Monday, November 6, 2017

South Africa shows why collaboration is key to tackling global crime networks




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South African President Jacob Zuma. Mounting allegations of corruption at home are having international repercussions.
Reuters/Mark Schiefelbein

Lord Peter Hain tabled a series of allegations in the UK’s House of Lords relating to the possible role of British banks in alleged money laundering and illicit financial transactions centred around South Africa’s President Jacob Zuma and the Gupta family. The Conversation Africa’s Charles Leonard asked him to explain why he took the step. Hain, who was a vocal anti-apartheid activist, was born in South Africa but grew up in the UK. He is a visiting adjunct professor at the University of the Witwatersrand’s Business School.

In the House of Lords you said the illicit transactions were “part of a flagrant robbery of South African taxpayers”. What do you mean by this?

As I explained in my speech, the Guptas, a family from India that relocated to South African have, with the connivance of the South African Presidency, been getting government contracts and allegedly thereby robbing taxpayers of billions.

On regular visits to South Africa – most recently last month – I have been stunned by the systemic transnational financial network facilitated by the Guptas and the presidential family, the Zumas. If there had been more proactive and genuine cooperation between the multi-jurisdictional law enforcement agencies – and within and between the banks, which have been moving money for the alleged Gupta/Zuma laundering network – the devastation wrought on South Africa could have been significantly reduced. And perhaps, the financial institutions involved would have been better able to mitigate their exposure.

So does it point to South Africans benefiting from the illicit transactions?

I had delivered by hand to Philip Hammond, the Chancellor of the Exchequer, printouts of transactions, and named a British bank concerned. I asked that he again refers these to the UK’s Serious Fraud Office, the National Crime Agency and the Financial Conduct Authority for investigation.

This information allegedly shows illegal transfers of funds from South Africa made by the Gupta family over the last few years from their South African accounts to accounts held in Dubai and Hong Kong. Many of the transactions are legitimate. But many certainly are not.

The illicit transactions were flagged internally in the bank concerned as suspicious. But I am reliably informed that the bank was told by the UK headquarters to ignore it. That is an iniquitous breach of legal banking practice in the UK, which I trust ministers would never countenance. It is also an incitement to money laundering. This has self-evidently occurred in this case, sanctioned by a British bank, as part of the flagrant robbery of South African taxpayers. They have lost millions of pounds and many billions of their local currency, the rand.

Was there a specific event that triggered your request to the Chancellor?

I was asked by senior African National Congress figures and stalwarts to do this. My relationships with them go back more than half a century when we stood shoulder to shoulder fighting apartheid.

As before, my latest information has been supplied by South African whistle-blowers deep inside the system who are disgusted by the corruption at the heart of the state.

What do you hope to achieve?

There are disturbing questions around the complicity – witting or unwitting – of UK global financial institutions in the Gupta/Zuma transnational network. There are also disturbing questions about these institutions’ wilful blindness to the reality that the laundering process often necessitates financial systems with lax regulation and controls. Unless we urgently find ways to leverage our respective capabilities to coordinate and influence action between the law enforcement and banking sectors we cannot win this battle. This coordination needs to happen domestically here in the UK as well as globally.

Unless we use the opportunity to crack down meaningfully, those who want to break the law will always be one step ahead. We must therefore get the international authorities to close down any money laundering networks.

As someone who fought against apartheid, how do you feel about having to take up a campaign against the country’s democratically elected government?

Having been active along with my brave parents in the anti-apartheid struggle it’s painful for me to witness corruption within a monopoly capital elite around Zuma’s family and their close associates the Gupta brothers.

But we should look closer to home, here in the UK. The complicity of our financial institutions in this, as well as the responsibility of law enforcers and regulators in all the concerned jurisdictions, should make government ministers and parliamentarians hang their heads in shame. Just as they were complicit in sustaining apartheid, so today they are complicit in sustaining the corrupt power elite in South Africa which is now betraying the legacy of Nelson Mandela and the anti-apartheid struggle.

The ConversationWinning the war against financial crime will require coordination, influence, action and accountability between multi-jurisdictional law enforcement agencies. The success of criminal networks also relies on the action or inaction – and cooperation or non-cooperation – of the relevant law enforcement authorities.

Peter Hain, Visiting Adjunct Professor at Wits Business School, University of the Witwatersrand

This article was originally published on The Conversation.

REMOVE THE MAFIAS AND THEIR BOSS ENSCONCED IN THE UNION BUILDING AND NOT THE BOOK.




MEDIA STATEMENT 
05/11/2017
REMOVE THE MAFIAS AND THEIR BOSS ENSCONCED IN THE UNION BUILDING AND NOT THE BOOK.
The Congress of the People (COPE) condemns in the strongest terms the actions and behaviour by SARS to intimidate Jacques Pauw and the publishers of ‘The President’s Keepers’ and the right-wing apartheid-style and fascist threat of the State Security Agency (SSA) to stop the distribution of the book, and the exposure of what is clearly the uncomfortable truth.
The book is clearly in the public interest and of great public importance given the evidence and confirmation presented of the most gross and treasonous abuse of power by Jacob Zuma and his bandits.
What SARS and SSA ought to be doing is to launch an urgent investigation into the breathtaking and brazen criminality which the book exposes and not to harass and intimidate those who act in the best interests of the nation. By now they should be launching searches and seizures at the premises of the tax dodgers, smugglers, crooks and criminals including raiding the Nkandla bunker as well as the Union Building which is used to ensconce the Mafia boss. Their shameless conduct serves to prove that their purpose of law enforcement without fear or favour has long left them and is replaced by stampede to save the Mafia boss. They will fail because they attempt to swim against the forceful tide of the mass rejection of Jacob Zuma's evils.
COPE calls upon all South Africans to stand up for the truth; in solidarity with Pauw, his Publishers and the distributors; for the democratic right to a free press; and against the actions of Zuma’s government and the ANC. During the dying days of the authoritarian apartheid regime they attempted to do the same but they were defeated. Let's act together again to defeat the forces of darkness.
Issued by: Pakes Dikgetsi
COPE National Chairperson

Sunday, November 5, 2017

Johannesburg's inner city: the Dubai of southern Africa, but all below the radar




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Johannesburg has become a regional retail hub with cross border shopping activity running into billions.
Mark Lewis



Over the last 20 years Johannesburg has become an intense wholesale and retail centre for local hawkers and for traders from all over sub-Saharan Africa. Billions of rand worth of fast fashion is sold annually in the traditional central business district and in 20 large Chinese shopping malls west of the inner city.

It is a vast, booming, low-end globalised trade that has transformed space and pioneered a retail phenomenon in the inner city for the sale of cheap clothing, shoes, household wares and accessories. Informal estimates based on bus passenger numbers and spending reported in the survey suggest that cross border shoppers are spending over R10 billion each year in Johannesburg’s CBD.

A new study into cross-border shopping in the inner city maps the shops and the goods sold. Researchers did detailed interviews with 300 retailers and 400 cross border shoppers as well as hotel managers and bus operators that service the flow of shoppers who travel to Johannesburg from countries including Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Malawi, Lesotho, Swaziland and Zambia.

The survey gave the first concrete insights into a vast trading web that operates in the cash economy and below the radar of formalised planning regulation. Yet it is an economy yielding four times the annual turnover of an average regional sized shopping mall.

The extent of the trade isn’t really known. And the scale of cross border shopping is widely disputed in City offices and among property investors. But the survey shows that the city of Johannesburg should acknowledge that its inner city has developed into the shopping hub of sub-Saharan Africa. Some retailers have dubbed it the Dubai of South Africa. That ambition – that it be a global retail centre – should be embraced in economic strategy and in physical plans to upgrade the area.

Hive of unreported activity


The research focuses on 53 city blocks within the Johannesburg CBD anchored by more than 3000 shops. These are streets that bustle with street traders, ground level shopping alleys and high rise shopping centres. The shopping zone is close to rail, bus and taxi infrastructure. It is also served by cross border bus depots and hotels.

The shopping hub is intense with throngs of pedestrians and determined shoppers crowding the streets on any given day. Buildings that have outlived their usefulness as office space and medical suites have been appropriated and converted at a rapid rate – primarily by migrant Ethiopian traders - to shopping centres hosting thousands of cupboard sized shops.

This activity has developed over two decades. It started as a quiet encroachment of space in the mid-1990s when Ethiopian survivalist entrepreneurs, who had fled their country to seek political asylum in South Africa, rented space in almost empty office towers. The space grew first incrementally and then in rapid bursts to become a burgeoning economic enclave created through the dramatic occupation and subdivision of space.

Based on the interviews, we calculated that the annual profit takings in the city blocks we surveyed amounts to close to R7 billion profit every year. But this is likely to be a major underestimate.

The sample survey indicates that about 70% of the shoppers contributing to these profits are cross border shoppers. Each shopper is spending an average of R14 364 on goods per shopping trip. In addition R3 497 is spent on other services including transport.

A large number of bus companies is linked to the trade. On one day 51 bus companies were operating from 19 sites. In that same week, a moderate shopping season of the year (mid August), 465 buses carrying up to 60 passengers - many of these being shoppers - left Johannesburg to neighbouring countries.

Johannesburg as a violent city


But retailers and shoppers face enormous risks. The dependence on cash poses a big risk in an area rife with crime and corruption and where law enforcement agencies appear to be complicit in illegal activities.

Over 60% of retailers interviewed said they had been physically attacked or assaulted. And 38% had regularly “gifted” police officers.

For shoppers the risk is also extreme. A third of shoppers interviewed had been exposed to violent crime. They travel in groups and hide their money. They depend heavily on the security and storage facilities of hotels and bus depots for safety.

These levels of crime are a major break on Johannesburg’s ability to maximise the benefits of these shopping trips. Shoppers are spending an average of 2.5 days on each trip. But they spend comparatively little on accommodation and almost nothing on entertainment. And they are too fearful to spend more time in Johannesburg than their shopping requires.

Most said they didn’t use city restaurants, preferring to lock themselves in their hotel rooms in the early evening. And retailers said they would like extended shopping hours but they close shops around 5pm because of safety concerns.

Untapped potential


Cross border shoppers are international visitors to Johannesburg. Their visits increase the demand for services, products and good infrastructure – all of which attract jobs and investment in the inner city. They require and inspire new investment in buildings, maintenance, entertainment services, transportation services and accommodation establishments. They transform buildings and environments. And they attract and support new cultural enclaves and diversity.

Shoppers and retailers say they would like to increase their investment in shopping in the inner city, there are signs of renewed interest from property investors and a number of new shopping centres have been developed in recent years.

The ConversationBut this potential will go untapped unless the city changes its attitude and tackles the risks in the area. Crime – particularly crime committed by law enforcement officers – must be curbed. By recognising and celebrating this sub-Saharan African shopping hub Johannesburg can take full advantage of the benefits of being the region’s shopping hub. In turn that could lead to Johannesburg becoming the host of choice for shoppers and retailers in this international trade.

Dr. Tanya Zack, Visiting senior lecturer, University of the Witwatersrand

This article was originally published on The Conversation.

Tuesday, October 31, 2017

Stop killing farmers, demand protesters

“We spend millions of rands on security instead of growing food for the nation”

By Tariro Washinyira
30 October 2017

Photo of protesters
Demonstrators against farm murders gathered near Green Point Stadium. Photo: Ashraf Hendricks
Thousands of people, many of them farmers, drove in convoy to Cape Town on Monday, eventually gathering at the Green Point stadium, to protest against farm murders. For much of the morning and afternoon the N1 into Cape Town moved at a snail’s pace.

“I want these killings to stop. I do not want any woman to suffer the way I did … My children are heartbroken,” said Marlene Conradie, widow of murdered farmer Joubert Conradie of Uitkyk farm in Klapmuts.

“We are ordinary people who grow grapes, peaches and olives,” she said. Marlene and her two children, Hannes (15) and Jane (11), were marching in Monday’s protest, titled “Genoeg is genoeg, enough is enough”.

AfriForum says: “Since 1 January 2017, at least 341 farm attacks have been committed, during which at least 70 people have been murdered. This means that during 2017 so far, there has already been more farm murders than the total amount of farm murders during 2016.”

According to Africa Check “police’s statistics differ” from those previously supplied by AfriForum. There are also other figures given by the Transvaal Agricultural Union. There are reasons for the differences based on methodology and also the definition of famer and farm or rural smallholding. It is extremely difficult to verify or determine how many farm owners have been killed on farms and also what the statistics are for farm workers living on farms.

Marlene Conradie and her 15 year old son Hannes console each other. Marlene’s husband Joubert Conradie was murdered on their farm in Klapmuts last week.
The protesters wore black regalia and held placards with: “Stop killing farmers”, “In memory of murdered farmers” and “No farmer no food”. GroundUp saw just one person with a small old South African flag on their T-shirt.

A dairy farmer and wheat producer, Thys Swart Swellendam of Grootvadersbosch Landgoed, told GroundUp: “We provide jobs for many farm workers and for each farmer that is killed, it means job losses and farms are ruined, and the secondary industry as well, because we produce raw materials for factories and other industries.”

He said farm workers are also attacked sometimes and their families are in danger. “We spent millions of rands just on security. That keeps us busy instead of growing food for the nation. With drought in the Western Cape, it is difficult because besides buying stock for animals we must also spend on security. Police, who should be providing security, are not doing that. Farmers are dependent on themselves and their neighbours.”

Some are however critical of the farmers. Colette Solomon, Director of Women on Farms Project (WFP) told GroundUp: “Women on farms do not feel safe from the farmers. They experience verbal, physical, sexual abuse and intimidation. Their tenure and housing rights are frequently violated but when they report to the police, police don’t take action. As a result most of them do not report abuse.”

Protesters hold hands and pray. Photo: Ashraf Hendricks


Published originally on GroundUp .

Saturday, October 28, 2017

OUTRAGE IN SOUTH AFRICA: White Boy Drowned in Boiling Water While Mother Raped, Both Killed

 The following story is  a reminder about the horrific situation white people, especially farmers endure. Torture, rape, brutality and it has not stopped.  Farmers, white people remain oppressed in South Africa.

A 12-year-old white boy was drowned in a bath of boiling water by black robbers who raped his mother before killing both his parents in a violent house robbery.


Three blacks broke into the family’s home in Walkerville, Johannesburg, where they assaulted and shot dead Tony Viana, 53, and brutally raped and killed his wife, Geraldine. They then tied up and gagged the sobbing boy, Amaro, and pushed him into a bath of boiling hot water to drown him, ‘because he would be able to identify them’.
The family’s gardener, Patrick Petrus Radebe, 24, their domestic servant’s son, Sipho Mbele, 21, pleaded guilty to three charges of murder and one charge of rape each, reported The Telegraph. David Motaung, 20, pleaded guilty on Tuesday to robbery charges.
According to the accused, “we mutually raped Geraldine Viana.” Sipho Mbele raped her first while Petrus Radebe helped to restrain her by standing on her face. Afterwards Radebe raped her too. The white family’s dog apparently barked tremendously during the burglary. The animal was killed by disembowelment.
They then left the South African court and walked back their cells laughing, according to Beeld newspaper. As the death penalty was abolished in South Africa, they will probably get lengthy prison sentences but could be out on parole within five to ten years.
Now there have been 70.000+ murdered total South African Whites in the unreported genocide since the end of Apartheid. Is this the “saint” Nelson Mandela’s “rainbow nation”? Source
In August this year, the Democratic Alliance posted the following -

How many farm murders will be enough for government to take action?

The recent wave of farm murders across the country must see swift and effective action from the ANC government.
Yet our government has continuously failed to put into action already set up plans for rural safety that will mean that farm workers and farmers no longer have to be subjected to torture, murder or the fear of falling victim to brutal attacks.
The DA wishes to convey its condolences to the families of those who have been killed in these attacks.
The Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on Police, Mr Francois Beukman, has the power to make the Minister of Police, Fikile Mbalula, explain the continued failure to protect farming communities.
The DA will therefore write to request that Mr. Beukman summon Minister Mbalula to urgently explain and to commit to keeping South Africans safe by implementing the rural safety plans.
We will also conduct oversight visits to measure the extent to which police stations are equipped to deal with violence in rural communities.
The government needs to prioritise the safety of farming communities as workers and farmers have a right to be protected from violent attacks.
Our citizens in rural communities should not live in fear while their leaders turn a blind eye to farm attacks.  Source
 At the end of the day, the white minority remains oppressed and under constant attack.  Its time for world leaders to recognize the severity of the situation.