Business Maverick

Scorpio

Brian Shivambu must pay back part of the VBS money

Brian Shivambu, in his personal capacity, must pay back R1.78m owed to VBS Mutual Bank, the South Gauteng High Court found earlier this month. That is after Shivambu, through his attorneys, paid R1m at court and conceded an order for the balance of an accrued R2.78m. The order relates to a R4m VBS business loan to Shivambu for a wine bar and restaurant in Soweto, and includes interest as well as costs on attorney-client scale.

Brian Shivambu is indebted to the curators of VBS Mutual Bank because he signed surety for a R4-million business loan in December 2017 in order to start a wine bar in Vilakazi Street, Soweto.

VBS managed to pay R2.1-million towards the wine bar before the bank was put under curatorship in 2018, after being robbed into insolvency.

The South Gauteng High Court delivered an order on 6 August 2019 favouring liquidator Anoosh Rooplal’s request for full repayment of the loan, plus interest and cost.

Court Order – Brian Shivambu

While at court on 5 August, Shivambu, brother of EFF deputy president Floyd Shivambu, conceded to being indebted and effected a R1-million electronic payment through his attorneys on the day, Rooplal’s spokesperson said. He further conceded an order for the balance – an additional R1.78-million – despite previously indicating that he would oppose Rooplal’s request.

The liquidator argued before the court that Brian was indebted for R2.78-million plus interest at the agreed rate of prime plus 500 basis points calculated from 24 January 2019, as well as legal costs on the scale of attorney and client.

The claim arises from Brian’s “obligations for having stood surety for the debts of Sgameka Projects” to VBS Mutual Bank, Rooplal said in his affidavit before the court.

Suretyship for Sgameka Loan Issued Notice of Motion (Brian Answer Shivambu)

Brian bound himself, jointly and severally, as surety for and co-principal debtor, jointly and severally, with Sgameka Projects in favour of VBS.

Brian Shivambu is the frontman and slush fund operator for illegal VBS money flowing towards his brother Floyd Shivambu, Julius Malema and the political party they head, the Economic Freedom Fighters.

VBS money was illegally siphoned through various VBS-linked companies and dumped into a company he ostensibly “owns”, named Sgameka Projects.

Sgameka Projects was a slush fund used to funnel money to the EFF, as well as two companies named Grand Azania and Mahuna Investments. These were front companies funding the lifestyle of deputy president of the EFF Floyd Shivambu and president of the EFF Julius Malema.

The R4-million VBS business loan was granted to Sgameka Projects under questionable circumstances, such as that Brian did not qualify for a loan and may have committed fraud in order to acquire the loan.

In quintessential VBS-style, no repercussions were meted out towards this delinquent client.

Note to readers: This is how the R4-million business loan to Brian’s Sgameka Projects fit into the total of R16,1-million in VBS loot adv. Terry Motau and law firm Werksmans traced to Brian Shivambu.

 

Court documents in the current dispute confirm Scorpio’s investigative piece published in April 2019 which found that neither Brian nor Sgameka Projects serviced the loan according to the agreement.

In his affidavit before court Rooplal confirmed that Sgameka “failed to make payment of monthly instalments… resulting in the accrual of significant arrears due”.

Neither Sgameka Projects nor Brian met the liquidator’s subsequent demands to pay the arrears account, which resulted in these legal proceedings.

The loan seems to have been irregular from the start, Scorpio revealed in April 2019.

Brian did not qualify for a R4-million business loan.

To circumvent this problem, Brian (on behalf of Sgameka) ceded an investment account professedly containing R4-million to VBS bank in order to borrow against it.

Except, sources could find no trace of the R4-million.

The investment account seemingly exists, but neither Sgameka nor any other entity has paid the promised R4-million into the investment account, bank statements show.

This may well amount to fraud. This matter should be investigated and aired during criminal court proceedings. The Hawks have been investigating the VBS robbery of R1.89-billion by 53 people and entities since October 2018. No arrests have been forthcoming since. DM

Gallery

Please peer review 3 community comments before your comment can be posted

X

This article is free to read.

Sign up for free or sign in to continue reading.

Unlike our competitors, we don’t force you to pay to read the news but we do need your email address to make your experience better.


Nearly there! Create a password to finish signing up with us:

Please enter your password or get a sign in link if you’ve forgotten

Open Sesame! Thanks for signing up.

We would like our readers to start paying for Daily Maverick...

…but we are not going to force you to. Over 10 million users come to us each month for the news. We have not put it behind a paywall because the truth should not be a luxury.

Instead we ask our readers who can afford to contribute, even a small amount each month, to do so.

If you appreciate it and want to see us keep going then please consider contributing whatever you can.

Support Daily Maverick→
Payment options

Become a Maverick Insider

This could have been a paywall

On another site this would have been a paywall. Maverick Insider keeps our content free for all.

Become an Insider

Every seed of hope will one day sprout.

South African citizens throughout the country are standing up for our human rights. Stay informed, connected and inspired by our weekly FREE Maverick Citizen newsletter.