In August 2016, while based in London, I spent some productive hours with a global oil trader who unpacked the complexities around SA’s Oilgate scandal. Our discussions resulted in the publication of an interview which laid out how South Africa’s 10m-barrel strategic oil reserve had been sold at below the market’s 11-year-low at a time when prices were rising – costing the country north of $100m.
Also read: The Editor’s Desk: Oilgate & SARS – how SA’s getting its own back
On Friday, Mr Justice Owen Rogers (above) handed down his 166-page judgement on the long-awaited civil court case heard in the Western Cape High Court during September and October. In it he details the actions of corrupt attorney-turned-SEO boss Sibusiso Gamede. This crooked fellow took just six months from being made the Strategic Fuel Fund’s legal counsel to taking over as CEO which enabled a fraud of gargantuan proportions.
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Within days of becoming ‘acting’ CEO of the SFF in an industry he knew little about, Gamede convinced then SA Minister of Energy, Tina Joemat-Pettersson, to approve his scam. The motivation behind his ‘oil rotation’ scheme was to line his own pockets and those of his Nigerian partners-in-crime. A crude scheme, it delivered an $18m profit to a Nigerian company that immediately sold its scammed oil to Glencore; the other leg was delivering an immediate $22.5m profit to Nigerian oil trading firm Talaveras.
Also read:Â Oilgate: Glencore and Co will lose R4.5bn if SA Govt gets deal reversed
The Judge generously affords the crooked CEO benefit of the doubt on large cash deposits into his account via casino ATMs (‘it is possible Gamede was a gambler depositing his winnings’). But nails him on four other payments totalling $100 000 which ‘can on the papers found to have been bribes’. The only mystery for anyone reading the judgement is how Gamede isn’t in jail. Or, indeed, what possessed the ANC to appoint Joemat-Pettersson to a position carrying such responsibility. If you thought education was expensive, try ignorance.
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* At noon today, it’s my monthly BizNews Share portfolio update. Only for Premium subscribers. Register here: https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/707564726897634829
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* Yesterday’s Rational Radio webinar enjoyed rave reviews from the 400-odd attendees. The Great Covid-19 Debate between Alan Whiteside and Nick Hudson certainly lived up to expectations, highlighted by the fac that there was a lot more that they agreed on than disagreed. If you missed the live event, the recording is here:Â https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2loaj-x0a3c
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