Leaked report exposes abuse of lottery income paid out to minstrel team

Leaked report exposes abuse of lottery income paid out to minstrel team

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Minstrels perform in Athlone on two January 2017. Archive Picture: Ashraf Hendricks

A report by attorneys Dabishi Nthambeleni right into a R27.3-million grant by the Countrywide Lotteries Fee for the Cape Town Minstrel Carnival Association (CTMCA) for your minstrels museum has found no evidence that a museum ever existed.
The investigators identified that the CTMCA didn't utilize the R5-million allocated to acquire or produce a museum.
Additionally they discovered that the CTMCA only purchased land worthy of R1.seven-million, not R5-million as allotted.
They observed the CTMCA used cash in the Lottery to buy workshop tools from considered one of its own directors, Richard “Pot” Stemmet.
A leaked forensic report reveals how millions of rand granted to the Cape Town Minstrel Carnival Association (CTMCA) via the National Lotteries Fee (NLC) to setup a museum to celebrate the city’s prosperous minstrel history went astray. The museum was never developed.

The small print of the abuse of an incredible number of rands of Lottery resources for the museum that in no way was are discovered in an investigative report commissioned from the NLC in 2021.

The museum grant was Section of over R64-million in Lottery money allotted to the CTMCA involving 2003 and 2017.

The initial A part of the investigation, by law agency Dabishi Nthambeleni, was executed between September 2020 and January 2021 and focused on a R27.3-million grant to your CTMCA in 2014, which incorporated funding to the museum. The authorised spending budget with the museum was over R12.8-million, with R5-million of that allocated for any building to house the museum.

Study the report (PDF, 7MB)

The NLC tasked Dabishi Nthambeleni to research the purchase of the setting up with the museum and if the museum “essentially existed”.

The organization was also instructed to investigate

the purchase with Lottery funds of two cars – a 60-seater bus and also a 23-seater bus – for R2.4-million; and
many machines “ordered with the producing from the costumes and hats” for the minstrels carnival, for R5.4-million.
At the time, convicted felony Richard “Pot” Stemmet was director in the CTMCA. He was appointed a director of the CTMCA in September 1996. He resigned in December 2016 but his spouse Zainonesa and daughter Raziah ongoing as two of various directors with the organisation. Stemmet was reappointed being a director in Could 2021.

The investigation adopted considerable reporting by GroundUp about the a lot of rands of Lottery funding allotted towards the CTMCA (see listed here, listed here and right here) and the best way the money likely served finance the ANC’s 2014 election marketing campaign while in the Western Cape, led by at time by Marius Fransman.



The constructing on the appropriate was the intended web site in the minstrels’ museum, in the middle of an industrial space in Primrose Park, Cape City. Photo: Raymond Joseph

In reaction to some Parliamentary dilemma, former NLC Commissioner Thabang Mampane stated grants to three CTMCA “initiatives” - including the museum - among 2012 and 2015. All a few assignments were done, she informed MPs.

Although the investigators discovered no evidence that a museum experienced at any time existed.

In the beginning the museum was due to open in rented premises in Crete Road, Wetton. A photo obtained by GroundUp in the supposed Wetton museum exhibits a coffee shop with a few musical devices and minstrel costumes and collages of photos haphazardly hung on the partitions, as well as a product ship on its plinth in the corner.

In its report, Dabishi Nthambeleni stated it had been “not ready” to verify if a museum experienced ever operated from these premises.

Stemmet told the investigators the museum were moved simply because they could not find the money for the rent of R100,000 a month. He said the CTMCA experienced acquired home for R1.seven-million in Schaapkraal to the museum, but couldn't get it rezoned, and had been marketed for the same price. Schaapkraal is in a very peri-city location much from the city.

Therefore, the museum had been moved to a fresh place in Primrose Park in February 2021, Stemmet informed the Dabishi Nthambeleni investigators. But following visiting the premises, that are within an industrial region, the investigators said they doubted whether or not an appropriate museum existed there. Photographs attached to the report exhibit a mishmash of randomly displayed uniforms, musical instruments and diverse minstrel paraphernalia nailed to the wall, shown on tables and unfold out on the ground, without any clarification.

“There's a minimum level of products for the museum [that] by no means characterize the much more than a hundred-calendar year background of your Cape Town Carnival, the investigators claimed, including that there was “no signage exterior the premises indicating which they housed a museum and … normally, the museum will not seem to be open to the general public.”

The CTMCA experienced breached the grant settlement, Dabishi Nthambeleni noted, by relocating The placement of your museum to an alternative location with no notifying the NLC.



The Schaapkraal house, on which no museum was at any time created. Photo: Raymond Joseph

Buses
Stemmet told the investigators the CTMCA experienced to maneuver from your rented Crete Road premises because it experienced run up a R4-million debt with town of Cape Town and was frightened its tools could be connected.

“Mainly because of the legal battles along with the debts, the organisation had to move its residence from five Crete Road to steer clear of the sheriff from attaching the home in the organisation,” Stemmet explained to the investigators.

Sedrick Soeker, the current director in the CTMCA, explained to them that the two buses bought with lottery money ended up saved in the mystery site “hidden in the Sheriff”. Though the investigators said they were not able to verify that any buses had at any time been acquired.

Stemmet also confirmed the buses were hidden to prevent them becoming seized. But when the investigators requested to be taken to your place the place the buses were being saved, he advised them that “the operator of the secret area was not accessible to open the premises for us”.

“The CTMCA could not give evidence of payment for 2 motor vehicles that it allegedly obtained with grant revenue,” the investigators noted.

Soeker also informed them the Schaapkraal property were marketed due to the financial debt.

“Mr Soeker explained that In accordance with his knowing, because of the financial debt owed to the town of Cape City, the CTMCA made the decision It will be very best to offer their [Schaapkraal] property … and also to also to hide the property of your CTMCA to avoid the sheriff from attaching the home.”

JP Smith, Cape Town’s mayco member for security and safety, has Formerly informed GroundUp that the CTMCA “threw cash away” on litigation with the City.

“Each year like clockwork, as we method the end of your calendar year, the CTMCA picks a authorized battle with town, above permits or something else. We by no means initiate it. They keep throwing dollars away on vexatious litigation which they shed and possess charges awarded against them. This is often totally self-inflicted,” he reported.

Soeker informed the Dabishi Nthambeleni investigators that the main part gamers on problems with Lottery funding have been Stemmet and previous CTMCA board member Kevin Momberg, “who were in charge of the many admin, funds and functioning ltpbet the CTMCA.” The investigators explained they had been not able to Get hold of Momberg.

Hats
During their “investigation in loco” in the Primrose Park premises, the investigators “discovered many equipment, some in superior affliction, some in terrible ailment plus some that appeared rusty and very previous”. Stemmet told the investigators that there was also an off-web page storage facility exactly where “devices plus some machinery” ended up stored.

“We requested him to take us to the facility but he was evasive to our request.”

Dependant on photographs and invoices in GroundUp’s possession, some, if not all, on the merchandise look like gear that was illegally removed from the CTMCA’s earlier premises. Stemmet is experiencing prices for this elimination.

Based on the ultimate progress report submitted to the NLC by the CTMCA, the equipment was acquired from Martin-Conne Milliners, a business through which Stemmet, his wife and his daughter had been directors at some time.

The investigators uncovered this “alarming”.

“With the CIPC research of Martin-Conne Milliners as well as invoices submitted, we Take note the subsequent alarming obtaining: Mr Stemmet himself can be a director of Martin-Conne Milliners. The registered deal with of the organization is five Crete Road, Wetton, Cape Town, exactly the same handle on which the museum was intended to be created and/or transformed,” they reported.

An audit by accountants Kopano Integrated, hooked up towards the investigative report, recorded the CTMCA was in the process of getting “machinery, plant and stock” valued at R8.1-million from Stalph 164 CC, buying and selling as Martin-Conne Milliners. Staph 164 was a close corporation of which Stemmet was among the directors.

In keeping with Dabishi Nthambeleni, the company has paid R1.two-million as a deposit, that means R6.nine-million remains to be owed, even though there's no payment day set for when this needs to be paid out.

The Kopano audit and also the near hyperlink in between the businesses “reveal to us that there's ‘foul play’ associated with the acquisition from the machinery in the museum workshop”, the investigators claimed in the report.

“We find that it is extremely probable that CTMCA employed the funding in the NLC to ‘refund’ considered one of its most important administrators for that residence at the next overpriced amount than the particular price tag and value of the home and/or machinery.”

Tips
Dabishi Nthambeleni concluded that it absolutely was unable to ascertain how the grant to your CTMCA had been spent.

“In point of fact, a detailed report on how the funding of your NLC was utilised, would be difficult because the CTMCA does not have any receipts, or evidence of payments to substantiate the amounts invested on Each individual item it requested funding for. The interim report and last report in the CTMCA only attach invoices,” Dabishi Nthambeleni concluded.

The investigators identified the NLC had not conducted a website pay a visit to ahead of approving the grant. But this was not standard observe at some time plus they identified no proof of negligence by NLC workers.

At some time, the NLC’s policies did not have to have funded organisations to submit evidence of payment with interim reviews, they identified. This meant the CTMCA was capable of get a next tranche of funding without needing to provide proof that it had applied the very first tranche for its meant function.

Next the appointment of a brand new board, commissioner and senior executive group, the NLC has tightened up on these together with other challenges.

Dabishi Nthambeleni recommended that

the NLC drop any upcoming funding purposes with the CTMCA;
the CTMCA and any customers who have been involved in the grant be subjected into the NLC’s “delinquency” course of action;
the NLC open a prison situation of fraud with SAPS or the Hawks for allegations of fraud; and
the NLC start off the process of recovering the misappropriated cash.
But, as opposed to act over the report’s recommendations, the NLC – underneath its previous administration – chose to suppress it, since it experienced done Together with the former reports into corruption it had commissioned.

GroundUp sent inquiries to Stemmet and Soeker through SMS, and asked for e mail addresses to mail the queries by e mail far too. But no reaction had been acquired at time of publication.



The minstrel “museum” in Crete Road, Wetton. Photo: Raymond Joseph