Limpopo municipal manager in court

THE CORRUPTION case against Collins Chabane Municipality manager in Limpopo, Tsakani Charlotte Ngobeni, was postponed to July 29 by the Palm Ridge Commercial Crimes Court yesterday.

Ngobeni has been charged for allegedly accepting kickbacks in exchange for illegally investing R120 million of municipal money with the now defunct VBS Mutual Bank, which was in contravention of the Municipal Finance Management Act.

National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) spokesperson Sipho Ngwema said in a statement: “On the next date, the matter will be transferred to the Gauteng High Court, Pretoria. The accused appeared briefly on charges of corruption and contravention of the act.

“It is alleged that in October 2017 Ngobeni deposited R120m that belonged to the municipality into an interest-bearing fixed deposit account at VBS Mutual Bank for a period of three months.

“In May the same year the municipality had approved and adopted an Investment and Cash Management Policy which came into effect on June 2, 2017.

“The policy prohibited the municipality from placing deposits with banks unregistered in terms of the Banks Act. The municipality was, therefore, not allowed to invest with VBS because it was not registered under the Banks Act,” added Ngwema.

Ngobeni has also been charged with corruption, for allegedly accepting a Range Rover worth about R1.4m from Kabelo Matsepe, a director of Moshate Investment Group and former prominent member of the ANC Youth League in Limpopo.

Matsepe and 13 others, including Limpopo ANC treasurer Danny Msiza, collectively face 188 counts of racketeering, corruption, fraud, theft and money laundering in connection with the VBS corruption scandal.

VBS collapsed in 2018 after the brazen looting of R2.3 billion by a group who included the mutual bank’s executives, politicians and municipal officials.

They had funnelled the savings and investments of the municipalities and poor people of Vhembe in Limpopo into their personal bank accounts between 2015 and 2018.

The NPA further alleges that on October 28 to 30, 2017, a few days after Ngobeni deposited the municipal money into VBS, she received R51 196 for accommodation, meals, beverages, spa treatments and spa products purchased at the Fairlawns Boutique Hotel and Spa in Morningside from a Moshate FNB account, which belonged to Matsepe.

Around January 30, 2018, Matsepe purchased a Tag Heuer women’s wristwatch at Arthur Kaplan in Mall of Africa worth R28 500, which was also paid for from the Matsepe FNB account, and she gave the wristwatch to Ngobeni in Polokwane on January 30, 2018.

VBS has since failed to repay the deposit of the R120m and other municipalities, mostly in Limpopo.

In March this year the NPA formally indicted the 13, while Ngobeni was charged separately.

According to the indictment, Matsepe was a middleman between municipal officials and Msiza, whose alleged role was to intervene and secure VBS deposits from municipalities.

Matsepe was allegedly paid millions for his efforts. It is alleged that more than R16m was paid to his company, Moshate, into his personal bank account, to distribute to mysterious beneficiaries that allegedly included Ngobeni.

The trial of Matsepe, Msiza and 12 others is expected to start in September and is expected to last for six months.