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Transnet’s former interim CFO Anoj Singh. (Photo: Gallo Images / Foto24 / Lerato Maduna) | Atul Gupta. (Photo: Gallo Images / Financial Mail / Robert Tshabalala) | Brian Molefe, former CEO of Eskom. (Photo: Gallo Images / City Press / Lucky Nxumalo)
Finally, Transnet and the Special Investigation Unit are asking the high court to annul the locomotive contracts worth 54 billion rand, the most expensive known to have been affected by state capture.
Transnet and the Special Investigation Unit (SIU) eventually petitioned the high court to cancel the contracts of the state logistics company for the acquisition of 1,064 locomotives, the scene of the largest known looting of the Guptas.
Transnet, then headed by CEO Brian Molefe and CFO Anoj Singh, both Gupta associates, awarded the contracts, worth approximately R 54 billion, to OEMs General Electric, Bombardier Transportation, China South Rail (CSR) and China North Rail. (CNR) in 2014.
Transnet and the SIU said in a statement that their documents, filed Tuesday, March 9, 2021, show that the hiring “was based on a flawed market demand strategy … and that laws, government instructions and the Transnet’s policy were deliberately ignored in conducting the tender. ” awards, enter into contracts and make payment to some of the [manufacturers]. “
They said that manufacturers “had no right to benefit from the locomotive supply agreements that were awarded to them in an irregular and illegal manner, and even less so when the [manufacturers] they behaved in the same way that CSR and CNR did ”.
amaBhungane and Scorpio #GuptaLeaks: Guptas and associates get R5.3bn in locomotive bribes
Echoing the expositions of amaBhungane and its #GuptaLeaks partners since 2017, Transnet and SIU referred to the bribery deals with Hong Kong-based Gupta against Regiments Asia and Tequesta Group.
“It is argued that given the nature of the bribery agreements entered into by CSR’s and CNR’s parent company, they cannot claim to be innocent.”
Our report has shown that the two Chinese manufacturers entered into contracts to pay the Guptas and their associates R9 billion in bribes over R42 billion from Transnet contracts. These comprised most of the 1,064 acquisitions and other orders for locomotives. By the end of 2016, the Gupta fronts had already received R3.7 billion.
Since then, CSR and CNR have merged to form CRRC Corporation, the world’s largest supplier of rail equipment. It is listed in Hong Kong and Shanghai with the Chinese state as the majority shareholder.
Transnet and the SIU also asserted that General Electric and Bombardier could not “claim that they did not know or could not have reasonably known that the procurement process and subsequent contracts were irregular and illegal.”
The legal action has been long delayed. Transnet said in a December 2019 statement that it “would approach the court to declare illegal and void the four locomotive contracts.” However, after that, a new address was appointed and it appears that Transnet returned to the legal drawing board.
Transnet and SIU said their request “is long. The founding affidavit is over 800 pages long and the attachments span many toggle arch files. The application is based on the extraction and analysis of more than 29 million documents ”.
In December, the SA Revenue Service convinced the high court to freeze R2.8 billion in local CRRC accounts, after a previous one South African Reserve Bank Freeze. DM
