parts of our “Dead Matter” series, published in March 2021, the truth appeared to be otherwise.

“[Acting] in breach of the MTPA’s mandate to protect biodiversity,” Outa notes, the WPS employees “obstructed and frustrated” Daniel’s attempts to obtain “formal authorisation for an animal rehabilitation facility for injured and so-called problem animals,” even though he had made a “substantial application for a rehab permit.”

Further, Outa adds, these same employees withheld “critically important authorisation (especially to keep lions)” that would have enabled Nkomazi Wilderness to market itself as a big five destination, so as to be in a position “to generate income for its core purpose of conservation”.

Next, under the banner of “defeating the ends of justice”, Outa names the core perpetrators of the alleged crimes: Jan Muller and Juan de Beer.

The allegation is that these departmental managers, aided and abetted by junior staff of the WPS, “criminalised the care of rescue animals at the project’s rehabilitation facilities, by invoking Section 29 of the Mpumalanga Nature Conservation Act (No 10 of 1998)”. This was done, Outa explains, “even though the project’s intention was to rehabilitate and not keep the animals”, as prohibited by Section 29 without a permit.

De Beer, Outa continues, obtained a search warrant with false information “that the project kept lions in secret cages for canned hunting”. As reported by the Lowvelder, “the police found no cages after a search on 22 May 2008 with a GPS location.” The search was conducted, according to Outa’s evidence, “on foot, by vehicle and by helicopter”.

Still, on 18 June 2008, the WPS “raided the rehab” to “confiscate and steal” the problem animals. Here, the allegations in Outa’s criminal complaint home in on a leopard that was euthanised.

“Juan de Beer of the MTPA committed fraud and perjury in the [High Court],” Outa alleges, “when he stated on 17 July 2008 in paragraph 17.2 of his affidavit that the leopard had to be destroyed because it was in such a poor condition, whereas it could not have been in a poor condition because it was sold by the WPS to Life Form Taxidermists in White River.”

There were another three instances wherein De Beer committed fraud and perjury in the same affidavit, Outa contends. One of these instances had to do with the sale of the confiscated animals to the Rhino and Lion Park in Gauteng. The contention of De Beer was that the park had “adequate facilities for the rehab animals”, but Outa includes photographic evidence that “they were decrepit and had no rehab facilities”.

As for the authorisation to keep lions that was denied Daniel, the very same authorisation was allegedly granted to Dubai World after the sale went through.

“Jan Muller of the WPS committed fraud and perjury in [the High Court],” Outa notes, “when he stated on 29 August 2012 in paragraph 19 of his answering affidavit that authorisation for lion had only been granted to Dubai World on 3 August 2009, whereas it had been granted a year earlier on 2 September 2008, as is borne out by the objective facts.

“Muller was willing to make a demonstrably false statement to create distance between when Daniel’s companies owned the Reserve (and failed to obtain the authorisation for lions) and when Dubai World became owners and obtained the authorisation on the exact same facts and circumstances.”

From here, Outa proceeds into what it terms “the barrier fence fraud”, an aspect of the case that – as Daily Maverick reported – appeared to spook the counsel for the defence during the civil trial’s in loco inspection. This, as Outa makes it clear, is a fraud that is still being perpetrated at the time of writing.

“To obtain the above authorisation for lion and other species,” Outa notes, “Dubai World was induced to excise 9,000ha of prime habitat from the Nkomazi Reserve for cattle farmers. This was done by erecting a 10km barrier fence between October 2008 and October 2009.

“The barrier fence violated Dubai World’s elephant permit conditions that had been set by the MTPA that there should be no more than 10 elephants on a minimum of 12,700ha.

“It also violated Section 101(2)(b)&(c) of the National Environmental Management: Biodiversity Act No. 10 of 2004.”

Accordingly, Outa states, “by enabling the excising of 9000ha from the Reserve to satisfy the demands of the criminal enterprise”, Muller is in breach of Section 4 of the Prevention and Combating of Corrupt Activities Act.

The criminal complaint includes links to a pair of expert reports, one by the defendants’ witness and one by the plaintiffs’ witness, that detail the damage caused by the illegal fence to the area’s biodiversity. During the fourth session of the civil trial, Outa notes, the government defendants, “as part of a pattern of obfuscation”, jettisoned their own expert’s opinion.

And by this point in the criminal complaint, the pattern appeared to be clear. In 2014, criminal charges were laid against Dubai World “arising from the fence fraud that had caused damages of R270-million to the environment”.

The charges were laid at the Badplaas Police Station, under CAS 47/03/2014. As Daily Maverick reported in August 2022 – and as Outa repeats – when the new team of Hawks investigators travelled to Badplaas to retrieve the evidence, all they found was “a useless file purporting to be a docket”.

The bottom line

In their seminal text Shadow State: The Politics of State Capture, published in July 2018, prominent academics Mark Swilling and Ivor Chipkin (together with others), stated:

“Mabuza is reforming himself before taking a tilt at the ANC presidency in 2027, but it’s worth remembering that he has perfected the system of provincial capture in ways that make the Gupta network look positively amateur. He is now the deputy president of South Africa.”

While many commentators have written off Mabuza’s chances at the ANC elective conference that is now less than two weeks away, it’s also “worth remembering” that he has surprised the pundits at every conference since 2007.

In this context, the opening paragraph of the conclusion to Outa’s criminal complaint should also be quoted:

“The only explanation that exists for the above conduct of the organs of state and their former employees is that they had been repurposed to serve and protect corrupt interests in the land claims, wildlife and agricultural sectors.” DM/OBP

[Richprins]

[Lisbeth]

Fred Daniel vs outgoing Deputy President: Senior counsel, NPA prosecutor named in ‘framing’ allegations


From left: Advocate Dawie Joubert. (Image: Supplied) | Conservationist Fred Daniel. (Photo: Supplied) | Outgoing Deputy President David Mabuza. (Photo: Gallo Images / Brenton Geach) | Getty Images

By Kevin Bloom | 21 Feb 2023

In an affidavit and WhatsApp messages obtained by Daily Maverick, evidence has emerged that advocate Dawie Joubert, a senior counsel and member of the Bar’s examination board, has been involved in an attempt to frame conservationist Fred Daniel. Together with two suspects named alongside Deputy President David Mabuza in Outa’s recent criminal complaint to the NPA, a senior public prosecutor has been implicated too. The documents suggest that the fraudulent activities of the Mpumalanga Tourism and Parks Agency are ongoing.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
‘[Jan] Muller’s deal that I provide his advocate Dawie Joubert SC with a false affidavit in exchange for immunity from prosecution is in essence a request to frame Mr Daniel.”

So begins the next episode in the ongoing saga that has formed the substance of Daily Maverick’s long-running coverage of the battle between outgoing Deputy President David Mabuza and conservationist Fred Daniel.

The above allegation, which is included in a sworn statement signed on 3 February 2023 by Andre Pienaar, a wildlife capture expert and registered game dealer, is backed up by WhatsApp texts in the possession of Daily Maverick.

Implicated in Pienaar’s statement are two men who appeared as suspects alongside Mabuza in the explosive criminal complaint lodged by the Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse (Outa) on 5 December 2022.

The two men, Jan Muller and Juan de Beer, were named as the thirteenth and fourteenth suspects in Outa’s complaint, a 41-page affidavit submitted under the Prevention of Organised Crime Act, in which Daily Maverick’s reporting (as per the wording of the affidavit itself) played a pivotal role.

As readers may recall, Muller is a former senior manager and De Beer a current senior manager in the Wildlife Protection Services (WPS) division of the Mpumalanga Tourism and Parks Agency (MTPA).

According to the evidence submitted by Outa to the Investigating Directorate of the National Prosecuting Authority — and initially covered by Daily Maverick in the first and second parts of our “Dead Matter” series — both men, consistently and over a number of years, acted in breach of the Public Finance Management Act by repurposing the WPS’ Problem Animal Fund.

“The Problem Animal Fund enterprise exploited the province’s biodiversity by monetising the killing of so-called problem animals,” Outa’s complaint noted.

“This was done by selling hunting permits to the highest bidder.”

But aside from Muller and De Beer, there are another two individuals implicated in the alleged attempt to frame Daniel, who, by any account, elevate the accusations to a much more serious level.

As suggested in Pienaar’s affidavit, Dawie Joubert SC, who acts as counsel for the defendants in Daniel’s civil claim against the government, and advocate Ansie Venter, a senior prosecutor in the Middelburg office of the NPA, were also involved.

So what is at the core of these allegations and where does the story start?

For that, we need to rely on the facts and evidence as outlined in Pienaar’s testimony.

In the opening paragraphs, Pienaar provides the name and address of his company, Parawild Edu-Capture in Hoedspruit, which is easily confirmed by information in the public domain. Equally confirmable is Pienaar’s assertion that he has operated the business for 30 years and has “lectured worldwide” on the subject of wildlife capture.

His credentials thus established, Pienaar goes on to explain that he first met Daniel between the years 1998 and 2008, when the latter was still in operational control of his Mpumalanga-based private nature reserve, Nkomazi Wilderness.

“I provided the Project with professional services during this time,” Pienaar testifies. “Parawild was specifically involved with a disease-free buffalo project at the Nkomazi Wilderness.”

Next, Pienaar notes that he “never delivered any crocodiles and/or hippopotamus to Daniel or [Nkomazi Wilderness].”

The last part is important because, as the reader will see, it is with regard to the (non)-delivery of these animals that the alleged attempt to frame Daniel took place. Before he goes there, though, Pienaar “pauses to confirm” that “as a registered game dealer with licence no. MPB 1050/18” it was his responsibility “to obtain the necessary permits to catch and transport animals for delivery to [Nkomazi Wilderness].”

Pienaar then continues:

“It is my experience that it has always been difficult to obtain permits for species of monetary value from the [MTPA]. I have come to accept that the reason for this is that officials of the Agency operate their own business that competes with the private sector they are mandated to serve.”

Again, the evidence that officials of the MTPA — most notably Muller and De Beer — had been engaged in such activities formed a core part of Outa’s criminal complaint, where the allegation was further made that both men committed perjury in the high court (see paragraph 232 of the affidavit).

Not only that, but similar evidence was led in Daniel’s civil trial, where the MTPA’s former CEO, Charles Ndabeni, confirmed in a witness statement that he had conducted an internal investigation which revealed the following (paragraph 36):

“It became apparent that the wildlife permit system had been repurposed from providing a critical service to the private sector, who relied on the system as necessary tools to maintain and protect biodiversity on their land, to a system that thrived on exploiting the province’s biodiversity to keep the [Problem Animal Fund] flush.

“To complicate matters, the law enforcement arm was abused to eliminate any competition for the [Problem Animal Fund] to create a monopoly that controlled the hunting and killing of wild animals, especially lion, elephant and large predators.”

While De Beer’s name was not mentioned in Ndabeni’s witness statement, Muller’s name — as the MTPA senior staffer who “controlled” the fund — was.

Which brings us back to Pienaar’s testimony of 3 February 2023.

“As a registered game dealer,” Pienaar states, “I have experienced first-hand how the PAF business activities of the MTPA WPS compete with the private sector.”

It was due to this first-hand experience, he adds, that he was allegedly targeted by the WPS in his commercial capacity.

“In June 2016,” Pienaar testifies, “the Wildlife Protection Services (WPS) confiscated my Mercedes Benz game truck and opened a criminal complaint against me under AC 321/2016 on 27 June 2016. The truck, a white Mercedes Benz with registration number DGY395L, engine number YES012782B and VIN number ADB65813526015799 was booked into the Whiteriver Police yard under reference number E280. The value of the truck and trailer then was R350,000.00.

“For almost six and a half years, I have tried to resolve the situation with no success. To date, I have also not been formally charged with any offence, except being removed as competition for the PAF.”

Due to the fact that Muller, De Beer, Joubert and Venter chose not to respond to Daily Maverick’s comprehensive list of questions, our attempts to gain clarity on the status of the charges against Pienaar were unsuccessful.

Still, as Pienaar continues in his statement, on Wednesday 10 August, 2022, he was “surprised” to receive a call from Muller on his mobile phone.

“Firstly, my surprise was that Muller is no longer a government official after he boarded himself from the MTPA in 2018. He should, therefore, not be dictating an Organ of State’s affairs. Secondly, Muller’s deal that I provide his advocate Dawie Joubert SC with a false affidavit in exchange for immunity from prosecution is, in essence, a request to frame Mr Daniel.”

And so we come full circle to the quoted allegation at the top of this article.

“Muller informed me that he was standing next to Juan De Beer,” Pienaar testifies, “whom I know as the Manager of Species Protection of the MTPA WPS, and another person, an unnamed senior public prosecutor, which I understood to be Ms. Ansie Venter from Middleburg.

“He asked me if I was prepared to provide a sworn affidavit that I had previously delivered crocodiles and hippos to Daniel’s project without permits.”

Muller, according to Pienaar’s testimony, “wanted the affidavit to prove that Daniel acted outside the law”.

In return, “he said that he was in a position to make a deal with the senior public prosecutor and the South African Police to return my expensive truck and squash all criminal charges”.

Pienaar then testifies that he requested Muller to make “his offer… in writing”.

As a result, he adds, “I immediately received further communications from Muller and De Beer via a string of WhatsApps followed by a phone call from advocate Dawie Joubert SC.”

In the affidavit, Pienaar translates the messages (social media) from the initial Afrikaans into English:

10 August 2022, at 15:17:

MULLER: “Good day, hope you are well there. I want to ask you a question, off the record and not at all for the MTPA. Have you ever offloaded hippos and crocs to Daniel. This is a very confidential question and should not be discussed with anyone else please”.

PIENAAR: I responded at 17:29: “I know nothing.”

MULLER: Responded at 17:43: “Don’t worry.”

Thereafter, Muller forwarded me various WhatsApps that he had received from Juan De Beer:

DE BEER: Forward by Muller: 15:05: “I have a buffalo case still pending against him. His truck stands at the Whiteriver SAP, case has run for years. Yes, I will withdraw, but then no civil claim against SAP over truck. From Juan, speak with you later.”

MULLER: Responded: 15:09: “Total exemption of any charges from your past.”

MULLER: 15:09: “Total.”

MULLER: 15:19: “Will this be OK with you?”

14 August 2022:
I then received additional communications from Muller:

MULLER: 14:24: “Sorry I am disturbing you again. The Adv wants to talk with you, when will it be suitable that he can phone?”

PIENAAR: I responded to Muller: 15:45: “At home in an hour. Reception is bad.”

MULLER: Responded to me: 15:49: 2 x thumbs up.

PIENAAR: Responded to Muller: 17:03: “I am ready.”

MULLER: Responded to me: 17:04: “Ok I am sending your number to Dawie Joubert. He is our senior adv.”

PIENAAR: Responded to Muller: 17:04: 1 x thumbs-up.

MULLER: Responded to Pienaar: 17:08: “He is also on the road; says he will phone you in a half an hour.”

On the same day, Pienaar testifies, he received a call from Joubert. The affidavit confirms that, during this call, Joubert informed Pienaar that he would “use his influence with the senior prosecutor Ms Ansie Venter in Middelburg to ensure that the criminal complaint by De Beer would disappear”.

Pienaar adds that while he was not prepared to frame Daniel, he was “willing to cooperate in an honest and transparent manner”. A few days later, he informed Muller that one of the conditions for his cooperation was “the permit to capture the 15 hippos on the Komati Farms”.

During a face-to-face interview with Daily Maverick in mid-February 2023, Pienaar explained: “I wanted to see how desperate they were. I know these guys. So I decided to put in the hippo story as well.”

Here, Pienaar’s testimony moves in a direction that suggests the fraudulent activities of the WPS are still ongoing.

Backed up by documentary evidence in an annexure to the affidavit, which is also in the possession of Daily Maverick, Pienaar lays out how Erjies Rohm — “a powerful player in the PAF enterprise” — blocked his permit application to capture the hippos in December 2021.

“Rohm also met with my client and used the confidential information in my permit application to solicit the work that I had applied [for],” Pienaar testifies.

“My client initially refused to deal with Rohm and chased him away as they suffered losses over the last ten years. Rohm was only interested to extract an amount of R375,000 (R25,000 per hippo) to profit from the animals. Rohm would then also be free to sell the hippos for more cash to hunters on the basis of the highest bidder.”

When contacted by Daily Maverick to comment on the allegations and the attendant evidence — a series of emails and letters, plus the permit application, that appear to corroborate Pienaar’s testimony — Rohm, like the other four individuals named in the affidavit, chose not to respond.

Finally, Pienaar testifies, on 29 November 2022 he reached out to Daniel himself, to inform him of the full chain of events.

For Daily Maverick, the question was obvious: why did Pienaar wait more than three months to come clean?

“I was waiting for them to respond,” he told us. “They were already putting stuff in writing that was incriminating them, and I wanted more of that. I also thought that they may have been monitoring [Daniel’s] phone, so I just waited.”

As far as Daniel saw it, as serious as Pienaar’s allegations were, they were simply part of a larger pattern. This pattern, he told Pienaar, was not only mirrored in the behaviour of senior counsel for the government defendants during the civil trial — regarding which the judge registered his “disgust” — it was clear in Outa’s criminal complaint too, where Muller and De Beer were accused of “defeating the ends of justice, fraud and perjury”.

By Daily Maverick’s reckoning, Outa’s criminal complaint contained a lot more that reflected the pattern. As just one example, there was the allegation that Mabuza submitted a false affidavit to the Carolina Magistrate’s Court in February 2018, stating that Daniel did not furnish the court with the evidence to justify an interim protection order.

“The purpose of the fraud,” Outa alleged, “was to have the interim protection order dismissed and to obtain a credibility finding against Daniel.”

While the civil trial is still ongoing, at the time of writing, the NPA’s spokesperson had yet to respond to Daily Maverick’s request for comment on the status of Outa’s criminal complaint. DM/OBP