CHARLES MOLELE
ANC veteran and businessman Tokyo Sexwale’s claims that billions of rands from the ‘mysterious’ Heritage Fund were stolen are simply not true, and pointed to a common scam, according to the South African Reserve Bank and National Treasury.
The central bank and national treasury released a joint statement on Monday following Sexwale’s allegations that billions of rands meant for freed education, health and COVID-19 relief were ‘pilfered’.
Sexwale made the startling allegations during an interview with eNCA on Sunday night.
“National Treasury and the SARB have previously received correspondence from Mr Sexwale and many others that alleges that billions of rands have been stolen from a fund that has been referred to as the ‘White Spiritual Boy Trust’ and which was set up by a foreign donor,” the joint statement by SARB and National Treasury stated.
“It is further alleged that there are trillions of dollars in the said fund and that, inter alia, a certain Mr Goodwin Erin Webb was its mandated representative in South Africa. On investigation, the SARB can confirm that it had no record of the existence of the said fund and it had advised Mr Sexwale in writing that, given the SARB’s experience and knowledge of this and other similar matters, it could only conclude that the alleged fund was a scam. It should be noted that Mr Sexwale is not the first prominent person acting on behalf of a Mr Webb or an unknown donor, for such funds, and such requests can be traced to many years before 2016.”
The joint statement added: “If Mr Sexwale believes otherwise, the onus is on him and his unknown sponsor to provide independent written proof of the existence and/or transfer of such funds, as well as certified copies of actual identification and citizenship of such ‘donors’, in line with the normal FICA-type anti-money laundering requirements. Allegations of theft of non-existent funds have no validity.”
During an interview with eNCA, Sexwale confirmed that ‘billions’ from the Heritage Fund were stolen.
“Yes, I am part of two people who are in charge of the Heritage Fund that belongs to a very powerful family out there in the world. This fund is here in South Africa already. It comes through the South African Reserve Bank. I am part of two people that are mandate holders for that fund. The fund is able to help the students with free education in this country. [Jacob] Zuma knew about the fund in 2016. Cyril [Ramaphosa] knew about the fund at that time,” said Sexwale.
Sexwale said the fund had offered billions of rands to assist with efforts to fight the impact of COVID as well as the historic debt of university students.
“This fund is there, but in the process of making sure it’s brought into the economy, we have found some resistance, and when we checked the resistance, we found that part of this money has been stolen,” said Sexwale.
He added that the matter had been urgently raised with Minister of Finance Tito Mboweni and his predecessor, as well as former President Jacon Zuma and President Cyril Ramaphosa.
“All I’m saying is that somewhere along the way we discovered that this donor fund has been pilfered. So it’s like storage of bread, we are in charge of that. We are supposed to get the key. If we open we will discover that a lot of this bread has been eaten by rats. Rats which I have crossed inside this office, people who are malfeasant, big names, big people, who have lied to this nation. It’s a police matter right now because something has happened inside there.”
Sexwale said Zuma knew about this fund back in 2016 when he announced free higher education. He said the current president, Cyril Ramaphosa, is also aware of the fund.
“This is why Zuma spoke about free education – not government money. I believe that Zuma believed that right now we would have this fund. The fund can help with all these things the [former] president spoke about,” he said.
In 2017, Zuma announced free higher education for students from poor and working-class homes during ANC’s elective conference at NASREC.
At the time, he said the move will affect 90% of South African households.
He said the programme will start in 2018 and will be phased in over the next five years and committed to increase subsidies to universities from 0.68% to 1% of the GDP over the next five years.
At the time, Zuma said the National Student Financial Aid Scheme (NSFAS) packages already allocated to existing NSFAS students in their further years of study will be converted from loans to 100% grants effective immediately.
Mboweni tweeted on Monday that Sexwale’s claims were “sad” and “untrue”.
Mr Tokyo Sexwale’s statement about stolen money is untrue, sad and seems that he was a victim of the many scams abound. You cannot steal transmitted money from the central bank. How? His statement on television was unfortunate. Will reach out to him,” said Mboweni.
- Inside Politics
