The High Court is expected to shed light on explosive claims suggesting that government’s purchase of Tautona Lodge was a financial sleight of hand to divert public funds to private hands connected to the ruling Botswana Democratic Party (BDP).
The Minister of Presidential Affairs Kabo Morwaeng, The Attorney General Abraham Keetshabe, former Minister of Agriculture Christian de Graaff, former Chairman of Thamaga-Mogoditshane Sub-District, Patrick Manthe and the Public Procurement and Asset Disposal Board (PPADB) have been slapped with writs summons to appear before the High Court to answer for the government’s controversial purchase of the lodge from de Graaff at the cost of P54 million.
All the defendants in the case are members of the BDP except for the Attorney General and the PPADB.
Botswana Congress Party (BCP) President and Leader of Opposition Dumelang Saleshando and BCP Vice President Goretetse Kekgonegile who have filed the court action, claim in their court documents that, “the acquisition of Tautona Lodge constituted a simulated transaction aimed at siphoning funds from the national purse to facilitate those connected to the ruling party.” The duo further stated that the Tautona Lodge farm “was bought at a highly inflated price”, through direct procurement method.
Their court records also suggest that immovable assets including an undisclosed number of cattle and wild animals which formed part of the assets being sold in the Tautona Lodge transaction were diverted to public hands.
It has never been made public that government bought cattle and wild animals along with the Tautona Lodge farm.
Among other things, the two BCP leaders are asking the High Court to issue “a declarator that all movable asets forming the subject of the purported sale vest in the state and should be retrived whereever they are found and in whomsoever they may be found.”
The are also asking for a court order directing de Graaf and the farm manager Patrick Manthe ´to deliver an inventory of all movable assets of Tautona Lodge including cattle and wild animals which at the time of the purported sale constituted part of the assets being sold.”
The also asked the court to issue an order “directing a Deputy Sherrif of the court with the assistance of the police to seize and deliver to the Sheriff all such movable assets as are the property of the State which formed part of the assets being sold in the Tautona Lodge transaction.”
Saleshando and Kekgonegile also want the court to set aside the decision by the Attorney General and/or PPADB “to allow for the transfer of certain movable assets acquired through public funds to be transferred and/or ceded to individuals.”
The BCP leadership state that they have in their possession information detailing how the Office of the President made a request to PPADB for the direct acquisition of Tautona Lodge.
“The said request was approved by the Public Procurement Disposal Board on a date unknown to the Plaintiffs,” the BCP leaders stated. Challenging the direct acquisition of Tautona Lodge which they argue “amount to abuse of power” they pointed out that it fell outside the legislatively sanctioned rationale for direct acquisition.
“There exists no rational justification for the direct acquisition of Tautona Loge in the circumstances of this case other than it being a corrupt practice or an attempt to siphon public funds through a disguised transaction……… there exists no continuing service which Tautona Lodge has rendered to the government and falling within the scope and ambit of the exemption legislatively recognised”, the BCP leaders stated.
They also revealed that Morwaeng and de Graaff have flatly refused to disclose the documents relating to the request for direct acquisition of Tautona Lodge’s entire issued share capital and those forming the basis of the approval for direct acquisition of the lodge.
Saleshando and Kekgonegile argued that government has several farms in the Ghanzi and other parts of Botswana, which are currently unutilised or under-utilised, which could serve the same purpose as the current Tautona Lodge. The BCP leaders want the court to reverse the transactions arguing that they are “unlawful and unconstitutional and moreover were obtained by fraud” on the part of Tautona Lodge and de Graaff by officials of the Botswana Government.
“The impugned transactions are unlawful as contemplated by Corruption and Economic Crime Act, the Penal Code of Botswana and indeed the Public Procurement and Assets Disposal Board Act and as constituting improper or unlawful conduct by employees of any state institution; unlawful expenditure of public money and intentional or negligent loss of public money.”
