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Mailbox: Hey Gwede, here’s some tips for your Zupta investigations

From Biznews community member Daniel Sutherland:

If you are a South African, the Zuptas are making money out of you. Just a friendly reminder that the Zuptas are making money out of YOUR pocket. If you are a taxpayer, even a poor person, the Zuptas are taking from you.

The interest of the Zuma family is the interest of the Gupta family. They have a mutually beneficial and symbiotic relationship. Duduzane Zuma is the channel through which the Zuma family is making money out of Gupta business operations through his shareholding and directorships of Gupta companies like Tegeta, Mabengela and VR Lazer.

They have become one single entity that latched onto the people of South Africa like a leech, sucking in billions in profits annually. And like a true leech, they don’t do anything to deserve that billions, they just open their mouths, and the people of South Africa provide the billions. One single entity sucking us dry. That is the Zuptas.

Here is what I am talking about: Eskom gave the Guptas R43m for breakfast meetings that the Gupta Age newspaper host. An additional R12m in the previous cycle.

The Guptas, and remember the Zumas are partners through Duduzane, are selling coal to Eskom from the Brakfontein mine at BEE prices.That is R480 a tonne of coal as opposed to the R180 a tonne of coal for other suppliers. At the time that the Brakfontein mine of Tegeta, a Zupta company, landed a R400m annual contract with Eskom, they did not even have a water licence.

Now Eskom strong-armed Glencore out of business, making their Optimum coal mine unprofitable, and in steps the Zuptas to take the Optimum coal mine over, with the help of the Guptas rented minister, the mining minister Zwane, who flew to Zurich to clinch the deal for the Zuptas, Next thing we know is Eskom ends the 40 year contract that Exxaro had to supply the Arnot power plant, and in steps Tegeta and the Optimum mine, taken over by the Zuptas, as new suppliers to the Arnot plant.

Talking about the Gupta Age newspaper. It is totally unproftable, and is only kept alive by government departments and the SAA that buys it in bulk.

Only the Northern Cape provincial government alone spends R500 000 a month buying the Gupta Age. I talked about the Guptas rented minister, Zwane. He was the MEC for agriculture in the Free State when he provided at least a R150m of taxpayer money and a free farm for the Gupta’s Estina dairy project at Vrede in the Free State.

Nothing came of it, the cows started to die and the project was abandoned. Duduzane Zuma and the son of Ace Magashule were partners in this project. Now we start with VR Lazer, involved in the R50bn Transnet locomotive tender. This was really a case study in corruption and insider trading. The Mail and Guardian reported on this.

Duduzane Zuma and Rajesj Gupta buys VR Lazer shortly before Transnet awards the tender for new locomotives to 4 consortiums. VR Lazer is a steel cutting company.

All 4 successful consortiums, 2 of them Chinese, pays VR Lazer a visit shortly before the 4 successful consortiums are announced. What is more is that Iqbal Sharma, the chairperson of the Transnet bid adjudication committee, also invested himself in VR Lazer shortly before Sharma himself announced the 4 bid winners.

Then there is the listing of Shiva uranium on the JSE. Shiva is a Gupta mining company, and as always Duduzane has his share there.

According to an M&G investigation, the Industrial Development Corporation accepted overvalued shares in exchange for money that was owed to the IDC by Shiva. This resulted in an estimated R100m gain for Shiva, and a loss for the IDC. A loss for the IDC means they have R100m less to do development work.

With all this already known, the Zuptas just captured Denel. It was reported in Friday’s M&G that VR Lazer will acquire a 49% stake in Denel Asia, which means they will get 49% profit of all Denel sales in the East, although they wont be making the products and wont be adding value.It is a classic third party middleman deal to leech on to money that they did not earn. The Zuptas are also selling Sahara computers to the state.

The Zuptas just acquired 10% of the export rights at the Richards Bay coal terminal.

* For more in-depth business news, visit biznews.com or simply sign up for the daily newsletter.


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