South Africa: NPA Asset Forfeiture Unit Seizes R165m Assets From World Cup Accommodation Corruption Accused

The National Prosecuting Authority Asset Forfeiture Unit (NPA AFU) has obtained an order to seize assets worth some R165 million from at least nine accused in a fraud, corruption, forgery, bribery and money laundering case.

NPA Investigating Directorate spokesperson, Sindisiwe Seboka, said the seizure was executed on Monday morning in and around Durban.

"The order of over R165 million is the amount of the proceeds of unlawful activities received by the enterprise, and the individual parties in furtherance of the conspiracy and/or common purpose and/or the commissioning of the crimes," she said.

The matter is related to procurement by the South African Police Service (SAPS) for the 2010 FIFA World Cup held in the country.

The accused are:

  • KwaZulu Natal Former Provincial Commissioner Lieutenant-General Mmamonnye Ngobeni

  • Businessman Thoshan Panday

  • Former Section Head of Acquisition in Supply Chain Management (SCM) in KZN Colonel Navin Madhoe

  • Captain Ashwin Narainpershad formerly of SCM KZN

  • Arvenda Panday

  • Privisha Panday

  • Seevesh Maharaj Ishwarkumar

  • Kajal Ishwarkumar

  • Tasleem Rahiman

"The state alleges that the three former SAPS officials failed to follow the prescripts of the Public Finance Management Act, by amongst others, deliberately delaying applications for procurement authority from the National Office for accommodation for the 2010 SWC and deliberately not following up on invitations they had sent to existing service providers (who charged reasonable rates).

"[This caused] the need to procure accommodation for SAPS members for the 2010 SWC on an urgent basis and at inflated rates, a mere couple of days before the 2010 SWC was due to start.

"Their intentional delay in procuring accommodation well in advance of the 2010 SWC, led to an urgent deviation from normal procurement processes which had to be processed in haste by the National Office," Seboka said.

She added that as a result, Thoshan Panday's company, Goldcoast Trading, received at least 80% of the accommodation order and "charged SAPS rates which were much higher than other service providers".

"Panday misrepresented that Goldcoast had secured block bookings in 2008 for the 2010 SWC, which was false. Panday then had to place police members in venues, paid them a low rate and claimed inflated rates from SAPS.

"In addition, Goldcoast and four other entities associated with him through family member ownership, received orders approved by Madhoe and Narainpershad for miscellaneous goods required by SAPS members for the 2010 Soccer World Cup, through fraud including cover quoting and forgery," she said.

Seboka said that it is the NPA's contention that Panday is the "mastermind of the criminal enterprise".

"By the end of 2009 he managed to get control of Public Order Policing Unit: Operational Response Service (ORS) deployment accommodation contracts with the help of Madhoe and Narainpershad in KZN SCM by deceiving the official who usually did procurement for ORS members to be deployed.

"The curator has frozen the bank accounts of all the parties cited and execution of the order has taken place today. The return date of the provisional order is 29 May 2023. Furthermore, the success of obtaining the order is largely assisted by Hawks investigators situated within the ID," she said.

This article originally appeared on SAnews.gov.za

Photo: SAnews.gov.za

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