A case for a forensic audit on procurement expenditure and land acquisition

Kgosietsile Ngakaagae | Friday February 15, 2019 12:03

I will then close my practice, in the interest of national service to go and help you investigate and prosecute the thugs. Anything short of that will be an exercise in futility. What we are presently having is some cheap distraction at Bakang Seretse and Kenneth Kerekang’s expense. Regrettably, Seretse sells and the media are so fixated on monetising the case they cannot see past the Directorate on Corruption and Economic Crime (DCEC) and Directorate of Public Prosecutions (DPP) ruse.

Just so we are clear, the whole government system has been, and still is a cesspool of corruption. Don’t be lied to, Botswana compares favourably to Nigeria in terms of looting by businesses and their partners in crime, the ruling elite.  I am really hoping to hear what Business Botswana’s position is on the situation at hand as regards the runaway corruption. I am not accusing them. I may have missed their take.

The most corrupt office has been the Office of the President (OP) itself. Truly, a fish rots from the head. A good fraction of its functionaries, since inherited by the Masisi administration are nothing but incorrigible thugs. These are turncoat economic hitmen who used to do corrupt bidding for their masters and would not miss out on the looting fest.  Detractors would be quick to say that mine is a case of sour grapes because I am defending accused clients. They will be partially right. Who wants to have their client used for PR gimmicks and as scapegoats for rampant corruption. Bank of Botswana are missing P5 billion. Hello! Who is being prosecuted for that? On the public narrative, you’d think Bakang raided BoB vaults and looted the bank. No. The thugs are still at the OP and in the ministries. Some are out in the countryside enjoying coitus against the order of nature and hammering half century single malt whiskies. P5 billion is still unaccounted for and the DCEC are ranting about Seretse’s house and hyping some fictitious theft of P250 million. Batswana are being distracted from the missing P5 billion and where all the other billions went all thanks to the DCEC and the their spin-doctors.

And by the way, the ministerial functionaries at lower levels have not been outdone.  Late last year, I had to obtain an injunction against a rigged tender where my clients’ tender bid was decimated by ministerial tender committee functionaries in order to disqualify it. They had preferred some other people that they had hoped to give the tender to. A ministerial employee would tell me in confidence that there had in fact been rigging and that the functionaries had not expected our swift and unequivocal response. When they realised we were ready to take them to the cleaners, they backed down. My client’s bid was reinstated after a corrupt disqualification. By the way, it had nothing to do with Seretse. Yet, all the DCEC peddle, is that Seretse bought a Maserati and a Rolls Royce Phantom as if it is a crime to do so. People own several aircraft in this country. Half of Phakalane is liable to asset forfeiture. And I know people who have Porches and Ferraris parked side by side in their garages genuinely acquired. You can google a second hand Rolls Royce any day and buy it online for the price of your Range Rover.

The DCEC itself is a corrupt entity. They blow a gasket and turn blue when I say this but they are corrupt and I won’t stop saying this. The DCEC are bound together with the DPP by a kindred spirit of corruption and cowardice. A frustrated DCEC agent once said to me, “We long sent the file of the minister to the DPP for prosecution. E ntswe ka marago”. He was preaching to the converted. Some DPP functionaries have told me that dockets bounce from table to table because no one wants to take responsibility for them. When the middle management, who are supposed to be the spade-workers for these high profile cases see the files coming, they run in the opposite direction? Who wants to deal with stuff that the big bosses don’t want to take responsibility for? Who covers the poor lawyers when they are exposed to conceited political wrath and backlashes? When I was a prosecutor, we were able to venture deep into the woods because we knew that our bosses had our backs. The bosses are now afraid. I am reliably told that some dockets at the DCEC have been decimated, with exhibits missing. These two organisations have to be reformed. The cheap, Seretse public relations stunts must end and we must get to the meat. There can never be justice until we know where the P5 billion has gone. Fengyue gobbled up P1 billion and never produced a wineglass. We are simply told that P600 million in capital outlay for e-governance just went missing. Where’s the audit trail? Money doesn’t just vanish like a promiscuous lover on Valentine’s Day.  Who does it lead to? By the way Seretse has nothing to do with the millions that have been stolen through the fraudulent plastic levy and the prison fence.