Fivce (5) suspects in court over R140 million land sale

NORTH WEST – The Molopo Magistrates’ Court postponed the case against Lekitlane Mutsi (65), Brian Moholo (66), Tshiamo Moholo (34), Johannes Petrus Van Der Merwe (44) and Barbara Christiane Van Der Merwe (47) to 08 December 2023 for the arrest of the remaining suspects. Lekitlane was granted R150 000 bail as he appeared before the same court yesterday. The other four handed themselves to the Hawks on Wednesday, 25 October 2023 and Brian Moholo was granted R150 000 bail. Tshiamo Moholo is out on R50 000 bail, Johannes Van Der Merwe R50 000 and Barbara Christiene Van Der Merwe R20 000.

Their case is linked to that of Henny Smit (70), the former Municipality Manager of Mahikeng Local Municipality who is also out on R150 000 bail after he was arrested on Tuesday, 10 October 2023 by members of the Hawks’ Serious Corruption Investigation and Serious Commercial Crime Investigation Units. Their arrest and court appearance related to the unlawful sale of municipal land to the value of R144 million without council approval and further ignoring the competitive bidding process.

It is alleged that on 31 October 2007, Smit illegally agreed with a company for the sale of land belonging to the municipality. The said company only paid R5 million as a deposit to purchase the land. Investigations reveal that the company went into liquidation in December 2011 without paying the municipality the outstanding debt. The assets of this company were subsequently sold to another company for an amount of R16 million at an auction.

In April 2012, the new owners of the land changed their company name, and between 2013 and 2015 they sold and transferred portions of the land to five other companies and a trust account. Investigations by the Hawks revealed that directors and shareholders of these companies had links to the company that was liquidated and they acted in common interest in illegally making gains from the municipal land that was acquired irregularly.

It was further revealed that the company that bought the land from the auction entered into an unlawful agreement with the Social Housing Regulatory Authority (SHRA) to build 2400 units at the value of over R301 million. An amount of R54 million was allegedly authorised by the North West Department of Human Settlement for the start of the project.

This contract however failed to materialise, as it was not budgeted for by SHRA. Investigations also revealed that an amount of over R550 000, was paid as gratification to Brian Moholo and it was further traced to a purchase of a house for his daughter, Bontle Moholo. This money was paid through a trust whose trustees are Johannes and Barbara Van Der Merwe.

The charges drawn from this alleged offence are fraud, theft, Contravention of the Municipal Finance Management Act (MFMA), four of the Prevention and Combating of Corruption Activities Act (PRECCA), two of corruption, money laundering, Contravention of the Public Finance Management Act (PMFA) about the loss by the Human Settlement department. More arrests are expected to be effected in this case, and investigations are completed.

Pic 1. Barbara Van Der Merwe
Pic 2. Lekitlane Mutsi
Pic 3. Brian Moholo
Pic 4. Johannes Van Der Merwe
Pic 5. Tshiamo Moholo