Floyd Shivambu’s brother quietly pays back R4.55m, admits he received the VBS money gratuitously

Brian Shivambu’s attorneys insisted on a secrecy clause before their client signed an “acknowledgement of debt” for R4.55-million in favour of Vele Investments, the majority shareholder in VBS Mutual Bank, during Vele’s insolvency inquiry.

Vele and VBS, along with other related companies, created a single criminal enterprise under the stewardship of bank chairman Tshifhiwa Matodzi with the goal of stealing from the bank’s depositors and laundering proceeds to participants in the scam, which amounted to about R2.7-billion.

In the acknowledgement of debt contract, signed on 23 March 2020, Shivambu admits that “there is no underlying basis for the payment of R4,550,000 and accordingly the amount of R4,550,000 must be repaid to Vele Investments”.

With this, Shivambu admits to having received millions of rands for doing nothing.

His acknowledgement of debt belies years of denial and attempts to legitimise the money flowing from three VBS-linked companies, of which Vele was one, through his company Sgameka Projects right into the front companies and pockets of his brother Floyd Shivambu and Julius Malema. A part of the VBS-loot also funded the EFF.



The acknowledgement of debt between Vele and Shivambu’s Sgameka Projects slots into Vele’s liquidation and insolvency inquiry in which curator Richard Pollock is attempting to recoup stolen money owed to Vele and, by implication, the VBS Mutual Bank depositors.

The amount of R4.55-million Vele claimed back is a slice of the R16.1-million which VBS investigators, advocate Terry Motau and Werksmans, found Shivambu had received “gratuitously”.

Shivambu confirms in the same contract:

“Sgameka hereby agrees and acknowledges that the amount, nature, cause, calculation and enforceability of the indebtedness is not disputed.”



 

and:





Shivambu’s admission of no work done in exchange for R4.55-million in VBS loot goes a long way in supporting the findings in Scorpio’s two-year investigation, in that:

a) Shivambu was the veneer of legitimacy for his brother Floyd, the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) and its leader, Julius Malema. He utilised little of the money for his own needs;

b) Sgameka funnelled millions of rands and benefits which Floyd, Malema and the EFF spent on property, a Soweto restaurant, their children and family, luxury cars, luxury clothing, holidays, groceries and the EFF’s fourth birthday bash in Umlazi; and

c) Bank chairman Matodzi, who stands accused of having orchestrated the fraud at VBS, utilised the EFF’s political power in exchange for money. Matodzi described the Sgameka Projects bank account as “extremely strategic” and the money dumped into it as “lobbying fees”.

Scorpio’s findings are based on reams of bank statements, documents, WhatsApp messages and eyewitness accounts. Malema, the brothers Shivambu and the EFF have threatened to launch legal challenges, but didn’t walk the talk.

(The EFF leaders have also, at the very least, encouraged a massive social media disinformation campaign, replete with threats against the Scorpio reporter, and have also “banned” Daily Maverick, Scorpio and amaBhungane from reporting on their public events. They have not, however, gone the legal route, for obvious reasons. — Editor)

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